Rip it! Rip it!

The frog chorus could be heard loud and clear in my sewing studio today.
I think I was a bit tired from our trip north, everything seemed to go together wrong.

Had a great time at my niece's wedding in Maryland.  Best of all we were in PA Friday without any obligations or plans.   I got to go to my first AQS show in Lancaster.  The quilts were really wonderful.  I tired out my husband and daughter, but they did enjoy themselves and took lots of photos.  I also tried out several long arm quilt machines.  I have to say I was impressed with the Handi Quilters machines.  My daughter took to it like a fish in water.  Her free flowing drawing style showed through superbly.

Do Not Weep continued

I had to darken some of my darkest purple with purple fabric ink because I needed a darker shade.  Next I added the third purple shade of fabric. Here I made a mistake and was glad the fusible was not fully attached.   Usually  my pieces are numbered 1-6 with one being the lightest, but I did it opposite this time.  I've been working at short intervals and came back to do the next layer and thought I forgot some places because I forgot how I numbered the piece.  I added more of the second darkest fabric where I should have put the lightest fabric.  Anyway, here is a picture of the mistake and then the correction.  I also found that my next color is a bit to close to the number 5 fabric and I need to go shopping for another shade.  I usually number and letter all my pieces so I know where they go.  Not wanting to waist the time I just numbered by shade and am having to spend lots of time figuring out which piece is which.  I will not make this mistake again.

Do Not Weep

I am trying to keep a record of the “Do Not Weep” quilt. After completely starting over with new designs I chose a new color scheme. Each woman will be a different color from light to dark of that color. Woman one is purple. After sketching her and assigning color value, I made a copy on double freezer paper.

Next I cut the woman out of heavy weight stabilizer. I then cut her out of medium purple about a 1/2 larger and wrapped that around the stabilizer and glued the edges down on the back. The next step was to cut out the darkest value from the freezer paper and fuse them on the fabric. I cut out the shapes, added fusing and positioned them in place using the holes in the freezer paper as guidelines.

That’s as much as I worked on so far. I did finish the the eight points for the mariners compass block for the star quilt, and picked out fabric for the 6 remaining houses in the “Strolling the Block” quilt. Next I must cut out all the fusible pieces for each color.

Rabbits Return

In 2004, somebody let about 30 bunnies loose in our neighborhood.  We thought they had all died off , but we saw a solid black rabbit two days ago and yesterday and today the rabbit pictured below was in our garage and under the porch.  We fed it and are hoping it stays around.

In progress

I am trying to keep a record of the "Do Not Weep" quilt.  After completely starting over with new designs I chose a new color scheme.  Each woman will be a different color from light to dark of that color.  Woman one is purple.  After sketching her and assigning color value,  I made a copy on double freezer paper.

Next I cut the woman out of heavy weight stabilizer.   I then cut her out of medium purple about a 1/2 larger and wrapped that around the stabilizer and glued the edges down on the back.  The next step was to cut out the darkest value from the freezer paper and fuse them on the fabric. I cut out the shapes, added fusing and positioned them in place using the holes in the freezer paper as guidelines.

That's as much as I worked on so far.  I did finish the the eight points for the mariners compass block for the star quilt, and picked out fabric for the 6 remaining houses in the "Strolling the Block" quilt.  Next I must cut out all the fusible pieces.

Friendship Gift

Below are some pictures of a small quilt I made as a friendship gift.  It is made of words printed on fabric from the computer, then the fabric was dyed and had pieces of colored tissue paper added.  I thread painted the tree and then made a quilt sandwich and free-motion quilted with invisible thread.  The edges were finished with zigzag stitching.

What I'm working on now.

Projects: 2 quilts for my son's who graduate from Morehead State University in May.  The youngest is getting a quilt of 12 inch star blocks and a larger mariners compass in the middle.   The older is getting 12 house blocks decorated for the seasons. The applique on this set is all hand stitched.

Next I am working to complete my praying the passion series.  I have four quilts of 13 planned quilts finished.  Prayers and scripture verses will be added as standing plaques.

Finally I want to work on quilted journals,  and a variety of  small art quilts. (less than 15")

My newest studio arrangement is working great.  It is once again a complete disaster, but my tools are always where they are suppose to be. Yeah!

Do Not Weep for Me

My daughter has posed for my bible women.  Below is one of the poses.  Each pose has been posterized and then put in gray scale.  Each of the five women will use 5-6 values of a color.  Other faces have been put on the images so all 5 women look different.  I have drawn enlarged copies on news print and now will begin transferring this to freezer paper.

Flynn Quilting Frame

Here are some pictures of the set up I used to quilt my triple Irish chain.  I had to pull my table out to have room for the longer rods.  On the right side it worked great because the frame could rest on my cutting and work table.  When the frame went to the left side however it was a bit trickier because I didn't have anything to balance it on and it gets heavy.  I finally stacked some books and a box on my storage cubicles.  This was not perfect, but worked in a pinch.

I think I will stick to smaller quilts because towards the end I had to adjust the frame at the end of each row.  Earlier I was able to quilt three one  inch rows.  When the quilt was pushed all the way to the right side, I put the machine in reverse and went back the other way.  Over all I was please with the quilting and it was pretty easy.

If I was doing a quilt this large with other that straight lines it would not have worked.  Over all I like the Flynn frame best for quilts up to 48".

Studio rearrangement

Was cleaning my studio and my small peg board fell off the wall.  This lead to a major overhaul of the entire room.  The last picture is of the treat box and pocket that my daughter made for me to check each day.

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