Evening in the Garden Quilts

Adventures in Fabric Art

Monthly Archives: May 2013


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It Up Friday: Projects for Boston and Everywhere

Project%20HopeThis week I have two finishes, both sewn with thoughts of hope and peace for this troubled world in which we live.  I’m very pleased with the way my Project Hope Online Quilt Show contribution turned out.  We all know how hard it can be to translate a vision into fabric reality, but mine came very close.  I puttered around and put it off, but now that it’s finally finished, I like it.  See all the Project Hope quilts on Flickr.

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On the day that I mentally committed to joining this project, the background fabric presented itself to me.  I opened the door to my fabric closet, and out tumbled a little, beribboned pack of fat quarters that I could not remember seeing before.  I mean, a sign is a sign, right?

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Me:  When were we in Grantsville, MD?

DH:  Two years ago on the way to the Buffet concert.  There was a bridge…  We ate lunch there.

Me:  And there was a quilt shop there?

DH:  Yes!  In an old school building.

So then, yes, I did finally remember Four Seasons Stitchery and the little bundle of batiks I bought there.

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I sprayed bleach to create the ray of sunlight.  Then I fused fabrics down to create the flowers, and use various threads to “paint” them.  There is also a chalk pencil involved for some of the white shading.  I quilted the sunbeam with iridescent Sulky mylar thread, the “Hope” with Sulky white rayon and the iridescent, and the background with Superior poly monofilament.  The stamens are French knots.

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Enjoy the binding on this piece, because I will probably never do it again.  Fiddly!!

My flowers are charred and gray on the outside, but are opening in the ray of light to reveal their beautiful, hopeful interior.  Nature is always renewing itself, in spite of setbacks.  The binding is my reference to Jacquie’s work (Tall Grass Prairie Studio) here and here.  Her work is graphic and cathartic, but not very hopeful to me (these particular pieces).  So, my binding is blood red, but it does open to admit the sunlight.

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Also finished is my flag for To Boston With Love.  See others at their page on Flickr.

I’m linking up with Finish It Up Friday on Crazy Mom Quilts.


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Design Wall Monday: Boston

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I got on board with this late, but I decided to send a flag to Boston for the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild’s initiative, To Boston With Love.   I don’t belong to a guild, and their project was aimed mainly at guilds sending in bunches of these flags, but individuals can participate.  I didn’t really understand the concept when it first came around, but now I think it will be a spectacular sight, and I’d like to contribute.  I really wish I had gotten in gear earlier, because I would have coordinated a group effort from our “Twilter” group of quilters on Twitter, and sent those in as a group.  Anyway.

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Yes, that’s a reject piece from my fabric bleaching.  I don’t have it arranged correctly yet, but I think it will make a fine background for my rainbow heart.  And, yes, that’s a strip of orange “Fairy Frost” in there.  You can’t get more cheerful than that.  This will only take me a few minutes when I sit down and get serious about it.  Lots of color for a little time.

 

I’m linking up with Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times.


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Sunday Stash Report: 5/5/13

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Lots of fabric pulled out, piled up, and all over the design wall, but only one small finish this week.  That’s okay.  My numbers are good.  I’m especially pleased to be finding uses for some long-time Stash Dogs.  Those “what was I thinking?” pieces, or fabrics that are pretty/striking/interesting by themselves, but don’t go with anything else.  Or that looked different online.  Making some progress on those.  I find that if I leave them out, or at least at the top of their baskets, then they are more likely to occur to me when I need something.

Dog!

Dog!

This week:  +0 yards,  -3.5 yards

YTD:  +50.5 yards,  -123.5 yards

Net Stash Used in 2013:  -73 yards

How about you?  Are you using it up to make way for new, pretty fabric?

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Cat!

I’m linking up with Sunday Stash Report at Patchwork Times.


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Finish It Up Friday: Flower to go with Elephant

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This little quilt with the floral fabric and flower and leaf quilting took very little time to make.  This was great and sad, because I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of making this, especially the lucious colors, and I wanted to keep gazing at it forever.

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Don’t you love these spontaneous little quilts where you just pull fabric madly from your stash, cut with abandon (partly because it’s such a small project), and have it mostly pieced  before you have time to second-guess yourself?  These are my favorites.  It also felt good to work on something small after the queen quilt.

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When I made Elephant, I was throwing some stash fabrics together to put a bright, boy’s quilt in my shop, but I decided to keep it.  While I worked on other projects, I kept my eyes open for more feminine stash fabrics that might do for the girl’s quilt.  My first grouping was too pink and floral, though I still want to use those fabrics together soon (for one thing, they’re still grouped in a basket under my cutting table…).  When I found this aqua print, I knew I had a companion quilt that would coordinate with Elephant without being matchy matchy or sickly sweet.

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The cabins are Kona Salmon, Coffee, and Azure, with a green Grunge.  The solids aren’t dead matches to the print, but they work.  The sashing is an off-white grunge.  Every block has a quilted flower in the center (Sulky white rayon), and the sashing is quilted with leafy vines.  I know, leaves again, but I love to quilt them almost as much as feathers.

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My twin great niece and nephew aren’t due till August, but these little quilts just happened and they feel right.

Of course, my studio is a mess because all the pulled fabric is still out (but I did cut up and put away all the scraps!), plus I have a pile of orphan blocks I want to use on the back of the new scrap quilt I’ve started, plus someone contacted me about making a baseball baby quilt, so that fabric is out…  It looks…creative!

I’m linking up to Finish It Up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts.  Go there to see lots of finishes!

 

 


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View From My Studio 5/2/13

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This is my view today as I sew.  Really, it’s behind me as I sew, throwing natural light over my shoulder into the fabric.  I see this dogwood when I swivel around to press or check Twitter.  Can you see my nesting friend, Mrs. Dove?

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Here she is.  She is like a Japanese taupe quilt, isn’t she?  She’s much less conspicuous than Robin, and she likes to sit with her head drawn back into her chest, behind the branch.  She’s been there for three days, continuously as far as I can tell.  She gets up and shifts around, but I haven’t seen her leave or eat.  Mr. Dove has not been around since he helped her helped her fix the place up.  Figures.  So we’ll keep each other company.  It’s a beautiful day here to nest or to sew.  I hope you’re having a good day, too.

Of course, all of us are sending positive thoughts to Libby Lehman for her complete recovery.

(Really, SpellCheck, you don’t know “taupe”??  Really?)

I’m linking up with Really Random Thursday at Live a Colorful Life.

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WIP Wednesday

WIP Wed

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Happy May!  I’ve begun a scrap quilt to have ready for donation (my pink and gray one went to West, TX, #19 here).  I started with this beautiful piece of Japanese (I think) dobby weave fabric in blue, navy, and taupe, with a silver thread.  While this was not a scrap (half yard), it is a piece I have had a long time without being able to use.  I wouldn’t exactly call it loosely woven, but the dobby texture makes it stretch like crazy.  I tried starch, but it didn’t seem to help.  It really stretched too much to fussy cut the pieces one by one, so lined everything up the best I could and cut it into 6 1/2″ strips, and then 6 1/2″ squares after some more adjustment.  Cutting four layers actually seemed to help the fabric stick to itself and cut better.  Also, it helped when I used my revolving cutting board.  I can’t think what that’s called- the one like a lazy susan.

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I pulled blue, cream, and orange scraps in 2 1/2″ and 3 1/2″ squares to sew into 6″ blocks to alternate with the textured fabric.  I like the way the shading in this fabric makes it look like tubes.

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Here are a couple layouts with the blocks I’ve made so far.  Do you like one better than the other?

 

 

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The Project Hope quilt is progressing.  I’ve cut and fused fabrics to the background, and I’m waiting for the mood to strike me to shade them with pens and thread.  Today I just wanted to sew stuff together.

I’m linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.