WIPs TO FOCUS ON

 

ALL OF MY UFOs AND WIPs ARE FINISHED!!

 

Gotcha!  April Fool's!?!?!

 

Now for the truth of the matter.

 

 

Every year I take time to re-assess my WIPs list.  It is quite a long list.  I simply re-arrange the order of the list and continue to do new projects.  Since I will be going away on four retreats this year, I have chosen to focus on some of my specific
WIPs with the idea that they will get finished.  I do not know which is the better way to approach this:  Do I start with the most current and work my way back to the oldest one?  OR Should I go back to the oldest one and work my way forward?

 

After looking at the list of the seven projects that I chose to focus on, I have decided to start with the most recent and work in that direction.

 

In November/December 2012 I started Bonnie Hunter's latest Mystery Quilt called "Easy Street".  This year I knew that I would not have much time to devote to it as it was happening so I decided to do some of each step.  For me that was not the best idea.  It has taken me more time to sort out what number of components are lacking.  In the future I will know that is not a good style for me.

Here is a sample of some of the units I have done.

 

 

 

 

Another Bonnie Hunter project that is still sitting in its little box is "Virginia Bound".  This one was started at a Workshop I attended in Pelham, Alabama when Bonnie came 2 years ago.  In reading her blog and checking her calendar I discovered that she would be coming to a "town near me" and I contacted the sponsoring guild and was able to get the last slot.  That was a really fun day.  It was great to meet Bonnie and to see her style of teaching a Workshop.

I have about half of the blocks done for this quilt that uses strings.

 

 

 

 

 

My landscape quilt and my kaleidoscope quilt are both small pieces and only need to be quilted and bound.  This should not take very much time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A third Bonnie Hunter pattern that I have going is the Lady of  Lake Erie pattern that appeared in Quiltmaker Magazine.  A few years ago I made a picture of the produce section at my local grocery store because it inspired me to think of a quilt pattern to use these colors. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I have chosen to use the Lady of  Lake Erie pattern and am naming this project "Farmer's Market".  I have about a third of the blocks completed and the rest are cut and waiting.

 

 

 

The topic for our projects for this month in my Art Quilt Guild is collage.  I have a fish collage that I started over five years ago.  It needs to have the thread embellishing done and it will be complete.

The first retreat is early in April and my guild meeting is at the end of the month.  This really could get finished.  Of course, that means I will be changing the order again of when to do these WIPs.  But isn't that what life is about?  Being flexible and willing to make changes?

 

 

 

 

 

And, of course, I don't want to forget about my Ticker Tape quilt. 

 

Now I am motivated to get started.  I wonder how many of these I will get finished at the first retreat in April????

 



 

 

-sandi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TRIADIC COLOR CHALLENGE

The triadic color challenge for Grateful Threads, my art guild, was due this week.  We were to choose a color on the color wheel and then look for its triadic partners.

My choice was yellow-green, red-orange, and red violet for the palette.  I went to the hardware store and found paint chips to use when I auditioned my fabrics.

Fabrics from my current stash were selected.  I had a wonderful batik that I had "saved" for a long time.  It was going to be perfect for this project.  I had an ample number of greens to choose from.

 

The bonus was that I had one fabric that had two of my colors in it already. I pulled several of my greens from the batik collection.  Then all that was left was the background fabric.  I had this wonderful creamy batik with a very subtle stylized tree pattern.  The picture does not do that fabric justice.

Next came the design.  I love trees and working with lots of trees.  One of my favorite trees is a weeping willow.  I had one in my yard when I was growing up and it was such a welcome spot to "crawl into" to read a book or just peer up through the branches and contemplate life.  After I was married and moved with my husband around and about I had several homes with weeping willow trees.  My daughter discovered the same fun when she was small.  She would take her doll and her doll blanket and play under the willow for hours.

A very simple tree was then prepped for fusible applique.  I made the leaves and then came the arrangement.

This design made me smile.  I loved using the asymmetrical borders and omitting the other two borders.

It is machine quilted using a stitch on my machine that is called "hand quilting stitch".  It is formed by using mono filament thread in the upper and placing a regular thread in the bobbin.  When I finished this I was so excited that the quilting over the tree looked like rain falling.

 

The quilting is straight line quilting spaced about 3/8" apart.  The backing fabric is a soft grey/cream toile pattern.

I thought that putting a regular binding on this piece would limit it on the edges.  I wanted the design to emphasize the infinity of the line; so I chose to use a facing.  I used the same fabric as the background.

To label this piece I wrote my name and the date and the name of the Challenge on the facing.  In an article I read recently, that author suggested that a quilter use cursive handwriting to sign her/his name so that in later years the person looking at the quilt would feel a more personal touch with the maker of the quilt.

Cannot wait to get this hung.  Have several spots in mind.  Just need to decide.

LilBit just wants me to get finished so we can take a walk on this beautiful afternoon.

                                                         -sandi

 

 



 

CREATIVITY IS . . .

I am not a perfectionist, but I am very disciplined to good use of my time and resources.  This principle in the above poster is nagging at me.  So, I am trying to go this way in my quilting.

This year I have become more involved in my Art Quilt Guild and in my Modern Quilt Guild.  Both of these guilds really challenge me to use that "other side" of my brain. They also require me to "let the ideas flow" rather than having everything so overly planned.

I should tell you that I majored in math and foreign language in college and spent a number of years teaching all the different levels of each of those disciplines on the high school and college levels.

I believe that all of us have an artistic side to our nature.  I am very creative when it comes to quilt making, I think.  It is not really difficult for me to use a color wheel and choose fabrics for a quilt design.  Sometimes I just take a look around me and choose a palette for a quilt.

I absolutely love this picture.  I am pulling fabrics for a quilt in this palette.  No, I don't think it will be a bird quilt, but the color palette is what has my attention.

Once in a while I choose to do an original quilt design, but when it comes to picking up a pencil to make a drawing or a paint brush to paint a picture, I freeze.  Well, that might be a strong word.  It is more like I go blank and cannot think of the way to approach the drawing.  What I see in my mind's eye does not come out on the paper.  I have never had an art drawing lesson.  I am finding that it is more difficult "to teach myself" how to draw than it was to teach myself how to quilt.  I have been trying to put a little time into sketching something almost daily.  I guess it will eventually come, but at the present it isn't looking too promising.

My Modern Quilt Guild is having a monthly blog lottery.  You make a number of blocks using the pattern or idea offered by the coordinator.  This month the inspiration was mosaic blocks and you can enter up to three blocks.  At the meeting you will put your name in the basket for the number of blocks you made and then the coordinator will draw the winner of all the blocks.  I am rarely, if ever, a winner, but it is fun to learn the technique.

Today I worked on some Mod Mosaic Blocks by following Elizabeth Hartman's tutorial over on Oh, Fransson blog   http://www.ohfransson.com/oh_fransson/2012/01/mod-mosaic-tutorials.html.  This was a very freeing experience.

The first one I did I pulled some mostly traditional fabrics from my stash and made it.

The inspiration piece was the Kaffe Fassett piece in the lower right corner.  Then I began to look for other things to add to it.

Trying to use up my stash that consists of a lot of traditional style fabrics and mixing them with more modern fabrics is fun.

Not too bad for a first try!  I do like using the small pieces.  The orientation of this block is fun.  If I turn it around then it looks like this.

Maybe I like this orientation better.

 

I picked another set of fabrics for this palette:

 

 

The second block I made looks like this. . .

Again, the center block is from Kaffe Fassett and these sections are much larger than the first one I did.  I guess the challenge for the winner will be to put all these very different mosaics together into one piece.  The only requirement was that the sashing had to be white.

My two blocks together . . .

Ummm, I think they will play well together in a scrappy layout.

This is how I am artistic or creative.  Still haven't made a drawing.  Okay, I will keep practicing.

 

The Bit is still in charge of the computer cord . . .


                                              -sandi