October 30, 2014

Oh, blessed day, you have arrived! I'm so excited to be able to post photos of these works to share.

I'm on my way to Houston, to be reunited with two of my quilts which are being exhibited at the International Quilt Festival 2014.

My small quilt, Not Half Bad, is part of the What's for Dinner? exhibit.

Not Half Bad depicts six oysters on the half-shell, hand sewn in silk, on an organza plate of ice. The napkin is a vintage handkerchief.  Of course, I included cocktail sauce, lemon slices, and beer. These placemat-sized quilts will be exhibited on a dinner table, how cool is that?

My quilt, It's Not the House, is part of the Festival Gallery of Quilt Art. This year's theme is Home.

closed

open

detail of outside

...

detail of inside

This quilt came out of a family discussion. My husband said one night, fussing, "Sometimes living in this house..." and my son immediately said, "It's not the house, it's the people!"

The "bricks" that make up the outside have words on them that describe each of us, and are color coded to match each interior profile. The doors can be secured open or closed using jewelry magnets that are sewn on in strategic places.

I'm so excited to be in Houston! It is fabulous to see my quilt hanging here.

I'll be doing a three minute video about It's Not the House on Saturday for Quilt Alliance, in which I'll tell about how I got my design idea, and the process by which I made the quilt.

October 22, 2014

Making progress on Baltimore Garden, block B4.

My guild's block of the month. It's a free moda pattern if you like it. I think it's super cute.

Fun, colorful hourglass blocks for my guild's anniversary quilt. Maybe I'll win this year?

October 16, 2014

When Maddie from Spool and BAQS put a call out for some applicants to help them with testing patterns and making samples for the store, I wrote a heartfelt note and was accepted. I really appreciate the BAQS philosophy, and I'm a sucker for anything with "corps" in the title. So I'm an official Stitch Corps member!

I received my first project last week. It is a cute star pattern called Stardust by Jen Kingwell Designs out of Australia. 

I've never worked from an Aussie pattern before. It was interesting to translate the vocabulary (wadding=batting, etc).

I would rate the pattern as intermediate difficulty. Getting some of the small pieces aligned correctly was tricky, and the block is put together with a partial seam.

The finished project, headed back to Chattanooga!

October 9, 2014

It's been a week of lots of finishes. I'm a deadline motivated type of gal.

Two quilts done and relinquished to the Quilt Bingo committee.

Amalia quilted and bound this one for me. I just had a label to slap on the back.

I quilted this one myself, and made some fun binding out of feedsack that I just love.

I call it "Catching Fire", and added a Mockingjay symbol. (from the Hunger Games trilogy if you are not familiar.)

I finished up a small series I started in a class several years ago.They started with a panel of nursery rhymes. They are fused collage and a bit of paint.

I embellished each one with some buttons and a hanging ribbon.

I finished up a hanging for my door. It only needed binding and a few embellishments.

And, lastly, I whipped up a wall hanging from an old Nancy Crow panel. It will be a bonus prize at Quilt Bingo.

October 2, 2014

I've finished block B2, Rachel's Ribbons, Birds and Berries. It was a relatively quick, easy block. I still need to add embroidery in several places.

I've started on block B4 Rebecca's Ribbon Birds of Peace.

I have been piecing a lot this week. It's nice to do something fairly mindless every now and again. I love how this one is coming together. I love the way it looks curvy but is constructed with all straight lines. This is my first time using Tri Recs tools. 

I ended up with 59 blocks so I made one more for an even sixty. I think I'll set them as 6 x 10, and do long thin borders with my extra four patches on each side.