Quilt

This would really qualify for the Mother/Daughter challenge too. I don't work in neutrals very often-love lots of color

. The leaves are sheers with the green ones dimensional-something I haven't done is quite a while. It's 16" by 23". The colors are somewhere between the entire photo and the detail. It's machine quilted.

Quilt

 In S. California I did marbling with another woman, and we sold the clothes I made. There were always scraps of rayon and silk left as well as some of the unknown fiber pieces I'd drop on the 2 meter bath we used.

Finally, I managed to do a quilt top from some of the pieces. The pale green is hand dyed cotton; the blue commercial fabric.

We did non-traditional patterns, had lots of fun and learned a lot about color. Everything needed that shot of lime to perk it up.

It was hard work but a great experience.

Quilt

Here's the latest quilt top I made. The rust is a commercial solid cotton. The rest are batiks-do love batiks. I designed the block with 4 rotating to make the larger block. Each small block is 5".

quilt

Here's another quilt I finished and will donate. The part I enjoy is making the pieces-no point in just storing tons of them here. It's a freeform Drunkard's path type block done in all hand dyes except for the black.

 It's machine quilted in the diagonal rows of color doing double lines along each edge using a color similar to the background.

Fiberactions

The theme this time was Nature's colors. This is not the first one I started, but when I saw the sun, I knew it was the one I would do. The fabrics are denim and upholstery samples and machine quilted. Blue will always be a color I think of when I think of nature: water, sky, bluebirds. bluebells.

The details show my version of the sun. It is made with molding paste through a stencil and was sitting around the studio for ages. The electric blue is made entirely of hand stitched French Knots. The background is a strip pieced samples I had and painted over, because I didn't like the colors.

 

The button at the right takes you to the Fiberactions blog. The quilt is a small one about 20" by 22".

Quilt

Here is another quilt that I'll donate. The violet and the red I hand dyed. The painted fabric was given to me by a friend who made it for a long ago birthday. The block is one I play with a lot and designed on Electric Quilt.

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Quilt

This was an experiment done all in hand dyed fabrics. It's 40 by 50" more or less. I wanted to do a piece with an assortment of block sizes. This will probably go to the nursing home as I don't have anything else to do with it.

 

 

Quilt

Here's another quilt for the nursing home. It's about 40 by 50" and has batiks and hand dyed fabrics.  Some people ask why we are giving quilts away. Our families have plenty of quilts-most we never see once we give them. These people really appreciate the gift and send us sweet Thank you notes. What better way to pass on things.

Quilt

Years ago in California I took a class in doing pieced baskets. The top sat around all that time. I'm not a traditional quilter but decided to finish it for the nursing home. Someone will enjoy it. Most of the fabrics are commercial, but one is hand painted. It's about35" by 50".

Quilt

This was an exercise I did using 3 sizes of Squares. Most of the fabrics are batiks, but there are also hand dyed and hand painted ones in it. I use whatever meets the color story. It's about 40" square and went to the nursing home.

Fiberactions quilt

This time for the Fiberactions-link at right-challenge, we were to use at least 10 colors.  Years ago with a partner I had a business marbling fabric for garments to sell in galleries. We marbled rayon and silk mostly. The rayon scraps are in this quilt. I put iron on interfacing behind them then stripped them together rather randomly. When the challenge was posted, these seemed to be a good starting point. I added the vertical bands of blue cotton. The diagonal ones were already in the strips.

The quilting is by machine and rather basic, since the fabric themselves are so busy.

Quilt

Here's the detail of an experiment I tried. I decided to use a Batik and then arrange and couch a satin cord on it to create a scene for the glass cabochon I'd done. The cord was whimpy, so I hand embroidered the chain stitch on each side. Once I'd stitched on the cab and added beads around it, it wasn't important enough, so the lines of beads came next.

It just wanted simple quilting and borders. Now blogger wants me to load photos from Picasa, so I have to move them there before putting them on my blog. Of course, it's sideways! Oh well, life's too short to worry about these things.

Quilt

I'm using up scraps again. I call this one tropical because of the colors. The print was from about 30 years ago bought on a trip to Florida-never throw anything away. Evidentally, it will find a home. The piece is about 20" by 30" and is machine quilted.

Quilt

Having done a small hanging of Jake, I couldn't leave out Mike-our new baby. It was challenging working on both with my husband around. I kept folding them in half and have since steamed them, so there isn't a line across the middle.

This is so normal for Mike--tearing something apart. That used to be a tennis ball. He's bigger now too and turning into a love.

Quilt

My husband said he couldn't remember Jake except as an old dog, and it bothered him. This was the first one he'd been home all the time to bond with. For his birthday last week, I took a mid life photo of Jake, printed it on treated fabric, and made a small wall hanging. It really touched him.


You can treat your own fabric for printing, but I just use the types I can find at the store. They come in about 4 fabric types and as single sheets or in a roll. I found that I never did it when I had to treat the fabric.

Quilt

Here's the latest quilt I've done. The piecing parts were left over and in my stash. It's about 24" by 40" All fabrics are cottons-some hand dyed, some commercial. It's machine quilted.

Quilt

I had this top sewn since one of the Nancy Crow retreats years ago. It is a motif I was working with but looked so blank that I didn't finish it.

Hand stitching with Perle Cotton and Embroidery Floss seemed to be the answer. Most of the thread are ones I dyed or painted.

Here's another detail.

I'm much happier with it now and want to continue this idea once the puppy doesn't need so much attention.

Quilt

I had some strips sewn together that were left from the first time I went to a Nancy Crow retreat years ago. There were two sets, so I layered and slashed them before sewing up the top. The quilting is done by couching a metallic thread along the main color areas.

 

Blogger put it sideways which might actually be better!

quilt

I love batiks and just made simple blocks to arrange on the design wall. This is the quilt that resulted. It's machine quilted along the triangle seams. This will be given as a lap quilt once I decide who needs it the most.

Quilt

This is the other piece I did for the Fiberactions neutral challenge. I love color but found that this challenge was easy, because the fabrics talked to me.

The gray shapes are raw silk. The couching of the metallic cord is the quilting. It's done by machine with the zigzag stitch.