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.

Book

www.joggles.com has a weekly video on the different products she carries. I always look forward to it.

The one several weeks ago was on using double sided scrapbook papers and folding them to form different types of pockets.

These are all double pages shown flat, so I didn't have a ton of things to put up.

They are decorated with stickers, Washi tape and whatever else I had around.

I need to do covers next. You can see the holes for binder rings in the center.

Quilt

I used to teach Crazy Quilt. Some people wanted to do it by machine, so these blocks were my samples. I finally put them together and used a triple zigzag along the seam lines to quilt it. The fabrics are a complete assortment of whatever I had in the pink range.

The closeup shows a truer color and the machine stitches. Even a basic machine can be used by varying the utility stitches or doing multiple rows of them. It went to the nursing home. I've been told that the lady who received it is a beader and understands what went into it.

Jewelry

Years ago when I went to the big quilt show in Houston, I attended a lecture by Marla Gassner who wrote The Bead and I. I enjoyed her talk so that I bought the book and made the yellow necklace.

Recently I decided to make another and did this green one. It's a great way to feature special beads as accents and also to use up odd beads that you don't have enough of to make a more traditional piece.

 

It's fun to wear. With my long, skinny neck, I often wrap it around two times. It always gets comments.

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.

Stitching

On Design TV Linda Kemshall has been doing Kantha Stitching which is kind of a big stitch quilting where you pull up the thread to make it pucker a little. It's an ethnic technique, but I don't remember where.

I started with a monoprint on a loose weave cotton and added irregular pieces of painted cheesecloth. I had also painted lace and decided to use these motifs. The thread is embroidery floss and Perle cotton that I dyed or painted. The stem and chain stitches seemed to be what the flowers and leaves needed. I kept saving the special thread and decided that the reason I made them was to use them, and when they are gone, I can do more.

Bead Journal Project

I can hardly believe this is my 6th year with the Bead Journal Project.

 

This year I've decided to feature some of the special pieces that I've collected or that were given to me. I start with a batik with a relatively plain background, so it doesn't interfer with the piece. This one has a fused glass center. I beaded the way you would a cabochon then decided it looked lost on the fabric but didn't want to cut it down, so I added the rays in the blue gray. From two feet away, they didn't show, so I echoed them with the melon-better but still not right. It needed the square melon beads with a blue gray seed bead on each side. It also needed the binding to stop the eye. I must say that it met with the idea that this should be a challenge.

Book

This is the 10th felt book. The button is one I saved from a coat I wore years ago. The felting was done with a thick and thin yarn on a felt base.

The 3 signature covers are paste papers. Paste papers are made from paint that has a thickener added so you can draw into it with tools. It's fun to do.

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 block

A friend can no longer come to our quilt group, so we decided to do a hanging for her of 6" heart blocks. She doesn't use the computer, so I know it's OK to show it. Mine is an Ultrasuede center and hand stitched with Perle Cotton.