The Quilt Rat

They're Back!!!!

2012-01-31T10:45:00.001-05:00

Jaye over at Artquiltmaker, is still posting weekly prompt words, I think this might be close to three full years already (now that is dedication!!!) Thanks Jaye!
At first, I kept up my responses in the form of doodles with fair regularity, but have to admit, I have not given the Creative Prompt Project my attention for a very long time. I thought it was time to pick up my pen and get back to a bit of doodling.
So this is my response to #122 Dress........The dress form was an important tool during my time as a Dressmaker/Designerand for #140 Birthday.....(which was actually the prompt word given within a couple of days of my own Birthday) I drew these Balloons.While I have no plans to try to "catch-up"on all the prompts I have missed, I will try to get back to playing along.

Machine Quilting.....Starts and Stops

2012-01-26T16:21:00.003-05:00

One of the first things we covered at the machine quilting workshop on Saturday, was how to start and stop your stitching. What I showed at the time, was how to simply begin and end with very tiny stitches, but while this is effective, it is not the best method.
I think the best method is done in such a way so that you (or judges) can NOT detect where your starts and stops are, AND that your stitches are absolutely locked and will not come out. This of course is also the most time consuming way to do it.You will begin as always by taking 1 stitch and bringing your bobbin thread to the surface, hold the tails in your left hand and begin stitching.Now you want to separate these two threads and then tie a knot, lay that knot right tight against your work......then do it once again.....you have now knotted these threads twice, below is a close up of the first knot as it was being pulled tight.Next you will thread a needle.........one with a larger eye and a needle threader helps or you can use a self threading needle if you prefer. (both thread tails are threaded into the eye together)The next step is to insert your threaded needle into the quilt right where that first stitch was taken, carefully slip the needle into the batting/quilt middle only, bring it out about an inch and a half away, give it a gentle tug to cause the knots to "pop" into the quilt and then you can clip your threads closely
To do this method in areas where you have ended your stitching, you will first need to thread a needle with your bobbin thread so that you can bring it to the top....now that both threads are on top you simply repeat the knotting/threading/burying process.
and there you have it, yes it requires a little effort but your starts and stops will be secure and undetectable.

Workshop refresher

2012-01-24T12:03:00.000-05:00

This past Saturday, I had the pleasure of conducting a machine quilting workshop. The ladies in attendance (all members of The London Friendship Quilters' Guild) came with great attitudes, eager to soak up everything I had to share. The current skill level of these ladies ranged from the absolute beginner to fairly accomplished quilters, so I tried to cover as much as I could in the time we had and because of this, I am well aware that it may have been difficult to absorb, digest, and remember all of it. I thought a post touching on some of what was covered would make a great spot for them all to come to for future reference and perhaps there will be some tips you can use as well.

We started with a basic primer on proper quilt preparation, talked about having the backing be slightly larger than the batting and the batting being larger than the quilt top. This allows for shrinkage or minor distortion that can happen with all the stitching and gives you a place to "hang"on to your quilt while moving it through the machine, especially as you work near those outer edges. I tried to emphasize the importance of always working from the center out.
We discussed basting with pins and with thread, we talked about posture at the machine and about providing proper support to the quilt as it is moved through the machine. Everyone was given a little card with a checklist to keep beside their machines at home to help them remember the simple steps to going from regular sewing to a free motion sewing set up.I covered some methods for marking and explained how to use a variety of marking tools. I want to point out that you should always test any marking tool you choose to use on each and every project, to be certain everything is working as it should, and that you will be able to remove the markings satisfactorily.
Almost all of the products shown in this post are likely easily found at your local quilt shop.

I LOVE this white ink pen by Clover.....it flows nicely, gives a smooth, consistent thin line on dark fabrics, and it doesn't go away until you use heat from your iron.
These chalk pencils are made for quilting by General's, they are super easy to use, glide on smoothly and can be removed just by giving the marking a good rub. That little red tool you see on the right is a marker with a tiny little wheel that dispenses a fine line of chalk, it is wonderful for marking grids or just simple guidelines for things like free motion feathers.Below,on the left, you see my absolute favourite pencil, it is another product made by General's and unlike the other tools I am showing, is not made for quilting, you find these at craft and art supply stores. They are called Sketch n' Wash (use a light hand with them) they mark easily and will wash out. On the right is the old standard wash out blue pen, and while they do wash out, you need to be very careful to be absolutely certain you have removed the ink before it ever gets near your iron.........if you iron this ink it will NOT come out.I also demonstrated using a pounce pad with stencils, the chalk is available in white or blue and can be purchased in forms that simply rub off or remain until they are removed with the use of an iron.
Here are my favourite needles for thread basting a quilt. I put a bit of emphasis on the use of quilting gloves (they are a must have for the machine quilter) but you can even use gardening gloves.........just be sure you have a good snug fit. We talked about different types of quilting feet, you will want to visit your machine dealer to find what will work for your machine.
We looked at using stencils, both purchased and ones you can make yourself as well as super simple ways to create shapes from cardboard (you can just trace around) or freezer paper (a quick press holds it in place, stitch around the shape, peel it off and stick in in another spot, repeat the process. I also tried to give a few tips on planning how you will tackle the quilting, having the layout and even the individual blocks on paper allows you to do a little auditioning and is a great way to help you see what your finished quilt might look like with your choice of stitching.While I did spend time at my machine demonstrating a variety of stitch patterns, I also brought with me some "training" samples. These are nothing more than quilt sandwiches with stitch lines drawn using permanent ink........by removing the thread from their machines, workshop attendees were able to sit and get a hands on feel for the smooth rhythmic movement each stitch might require. I thought this might be a valuable learning tool as it can be used over and over. Even though you are not using thread you can see where you stitched by the holes left by the needle, give it a rub, the holes disappear and you can try it again! I did show how to stitch with out any guidelines but I think for those just starting out, having a line to follow is helpful. In the second of the photos below I had drawn the complete pattern at the top and just the grid at the bottom, once you get the hang of the movement you can thread up and stitch the pattern using the grid only.
One of the most important tips I can give about following a line to stitch, is the need to look ahead, in other words, have your eyes focused on the line where you intend to go (not on the needle) if you look at where you want to go, the machine will follow. One of the gals in attendance had a great analogy for this..........she said "it is just like driving your car.........you don't look at the steering wheel or the front end of your vehicle, you look ahead in the road to where you are going." Wonderful advice!!!

and the MOST important tip of all is, practice, practice and more PRACTICE! We all want to be able to achieve nice even stitches, smooth, beautifully flowing thread lines, we want to have a whole repertoire of lovely designs that we can apply to our quilts but like any other skill, it takes time, patience and oh, did I mention practice?

Do you like puzzles?

2012-01-18T13:46:00.001-05:00

I LOVE puzzles. Sometimes I see something and I just HAVE to figure out how it was done. This was the case last week, when at guild, I saw a quilt that was made using a Japanese folded fabric technique. As I got an up close look at it I immediately recognized that it was basically a cathedral windows sort of thing but done using circles instead of squares.............well I became obsessed with figuring out how to do it. Will I make a quilt using this technique? No, not likely, but I do love the effect and now that I have a few samples created, I'll file it away in case I do want to use it one day.
So with the templates I created, I made a few pieces that when arranged and rearranged can make an amazing amount of varied designs.............and keep in mind that because this uses a "quilt as you go" method, these become a completely reversible finished quilt with designs on both sides when all stitched together.

Below are just a few examples of what can be achieved using just 4 of the five pieces you see in the top photo............. oh the possibilities!!!!

Samples and something different

2012-01-11T14:45:00.001-05:00

I have been asked by my guild, to conduct a machine quilting workshop, I did one a few years ago and it was actually a lot of fun. Workshop day is fast approaching and I understand that quilters of all skill levels have signed up, so I have been busy working on getting prepared for it, as I hope to have something of interest for all. (from beginner to the more experienced) Maybe some cool tips and tricks to share.
This workshop benefits our outreach program, instead of having to "pay" to attend, participants will work on and complete quilts destined to be given to children at the Children's Aid Society.

............and now for something completely different.........A couple of months ago, I picked up this cute little loom at a vintage/antique/nostalgia show. I have no idea what I am doing, but am always intrigued to try something new. This is how I found it (actually is was folded flat in the box.) this little loom measures a mere 14" long by 11" wide by 11" tallLooks like someone had started to "warp" it with string, I removed that stuff and replaced it with about 4 yard lengths of this brightly coloured thread/yarn. I don't expect to be able to do much with this set-up, but I plan to have fun "experimenting" with possibilities. As you can see, I began doing a very basic weave to start with. I think it might be fun to try selvage edges, maybe some unconventional materials?

Working with Wool

2012-01-02T10:40:00.000-05:00

This past October, while at the Creative Festival in Toronto, I picked up a little penny rug kit. I have wanted to try working with wool for a while but just had not gotten around to gathering the supplies. The kit contained everything I needed to get me going and I absolutely loved making this little piece. (it is about 11" across)
This, of course, has me now wanting to do something more substantial with wool, an idea has begun knocking about in my head so I am now collecting interesting threads, pearl cottons, silks and recently, at a thrift shop, I came across this full length (and at one time, very expensive) wool coat. It really had kind of outlived it's usefulness, as it did have a few holes and stains.....but it will be reborn.After a HOT bath, a ride in the dryer and lots of "un-sewing" here it is, now a pile of wool pieces, waiting for me to get started.

Cards and snow?

2011-12-22T14:05:00.002-05:00

I thought I'd post some of the cards I have made recently.
These were made using aluminum cans (beer and soda) as my metal for embossing. I showed how I do this here For this one I punched holes through the metal so that the red from underneath could show through
This card, is a photo from last years poinsettia which had been tweaked in Photoshop, printed onto fabric and stitched.
And since many people are looking for snow this time of the year (I am not one of them) I thought it was time for another "snowflake"
Last weeks CPP word was Cloud. What I immediately thought of, was Cloud 9 ......... I kept this one real simple and just drew various sizes of the number 9. Here is what the cut paper looked like before it was unfolded.

..........and after

New bag

2011-12-19T10:20:00.001-05:00

This month, at our guild meeting, we welcomed Shirley from The Marsh Store as our vendor. Shirley brought with her, wonderful fabrics, patterns, threads and all sorts of terrific notions to tempt us. One of the things that caught my attention was a bag she had on display and, well...the pattern and supplies for it just had to go home with me.
First of all, I have to tell you about this new batting alternative called inn-control

It is a great product. It is easy to cut, easy to sew and gives amazing body to the bag. It is soft and pliable and yet the bag stands on its own even when completely empty. You can find out more about this product here
There are lots of things I liked about this bag pattern (and a couple of things I didn't) but that is why we sew right? we can make it the way we want! I rarely ever follow a pattern exactly anyway. So I changed the outer pockets from that rounded shape to plain rectangular ones. Then I made a couple of fabric strips that I studded and placed on either side of those pockets just to give a different look. The inside of the bag, I made as called for, with the exception of a loop that I added which gives me a spot to hang my keys so I can always find them quickly.This bag has a nice zippered closure, lots of padded pockets on the inside that are big enough to hold one of those cool Tablets, you can even carry a small Netbook in here along with all your regular purse stuff.
The bag is designed by Brenda Miller, and is called The Everything Goes Bag

Clever idea!!!!

2011-12-14T09:52:00.000-05:00

First of all, let me make it perfectly clear that this was NOT my idea, but I thought it was something I just had to share. I have been lucky enough to be part of a wonderful, fun group of ladies who have formed a small sewing group that meets once a month, we all pretty much work on whatever projects we have on the go, share ideas and socialize. Best of all, there are no phones ringing, no chores and NO interruptions.
Yesterday, Cindy shared this clever idea.......have you seen these packages of ponytail holders at the dollar store.......they are tiny, soft, stretchy fabric rings and you get a LOT in a package. Don't have a ponytail? ........oh but you do have bobbins don't you? Lots of bobbins? and when you go to classes and workshops or just even as those bobbins sit in the drawer, do you find the threads unwinding and making a tangled mess? .......well Cindy showed us how those ponytail holders solve that problem. Those little fabric rings fit perfectly on your bobbins whether they are full or not, keeping everything neat and in place
I think this is brilliant! I found packages of black and white but they also come in a great array of colours so you could even colour code your bobbins, you know, one colour for your cottons, one for your rayons and one for.........well you get the idea. They even work great on those little spools that also seem to want to unravel.

Winners, Progress and Prompts

2011-12-05T11:30:00.001-05:00

Winners:
The great folks at LAPEL stick told me I could pick 2 winners who will each receive one to keep for themselves or give as a gift, the randomly chosen winners are Just Pam and Royce.....emails from me are on the way ladies. Hope you love this product as much as I do.
Progress:
All of the flowers, leaves, buds and vines for the borders are prepared, in place, and ready for the hand stitching to begin. ( a couple of pieces can't be put on until after all the seams are stitched) but I love that with this method, I can see exactly what the finished border will look like
Prompts:
I thought it was time for a couple more papercut snowflakes in response to The Creative Prompt Project. #133 is Green..........since I am in applique mode and doing it in a "scrappy"fashion, I did notice that choosing colours for the flowers can take a while, but leaves and vines are easy......greens, of course! So this snowflake is made up of leaves and vines
CPP # 132 was Ocean......in this snowflake, you will find ocean waves, sea horses, turtles and of course plenty of fish.

Designing applique borders and a "Giveaway"!!!

2011-11-30T10:37:00.002-05:00

Earlier in the year, I appliqued a block called "Miss Kelly" designed by Erin Russek. I have decided to finish it in a "Round Robin" sort of fashion. I wanted to start by designing an applique border for this piece, first I scanned a few my own flowers/buds and leaves that I planned to work with. After a little tweaking on the computer, I printed out several pages of these elements (actual size) in greyscale. Now I could cut them up and start arranging, a little dab of LAPEL stick ( I love this product) holds it all in place as I play to find a layout I like. As an added bonus, the paper version can be used as my placement template.........its just too easy!!!

Then I got busy making the required number of pieces in fabric using my preferred method (freezer paper and gluestick) you can read an earlier post that describes this method here

So......you want to know about the giveaway?.....have you seen LAPEL stick for sale at your local quilt shop? Have you tried it yet? They are terrific and have many uses............want a chance to win one? Leslie Durand, Sales and Marketing Director for LAPEL Stick contacted me yesterday and generously offered to let me host a giveaway. She has told me I can pick 2 winners, so....... just leave me a comment in this post. I'll post the winners Monday Dec 5th. and Leslie will send you your very own LAPEL stick......keep it for yourself or use it as a stocking stuffer
You can learn more about this product at www.lapelstick.com or www.fashionemergencies.com

My most recent article

2011-11-24T12:06:00.001-05:00

The Winter issue of The Canadian Quilter is currently showing up in quilters mailboxes across the country and contains my second article as CQA's Artist in Residence. This article is about creating quilted postcards, and while I do give instructions, hints and tips in making these little works, I also point out that they don't necessarily have to be made with fabrics. Unfortunately some of the text got omitted alongside the photos, so I thought I would take this opportunity to share with you what materials were used in constructing the top layer of some of the cards shown.

This first one was made using a painted paper towel (heavily stitched) which was then embellished with rubber stamping, a few fabric scraps, beads and bits of broken costume jewelry.
This one, is again, paper toweling that had been painted, rubber stamped and stitched.This is one of my favourites. It is just so simple, a plain brown paper bag (I think it was from the liquor store) was stamped and stitched. Selvage edges, buttons and a small safety pin finishes the look.
and these? well they are nothing more than pre-printed paper napkins found at the dollar store. Lots of stitching was applied to make some of the areas really stand out.

Play time.........and a beer?

2011-11-14T14:00:00.001-05:00

Okay, well ......actually....the beer can was already empty when I got this idea.
I have wanted to try some metal embossing for a while now, but just had not gotten around to picking up any supplies.......you didn't think that would stop me did you?
So I began with a clean beer can, cut it apart (carefully because those edges can be quite sharp)
With the printed side of the can face up and those sharp edges taped down on to the cork trivet, I drew a design, pressing firmly with the pen, then, flipped it over and drew echo lines around those first lines, which really gives the design it's depth, the cork trivet has enough cushion to allow for a fairly good imprint. (it would be best to use a pen that no longer has ink but a little spritz of hairspray and the ink dissolves so it can be wiped right off)I simply stitched these to some fabric covered Timtex and created postcardsThen I decided to do a slightly larger one......as you can see, I used a can of Moosehead for this one, repeated the process of embossing, but this time I stitched it onto a piece of Timtex that I had first painted black..........reminds me of those decorative tin ceilings.

Sometimes, you just have to CUT!

2011-11-07T11:09:00.001-05:00

Do you recall this little painted quilt I did a while back? It was a project I really enjoyed doing and was pleased with the painting and stitching on the blossom. BUT I was not at all happy with the composition or my colour choice in that blue background. I continued on though, I thought perhaps if I gave it a nice border and lots of quilting I might like it better, well I did NOT! and it has been stuffed into a drawer ever since. Last week I decided to do something with this. I chopped it up and put it in a frame. Now I see just the part I was pleased with and the rest has gone away.Since I was in a cutting mood I did a couple more snowflakes as Creative Prompt Project word responses.
#123 is Butterfly..........this made up of butterflies, flowers and cocoons
#128 is Candy, here I incorporated life savers, jelly beans, gum drops, wrapped candies, tootsie pops and rope licorice

Designing like a Kid!

2011-10-27T11:50:00.002-04:00

As I grow as an Artist, I always try to remember not to take it all too seriously, when it ceases to be fun, I know I will no longer enjoy it.
A couple of weeks ago, I had the extreme pleasure of taking a workshop conducted by Kathy K Wylie. Kathy is an award winning quilter, designer, teacher and the author of the book, Sewflakes, Papercut Applique Quilts.....now most of you know that I generally refer to my time spent in my sewing room as "playtime", Kathy's workshop led me to even more ways to "play" with design.

I really LOVE pieces that at first look, may appear to be simply pleasing designs, shapes, colours BUT upon closer inspection reveals more. Kathy's method is a wonderful take on the old paper snowflake we all did as kids, but Kathy takes it to a whole other level, not only does she show you how to create the initial design but guides you through the process of going from paper to fabric.

This piece that I teased you with last week is as a result of that workshop. Did you notice that is is made up entirely of insects?If you have been stopping by my blog for any length of time, you may remember my involvement with the Creative Prompt Project. I used to do a doodle each week in response to the "prompt"word posted...........did it for about a year and a half and guess I just got bored with the doodling. Not certain why I stopped, perhaps I no longer found it challenging. BUT I think making these papercut snowflakes will be a challenge and so much FUN!!! So I am going to get back to playing along.......using papercut designs instead of doodles....here are my responses to the most recent prompts.
#126 was Pumpkin.........the pumpkins are obvious, but look closely, do you see the vines, leaves, blossoms, seeds and even a whacky Jack O'Lantern face?
#127 is Ghost. Doesn't look like much before it gets unfolded does it?

Big and little ghosts, float amid the gravemarkers and funky trees all radiating out from a little tiny spider web.
Want to learn how to do this yourself? grab a copy of Kathy's book. click on the image below to find out how to get yours.

Okay, enough of this ......gotta go play!

.....and we have a Winner!

2011-10-24T10:12:00.000-04:00

First of all.......Thank you to everyone who played along, I hope you enjoyed learning a little about this fun digital scrapbooking software.
Congratulations to Dolores, she will receive her very own copy of My Memories Suite software.....an email from me is on the way.

I am sure you are all happy for Dolores but if you are just a wee bit disappointed and really wanted to play with this software yourself, don't forget that the good people at My Memories provided me with code for you that gives you a $10 discount off the purchase of the My Memories Suite Scrapbook software AND a $10 coupon for the My Memories.com store - $20 value!)

The coupon code is: STMMMS69407
There is no time limit, so if you are interested but want to learn more and perhaps even take your time to watch some of the video tutorials, you can always come back here and grab the code when you are ready.........heck maybe you have friends or family members who might like this......why not send them the code too and share the fun!

Blog-versary

2011-10-20T12:34:00.000-04:00

I can hardly believe that I started this blog 3 years ago. Yup, it was 3 years ago today that I put up my very first post..........and it said:
"Blogging is a new concept for me. I have absolutely no clue as to what I am doing just yet, but I have never let that stop me before. I have found many blogs to be intriguing and inspiring. What will I bring to this forum?...................I do not know. I will just have to see where this leads."

In the beginning I didn't even know how to upload a photo and creating links was a complete mystery. I have met some fabulous people through this medium, been given some wonderful opportunities and have enjoyed having this place to chronicle my journey as I grow into the artist I want to be and most of all, to be able to share ideas.

What is a blog post without an interesting photo? You'll have to wait until next week to learn more about this one.

In the mean time don't forget to enter the giveaway I am hosting, read my previous post to find out how to be entered into the drawing for the digital scrapbooking software, My Memories Suite
(Comments/Entries must be made in that post, thanks )

It is Giveaway time!!!!

2011-10-17T09:55:00.000-04:00

Are you a Scrapbooker?........not me.........well ......not until I was contacted by Liz from My Memories Suite. Liz asked if I would like to review their product and host a giveaway. What is the product you ask? My Memories Suite is a digital scrapbooking software, I have to warn you right off......... it is rather addictive. I have been having a blast exploring what can be created using this software and I have barely scratched the surface.

First of all, if you are a regular reader of my blog you may have noticed a few changes to my site. Do you like my new banner? it was created using the My Memories software.Did you happen to notice that on my sidebar, I have changed the way my galleries are presented? you guessed it.........each was designed using My Memories.
Let me tell you a little about my experience with this digital scrapbooking software, it was quick and easy to download and install (Instant gratification.........no waiting on the postman)
The software is super user friendly, I was able to start creating immediately, but IF you find that you sometimes need a little help, My Memories has wonderful customer support. There are lots of easy to access instructional videos so you can "see" what you want to know or use the fabulous searchable PDF covering everything. My Memories Suite comes loaded with great background papers, templates, shapes, embellishments, you can even add music, make a video, I can't possibly cover it all, so if you want to see more about this software and what it can do, why not take a few minutes to check out some of the YouTube videos. The MMS blog has some wonderful tutorials as well........these are sure to make you an expert in digital scrapbooking

One of the things I thought I might do with this software is to create an album where I can show some of my projects from start to finish....Or maybe just a pretty way to showcase my quilts using some of the software's papers, embellishments and Word Art (I'll share more of my ideas soon)

So, how would you like a chance to win your own copy of My Memories Suite?

To be entered in the random drawing for your very own copy of this digital scrapbooking software, I am asking that you go on over to the My Memories Suite site HERE , check it out and then come back and leave me a comment (in this post)telling me what your favourite papers or designer packs are.

but wait......would you like to better your odds of winning?........okay, I will give you several ways to get even more chances to win this prize.
For additional entries:

You can become a follower............leave a comment telling me.

If you are already a follower.................leave a comment letting me know

Help spread the word, create a post linking this giveaway on your blog.................come back and leave a comment for me.

If you would like to Facebook or Twitter...link this giveaway.........then be sure to return here and leave a comment telling me what you did

Visit the My Memories blog....become a follower there..........remember to come back and tell me

There, lots of ways to get extra chances BUT wait!!! This is the best part........No one will go away empty handed, because even if you don't win the giveaway of this terrific software, MyMemories Suite has given me a special code for all of my readers,
YES, that's right...your very own Share the Memories code that provides a $10 discount off the purchase of the My Memories Suite Scrapbook software AND a $10 coupon for the My Memories.com store - $20 value!)
So don't forget.......if you don't win ( or can't wait) the coupon code is: STMMMS69407

I am going to leave this open for the week and announce the winner on Monday October 24th to give you lots of time and please be sure I have a way to contact you.

Just a few more tests

2011-10-11T11:28:00.001-04:00

My last post garnered some interesting comments and suggestions about using those FriXion pens, Some of them led me to want to do a couple more tests. This time I drew a pair of marks side by side on fabric which I then cut in two. One would have the marks removed with heat (I used a hair dryer) and the other had the marks removed by washing only.
I discovered something very interesting I wanted to show you, this was difficult to capture with the camera but when looking at the fabric that had the markings removed with heat.......the markings "appear"to be totally gone BUT if you hold the fabric at just the right angle in just the right light, look what you can see, it is almost a "ghost" image of those markings. Click on either of these images to get a good, close up look....see how the markings now appear to have been drawn with a white pen?

I tried this again, but first actually stitched out the design, then rinsed/washed. While I can see some of the ink lines very, VERY faintly, the no heat and washing method seems to give the best result.
These pens write extremely well on fabric, the ink flows easily, but I think that I will only use them for perhaps marking applique placements or something where the markings will be covered by other fabrics, I don't think I'll be using them to mark my quilt tops.

Be sure to check back later in the week, you'll want to get the details about a giveaway I will soon be hosting.

Quilters BEWARE!

2011-10-04T13:18:00.001-04:00

We have all heard it said.........if its too good to be true, it probably is.

Have you seen the pens on the market that are erasable? Have you seen them at your local quilt store? They are called FriXion. The ink disappears when you run the iron over it. It seems like magic.....ah, but remember that line about something being too good to be true?

Back in April, I tried this pen out and was impressed, well that was until I saw the warning on the packaging.........extreme temperatures? (click on the image for a better view) What happens at extreme temperatures?

Well the ink reappears. Great for a magic act at a child's birthday party, but not so good for your quilts.

I found that if I put the fabric I had "erased" into my freezer, the ink reappeared, I wanted to give it a better test, so I did the same thing again but this time I left the "erased" fabric for 6 months before exposing it to the cold (hoping that after this much time had passed, the ink would not reappear) Nope, no such luck, the markings did indeed re-emerge.
You can see in the photo below that the markings come back VERY visible.

Now you may be saying to yourself...........why would I put my quilts in the freezer? well of course you would not BUT think about times when your quilt could be exposed to extreme temperatures. I can tell you that during our Canadian winters it can get mighty cold in the trunk of my car on the way to a guild meeting, what happens when you ship your quilts? They can often spend a day or two in very cold warehouses or in a cold shipping truck. I can just imagine sending a beautiful quilt off to a show and the judges opening the package only to see lots of ink all over the quilt........I am fairly certain they would NOT be impressed.

I have seen these pens available at quilt shops, (they come in lots of colours) upon speaking to one shop owner, she was completely unaware of the problem with these pens AND because the pens a sold individually, you probably are not getting that packaging with the warning on it. So just beware of what "could" happen if you decide you want to try these pens out on your quilts and please share this with other quilters you know.

Told ya, I don't like to waste a thing!

2011-09-27T10:07:00.002-04:00

I have an old June Tailor board, it is a cutting board on one side with a pressing mat on the other, but as you can see it is now in pretty rough shape. It is scorched, there is fusible stuck on the pressing surface, then the glue is all dried out and the whole thing has begun to separate.

Do I need a new one? no, not really. I just created a bag/pillowcase sort of thing with handles that I can slip the board into. Now it is still usable, I can press on the new, clean fabric and simply slide the board out for cutting, as an added bonus, when taking it to workshops I can slide my long rulers inside to easily take them along.
I decided to create something similar to make it easier to move about with applique projects. This time I used a piece of leftover sheet (most of the sheet was used as backing for this Row Robin project) The top part of the sheet still had that nice edging, I again, made a bag/pillowcase sort of thing with handles but this time I slipped a piece of Styro-Foam inside.

It is super lightweight, portable, and I can pin into it. This will easily accommodate an 18"block

No Waste

2011-09-13T11:23:00.001-04:00

I hate to waste any of my art supplies and more often than not, when I have been playing with paints, I find that I have a bit extra leftover. I just can't bear to watch it get washed down the drain, so I add water to what is left to really dilute the pigment, then I sop it all up with wet paper towels. I think that leaving them to dry on a slightly scrunched plastic bag might help contribute to the texture. Here are a few that turned out kind of interesting. These have all been pressed flat, so what you are seeing is the way the colours dried, blended and the lines that were created. (click on the photos for a closer look)
What do I do with them? Well, this is a postcard I recently made for our quilt guild's exchange. The only "fabric" is that small bit of selvage edge, the rest is painted paper towel that has been stamped and heavily stitched.

Easy, simple, and best of all..........nothing is wasted

Artist in Residence

2011-08-26T10:12:00.000-04:00

That's me!
When I was asked if I would consider taking on the job of CQA's Artist in Residence, I immediately said yes..........what a fabulous opportunity and learning experience this will be. I am thrilled to be a small part of the Editorial team.
A couple of weeks ago I had mentioned that CQA members would be hearing more from me very soon.........well the latest issue of the Canadian Quilter is out and contains my first article.
here is a sneak peek......( sorry, that is all I can show)........ members will see the pattern, instructions and tips found on the next pages.I know that not every project will appeal to all quilters, but I am hoping to provide a wide variety of designs and techniques over the coming year that members will enjoy and find interesting. The deadline is fast approaching for my next submission.

Want to know more about The Canadian Quilter's association? click here

Sewing in "Reverse"

2011-08-21T09:10:00.002-04:00

The one thing I would guess we all dislike having to do, is to sew in reverse (rip out stitching) but I decided I had to go backward in order to move on. A few posts ago I showed the center portion of a bed quilt I am currently working on. Well, I really, REALLY, did not like the look of those blue strips separating the blocks, I just knew they HAD to be removed. I suppose that is a downside of not following a pattern and "making it up" as you go along.
Not sure why I was bothered by those strips..........just seemed a bit cluttered, I am much happier with this cleaner look. Here is the pieced top, which measures 102 x 108 inches. Now I just have to find a space large enough to lay it out for the backing, batting and basting process.

The job of stitching on those long borders was made super easy by using the 1/4 inch walking foot system available for my Janome 6600P

From a little idea...............

2011-08-10T10:12:00.001-04:00

This past May, the CQA (Canadian Quilter's Association) mini conference was held here in London ON. I designed and created a pattern especially for the event. This leaf shaped fabric bowl (we are the "forest"city after all)Originally, I thought that a few would be made as decor, but the local organizing committee had other ideas and the project took on a life of it's own. The pattern was sent to guilds across the country and was printed in this issue of CQA's The Canadian Quilter.
It wasn't long before the "leaves", made by quilters from coast to coast began arriving. In this article, you can see that Christine is nearly buried under just a small sampling of what arrived at her door. 100s of the bowls were given away to quilters during the 4 day conference, and those who attended the Gala banquet received their leaf bowl filled with all sorts of fabulous quilty treasures.
This was the first time I had created a project for others and I was completely amazed by the response.
Are you a CQA member?...........if so, you will be seeing more from me very soon....ah, but that is another post.

Temporary Art

2011-08-01T20:21:00.000-04:00

I visited the Imadon street painting festival that was going on this weekend. Can you imagine doing all that work only to have it disappear within a few days (sooner if rains are heavy)? The artist's spend several days in awkward positions, on hard asphalt, under the hot sun as they produce incredible works with simple chalk pastels.......I just HAD to buy some for myself :-)
I only took photos of this artist's work, with her permission, of course. Axl T. Ernst was the feature artist this year.........can you see why? You can visit her web site here and to see more photos of this work in progress, go to her blog here
It really is quite amazing to see what can be achieved on such an unforgiving surface, the work is so fabulous you may not even notice the patched cracks in the asphalt or the parking spot lines.
I could not resist a photo of the state her shoes were in as she neared the completion of the festival.

Making a Cling-On

2011-07-20T13:54:00.002-04:00

I had picked up a few unmounted rubber stamps recently and wanted to make them usable with my clear acrylic blocks, but a rubber stamp doesn't stick to them the way the "cling mount" types do. Instead of going out to purchase a special product made for this purpose, I thought I'd see what I had on hand to do the job.
I dug out this roll of window film and some double sided tape.I applied the tape to the back of the stamp, laid a piece of the window film, non-sticky side down and pressed it firmly in place.
I then trimmed the film very close to the edge of the stamp and removed the backing paper. It can now be used with an acrylic block, removed and repositioned over and over.Here is a piece of fabric I went a little stamp crazy on.
I rinsed the stamp clean, left it to dry and found that it did retain it's "stickiness"
A piece of that same window film serves as a sheet to store my stamps on as well. This will make them easy to store and organize. (actually a plain piece of clear vinyl also works really well to store them on )

Lots of Pieces

2011-07-12T10:22:00.002-04:00

I started a bed quilt a little while back but then it just sorta got left sitting on the shelf. Projects sitting unfinished drive me crazy (not a long drive mind you) so I thought I'd spend some time getting back at this one. The center is complete and I am now deciding how I want the borders, I think I want to make this roughly King size..........I am quickly discovering that is a lot of 6" blocks.
And look what just arrived in today's mail..........these are fat quarters I won thanks to an online quilt show/contest that happens weekly at the Quilting Gallery. Every week there is a different theme, it is super easy to enter. You simply upload a photo along with a description of your piece, viewers come to the show on Friday through Sunday to choose their favourites, the quilts with the most votes wins a prize donated by generous sponsors. Even if you don't want to enter it is always fun to see the wonderful quilts.
These fabulous fat quarters came from Cheryl at On The Grain Fabrics, thanks so much Cheryl, these will work themselves nicely into the quilt above. (btw, Cheryl is the sponsor again this week)

Trees.......thread and real

2011-06-28T16:21:00.000-04:00

Here are a couple more photos of the tree I have been working on as a thread painting lesson. (see my last post)
I used only 3 colours of thread.

and this is a piece of tree I picked up while walking through a park the other day. The tree is dead and has been stripped in preparation for carving.
Check out the texture ( This is what it looks like under the bark, I think it might have been caused by the Emerald Ash Borer, which has destroyed many trees) I have some ideas for this piece of wood

Following a lesson plan

2011-06-20T10:07:00.001-04:00

A little while back The Quilt Show had several video lessons by Nancy Prince on thread painting. The first project was called Solitary Tree and I decided to follow along. There was a downloadable file of a tree that could be printed, but I wanted to use my own drawing for this.
I started with a very cool piece of fabric for the background and hand appliqued this circle to represent the moon.Next, the tree was drawn using a Sharpie marker onto some water soluble film
It was backed with stabilizer, then put into a hoop
and following the directions.........the free motion stitching has begun.

More to come

How Unfortunate........

2011-06-15T09:59:00.001-04:00

As many of you know I had the distinction of designing the logo for the CQA mini conference, Quilt Ontario, that was held here at the end of May. That logo appeared on bookmarks, posters, in the CQA newsletter, brochures and even on tote bags, and each time the logo was just as it had been designed. Of course, the conference is over, the paper is probably in the shredder or recycling bin, and the bags will likely end up in a drawer somewhere.
The one thing that will be around for a long time are the pins that were made, attendees purchase these pins, many collect them at conferences year after year.
How unfortunate that someone at the company producing the pins decided to "change" the artwork. Now I am fully aware that when reproducing artwork on a pin that is roughly 3/4" across, it may not have the same level of detail.......BUT.......I certainly did not expect to see this.

Here is the way the artwork has appeared on everything.....except the pin

here is the pin.

an employee at the company decided that the roots and branches should be black...........uh......that is not how it was designed and not how it was supposed to look.

Apparently this employee felt that he(or she) were "improving" the design.
How unfortunate.

Edit: It was and is not my intention to make an issue of this. I just found it curious that the artwork was reproduced unchanged on a great many items..........what circumstances led to the pin being different, I don't know. The company responsible did acknowledge the error and has made an effort to compensate for it. I guess the lesson is that it is always a good idea to be sure you can get approval when having work like this done to avoid surprises.

Because you know I am wierd......... right?

2011-06-08T21:05:00.000-04:00

I told you I would show how I my that little kilt.........if you want to know why I made it, well, I guess its just because........just because I am weird.
When I saw the theme for this year's Wee Quilt Challenge was DYI Plaid, I had lots of ideas for making some interesting and complicated plaids.......but for some unexplained reason, I really wanted to see if I could make this tiny little kilt. Don't forget this pieced is quilted, which means I was going to have to see if I could actually pleat something 3 layers thick.
I started "designing" my plaid by drawing some simple lines on paper and adding colour until I had something I liked. Then I drew that same grid pattern directly onto some plain white cotton using a Sharpie marker.
Because I did not want to have to worry about a hem, I first folded the fabric in half so that the fold would become the hem of the kilt and drew the lines on both sides. (so if you look under the kilt..........you will see the plaid is the same inside and out)
I played and manipulated the fabric, used lots of pins to be certain the piece was large enough to handle all of the pleating that would soon happen Then it needed to be coloured. I used blue, green, orange and navy colour pencils to fill in all of the squares and lines, being very mindful of the placement of each colour. Once it was all coloured, I brushed a thin layer of textile medium over the entire piece (front and back)
I cut bits away........some to be used for the waistband and some to make the side fringe. I used a lightwieght interfacing as my "batting" layer. Straight line machine quilting added the final lines of the plaid.
Normally it would be quite difficult to pleat something that is 3 layers, but I think the added stiffness from the textile medium actually helped with this, of course, so did lots of pins, a little starch and a good hot steam iron! I tried to make this piece to as functional as it could possibly be.........in other words it could actually be worn (by a very tiny person) The finished "Kuilt" is just 10"high.
Here you can see what the piece looks like when it is fully open. There are teeny darts, a little buttonhole to allow for the buckles to pass through, it even has a designer label and is finished with a very small kilt pin.The belt loops on the back are really just for the hanging rod so that it could be displayed on the wall.

Ribbons

2011-05-30T13:29:00.000-04:00

Who doesn't LOVE a pretty quilt show ribbon? I am the proud recipient of these beauties.
Imagine my delight to learn that the block I entered for the "Memories in Black and White" annual quilt block contest held each year at Joseph Schneider Haus in Kitchener ON., had been awarded First place honours.
I blogged about this block here.
Each year a quilt is made from the submitted blocks that is later raffled to raise funds for various projects at this historical museum. Here is the quilt on display after a quilting bee in which Mennonite women from the area expertly applied their beautiful hand quilting. It will now go off to be bound and will return to hang in a place of prominence until the raffle winner is chosen in Dec of 2012The comments from the judges just blew me away!
and if that wasn't exciting enough, I got quite the surprise during the Scottish Tea last Wednesday evening at a gathering held at McDougall Cottage in Cambridge ON., where the annual "Wee Quilt Challenge" is on display until Labour Day. The theme for this year's challenge was DIY Plaid, entrants were asked to create their own plaid. With not much more than plain cotton and colour pencils, I created my plaid, which I then fashioned into this fully functional wee kilt. It is titled "Kuilt".........what is a kuilt? well, it is a quilted Kilt, of course!
here it is hanging on the wall at the Cottage.
This ribbon will hang along side it during the show.
I plan to show more details of this piece and how it was made in my next post.

It's all done with Mirrors!

2011-05-18T10:22:00.000-04:00

Don't we all have items on our list that we forget to pick up at the quilt shop only to remember later, when you "need" it? I have long thought a set of right angled mirrors would come in handy when designing. While at a local quilt show recently I asked Shirley, owner of The Marsh Store if she carried these, Shirley told me that she did not have any in the store and would gladly order them for me, BUT she said, her opinion was they were a little pricey for something you could likely make yourself. She went on to suggest that I purchase a couple of inexpensive mirrors from the dollar store and see what I could do with them. Well.........THANK YOU Shirley......money saved on mirrors can be better spent on your luscious fabrics and fibre art supplies.

So.......$2 (plus tax, of course) and I now have a quick and easy way to develop designs and see how multiples will look, without having to spend time on the computer manipulating photos.

The mirrors
A small screw driver to pry open the plastic frame.......it popped open very easily
I used a set square to get the proper angle, a little tape on the back and I was in business ( you do need to leave a small gap when creating the "hinge")
Did you notice the doodle on the sketch pad there? Look how these mirrors allow me to see all sorts of possibilities simply by placing the mirror(s) on various sections of the doodle. You will also see that sometimes I placed the mirrors at less than a 90 degree angle to see the effect even more sections would give.

I LOVE a Challenge

2011-05-13T16:27:00.000-04:00

Like most guilds, each year we are given a new challenge. Those who chose to participate were given some fabric and a just a few rules. Our guild is celebrating 30 years so our challenge was to work with the fabric given ( our guild colours Blue and Gold) along with any other fabric of our choosing. The rules were pretty simple. The challenge fabric HAD to be visible on the front of the piece and it also needed to have at least 1 dimension measuring 30 inches.
The fact that blue and gold is likely one of my least favourite colour combos made this even more of a challenge for me.
I generally use challenges as an opportunity to try something that I have not yet done. I used this as an opportunity to do a small whole cloth type quilt with a "faux"trapunto effect. It is titled Challenging the Rules, the 30" dimension is from corner to corner on the diagonal.
I started by creating a fairly simple design with our guild logo/block at the center. These bits were cut from the challenge fabric and fused to a plain piece of muslin.Next, I overlaid a piece of tone on tone white fabric on top, which as you can see quiets down those colours very effectively.
I used 2 layers of batting to create more drama to the areas that would not be stitched.
I began by stitching just around the motifs.Then it was a simple matter of experimenting with a variety of free motion quilt designs, again, I wanted to try some things I had not done before, such as the crosshatching and circles.
I learned a great deal working on this little quilt and really want to tackle something similar on a much larger scale. I learned that eyeballing straight lines is not a very good idea, I learned I could FMQ crosshatch using a ruler, I learned circles can have the illusion of round without being perfectly round and I also learned that it is rather difficult to properly photograph a white quilt.....I apologize for these photos (they are not the best)
I wondered if I would be disqualified because of my interpretation of the challenge fabrics being "visible" on the front. But apparently the voting members thought it was okay as this piece placed third among some really fabulous work. I am ALWAYS amazed at the wonderful, unique variety of work each challenge brings year after year.

Seeing BUGS

2011-05-09T10:19:00.000-04:00

I have been stitching bugs and unlike most quilters I don't seem to have a large collection of thread, I think this is going to have to change. Some of them have been stitched using regular embroidery floss and I am finding that since this piece is being handled a lot, the thread is looking a bit "hairy", not liking this at all. You can see what I mean with this spider and flying insect.Then I began using a single strand of some machine embroidery threads I have, they look like rayon but are actually polyester. I have stitched them in a style similar to Kantha stitching inspired by a piece Bev White showed us. Here they have been done in positive/negative for a rather interesting effect.

I have now added a very thin layer of batting and plan to do some hand quilting on this piece. Great for relaxing outside on the deck.

Black and White

2011-05-02T12:50:00.000-04:00

Working in greyscale is an interesting exercise. You can certainly learn a good deal about value this way. I seem to be in a black and white mode these days.
This year's block challenge at Joseph Schneider Haus in Kitchener was themed "Memories in Black and White" Each year a quilt is made from submitted blocks that will later be raffled as a fundraising project. This is the block I submitted. It is done completely with black, white and grey fabrics. I chose to design and hand applique a block using my version of Forget-Me-Nots.I made the best use I could with the few prints I had. The "buds"are almost all a bit different even though they came from the same fabric. The main flower's centers were created by being very selective about cutting this Mark Lipinski print. As you can see, I never hesitate to cut holes in the middle of a piece of fabric

Stitching Insects

2011-04-27T15:02:00.000-04:00

I am still just playing with that little crazy quilt piece. I added a bit more fabric to the outer border to give me more stitching space. I am currently making up insects (all in greyscale) using black, greys and white threads
So far I have completed some ants and a couple of moths.
It is really like doodling with needle and thread in place of a pencil.

Workshop progress

2011-04-20T11:04:00.000-04:00

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to spend the day in a Crazy Quilt workshop with Bev White. Bev is truly a gifted artist with a generous spirit, wonderful sense of humour and is a tremendous source of inspiration. Still, she managed to keep us on task and by the end of the day I had 4 triangles stitched and ready for embellishment.
I decided to pair them up with that discharged Moth I did earlier. So I added a bit of fabric to make everything meet up and intend to display this one on point.I chose to do this in a black/white/grey pallet but quickly began to realize that my stitches don't really stand out. It seems that it all appears to be part of the fabric prints. Here are some close ups of some of the hand stitching.

This webThis SpiderThis winged creature was created by taking a piece of lace, cutting it up and re-arranging.

Do you see what I see? I see a great similarity between crazy quilts and the newest craze of Zentangles, do you?
Still lots to be done to this piece.

Going Crazy

2011-04-08T15:12:00.000-04:00

Next week I will be taking a "Crazy Quilt" workshop.........I have never had a desire to make a crazy quilt but this workshop looks to be lots of fun so I am in. I, of course, will want to do something just a wee bit different so I have decided it will have a "bug" theme. I plan to use a black and white pallet and incorporate some of my doodles.
I have been gathering a few insect fabrics but I wanted some little trims as well, so today, with the help of my printer and a piece of TAP, I printed images, which I then transferred onto twill tape and even a piece of white selvage.
Next I took an image that I printed twice, (the ruler is just for scale)
with some fusible pressed to the wrong side of each and carefully cut out, I was able to create this little double sided moth that can flutter somewhere on the piece.
It will be a nice addition to some of the little metal bits I have collected as well.

de-Colourant

2011-03-30T14:00:00.001-04:00

On a recent visit to The Marsh Store, I came home with some de-Colourant to try, made by Harbor Sales Inc. Basically, de-Colourant is a substance that you apply to areas of your fabric where you'd like to remove the colour. Once the de-colourant is applied, you leave it to dry, then to "activate" it, you simply press with a good hot iron using lots of steam. There are many of ways to play with this product, try using, brushes, stamps, stencils, resists, the list goes on, but I wanted to see if I could use it with one of my own designs.
I printed directly onto freezer paper and then ironed the freezer paper to fabric.
Next I went to the machine, removed the thread and using the free motion setting, I stitched along the lines. Once I was satisfied that I had created enough perforations, I began to brush the De-colourant over top of the paper.
I peeled off the paper and left it to dry. See how faint this is?And here is what emerged once the steam iron was applied.
One of the things I LOVE about The Marsh Store, is that in addition to the fabulous fabrics, notions, and services they provide, they also strive to bring in products for the art quilter as well, I always come away with something wonderful. Thanks Shirley!

Eighth inch stems

2011-03-23T11:36:00.002-04:00

In my previous post, I promised to come back and show how I achieve those eighth inch stems. I use a bias tape maker, they come in all sizes. For these tiny stems you will need one that is 6MM or (1/4")
When you are purchasing your bias maker, pay attention to the "mouth" Can you see the difference here?These are both the 1/4" bias tape makers, but the one with the big open mouth won't work for this. The one on the right is what you want to look for........mine is made by Clover and works wonderfully.
Begin by cutting your fabric strips slightly wider than a half inch
Dampen your strip with spray starch or Best Press, then press as you guide the fabric through the bias maker.You now have some nice 1/4 in stems.but wait...........want them even skinnier? Fold them in half and press once again.

Your raw edges are trapped inside and you now have a very narrow bias strip that can be easily curved for the most graceful, narrowest of stems

Applique - Glue Stick and Freezer Paper

2011-03-18T12:23:00.001-04:00

This is my preferred applique method. Press your freezer paper shape to the wrong side of the fabric
For ease of applying glue, I do this on an old magazine. The glossy pages make this part of the job super easy and keeps everything much cleaner. You'll want to apply the glue onto both the seam allowance as well as a small amount along the paper's edge.

On this piece, I began with the corners firstThen the sides

Finally the curve
I do NOT remove the freezer paper, it stays in place until all of my pieces are stitched in place and is removed from the back as I showed in my most recent post.

Until recently, I have been using a regular glue stick that you can buy at any office supply store. These work fine, but there are some drawbacks. I find that they are quite "gooey" and can be a little bit of a mess, on top of that, areas where you may have been a little generous with the glue tend to be difficult to pass your needle through. Michele at Quilting Gallery asked if I would like to try a new product called Lapel Stick and offered to send me a couple. I must say that I am impressed with these. They are smooth and easy to apply, rinse out very nicely, stick well, are not nearly as messy and do not leave the fabric quite as stiff, so they do allow for much easier stitching. I did not hesitate to order more so I have a good supply of these on hand.

There has been some discussion in our Yahoo group about how to go about getting nice thin stems. I'll get some photos prepared and show this in my next post

When Fabric Speaks

2011-03-14T11:58:00.003-04:00

While working on the next applique block for the "My Tweets" BOM, I was having a little trouble deciding what fabric/colour I wanted to use for the flowers. Nothing in my stash really appealed to me for this one, so of course, I had to go shopping. I came across this fabric on the weekend and it screamed "Take me home.........I am the one"I love the way these pieces turned out.
I hope to have the block assembled later today, so I will be able to show the whole look soon.

Whew!

2011-03-07T15:49:00.001-05:00

In my last post I talked about the fact that the method I use for applique involves leaving the freezer paper in until all of the stitching is finished and then immersing the work in warm water to dissolve the glue and soften the paper for removal.
Well, this block is completely stitchedHere is a view of the back............see all the paper still in there?
I make slits through just the background fabricPut the block into VERY warm water (I added about a teaspoon of Retayne to the water)
The freezer paper is gently pulled out through the slitsOnce all of the paper is out, the piece is again rinsed to be sure all of the glue is removed, then instead of wringing or squeezing, I roll the piece in a thick towel to get rid of as much water as possible.Next I basically "block" it by making certain I have it laid out as flat and smooth as possible to dry.Here is the block finished, the Retayne once again seems to have helped in the prevention of any nasty mishaps with one or more fabrics that might have other wise bled. (I have to admit that I am really not a pre-washer)....now onto the next block in this "My Tweets" BOM series. I plan to do a little tutorial of sorts on this method......but I have some other products to try......you'll just have to wait and see

Applique and Glue sticks

2011-02-28T11:33:00.000-05:00

That is how I learned to applique. Freezer paper and glue sticks. This is the only method I have tried so far and I do like the results. First complaint I hear people have about using freezer paper, is having to reverse the pattern. You don't have to reverse your pattern, you can draw directly on the shiny side of freezer paper if you use a "wash" pencil. (of course you will want to transfer any important markings to the dull side as that is what will be visible when working on your project.
I like that I can pre-assemble all of the larger multi-pieced elements
I can leave most of the pieces aside until I am ready for them..........I just add a few at a time, stitch and then add more
With the pattern lying under the fabric as your guide, line everything up and continue to add pieces. (oh and I glue these down as well) I only use pins where absolutely necessary.
You get very nice smooth edges and wonderfully sharp points. BUT with this method, the freezer paper stays in until all of the stitching is done.
Then you slit the back, hold your breath as you immerse it in VERY warm water. This dissolves the glue while softening the freezer paper which you pull out through the slits you've made. So the big drawback here is if one of more of your fabrics might bleed. I add a few drops of a product called Retayne to the water and so far I have had great results ( or maybe I've just been lucky) We will see what happens when it comes to this block as one of those birds is really quite purple & red.
I still have a bit more stitching to do, tune in next week to see what happens (insert scary music here)

Painting Lesson

2011-02-22T11:55:00.001-05:00

I have been wanting to teach myself to paint on fabric for some time, its not that I don't have time or supplies, I just never seem to know WHAT to paint, so I never get started. I decided to pick up a couple of instructional books that have lots of lessons/subject matter for student use and just dive in. ( now keep in mind that I can not paint on paper or canvas......so I don't know why I think I can paint on fabric.......I just know I really want to give it a go)
The books that I purchased, are authored by painters using canvas and oils..........I will need to adapt, as I am using fabric, along with a variety of textile paints and inks.
I began by picking a fairly simple shaped subject and using freezer paper created a "resist" so that I could paint my background.
Once the paint had dried and the resist removed, I was able to lightly draw in some of the detail lines.
I slowly began building the base colours

added detailthen added a some dimension with a little bit of thread painting.They say that we learn by our mistakes..............well I learned a great deal as I worked on this small piece, I plan to add borders and quilt it.
Eventually, I would like to be able to work from my own photos.

Developing the Centerpiece

2011-02-16T11:38:00.000-05:00

While waiting for the next block in the "My Tweets" BOM, I have been working on preparing the centerpiece of the quilt. I thought I would show you how I go about working with an applique design that has a lot of pieces. I begin by tracing all of the elements onto freezer paper to create the templates. I then laid the full size paper pattern on top of a piece of Styrofoam so that I can pin each piece in place as I cut it out. This helps to keep all those little bits (there are 123 of them) in the correct place/order and allows me to very quickly see if I am happy with my fabric choice. In this case, I started with the leaves, and vase, then moved onto the birds as I was fairly certain which fabrics I wanted in those spots.Now with many of the key elements in place, I audition fabrics for the rest, trying to maintain good balance with colour and value. I don't do the next step in the preparing the applique piece just yet. I simply place the raw edged piece in place until I am satisfied that it is a keeper.
Only once I am pleased with my choices, do I move onto the next stage. Here, all of the pieces are now prepared and ready to be placed onto the background fabric for stitching.
This center block is made up of 50 different fabrics. When I shop for fabric I tend to purchase almost exclusively fat quarters, so while my stash is not large, I do have a wide selection to pull from.

What can you do with those tiny scraps?

2011-02-10T11:48:00.000-05:00

Some time ago, I saw a post on Terri Stegmiller's site, Stegart showing how to do a Mosaic Collage with little bits of fabrics. This is something I filed away, wanting to try.....It is on a long list of things I want to get to.
I decided to give it a whirl on a very small scale. I chopped up some bits of fabric (these measure about 3/4" square), the hearts are a simple rubber stamp design on fabric, then coloured with inks, cut out with fusible on the back.
On top of a piece of Timtex, I added a layer of fusible web, on top of that, I laid out those bits of fabric. Using a dry iron and parchment paper to protect it, I fused everything in place.
When it came to the quilting, I found this foot that I purchased for my Janome 6600P very useful. It is easy to see through and allows you to free motion over those raw edges super easily.

I fused the hearts in place, trimmed it up and now I have a postcard ready for my guild's postcard exchange.
For some incredible inspiration and great ideas, be sure to check out 3 Creative Studios Look at the list of Free Projects to find Terri's Mosaic Collage Art Quilting Technique. She shows you step by step, how to do a whole art quilt with this technique (not just a background)

Aren't you just amazed by what other quilters share with us everyday? FANTASTIC!!!!

Feathered Heart and Giveaway Winner

2011-02-04T12:17:00.001-05:00

Thanks to everyone who entered, I wish I could send everyone a book but I could only choose 1 name........the winner is number 39 .....Joanne, Congratulations! I'll be in touch to get your snail mail info
btw (I counted the first 2 comments as one, since they were from the same blogger)

Now, I don't want the rest of you to go away empty handed so how about if I share this project with you. I wanted some extra clipart for my guild's newsletter, something valentine(y) so I drew this feathered heart and scanned it.
Then I thought how would this look stitched, so after tracing I did a little FMQof course, I could not leave it alone, so after stitching, I decided to add some colour.
In this case I used INKTENSE pencils. Instead of wetting them with water I used a bit of clear aloe-vera gel with a small paint brush. See the how the gel makes the colour come alive? The photo below shows the right side having had a thin layer of gel applied on top of the pencil. By using the gel you have no danger of the colour bleeding.
I did mine on a small piece of fabric to turn into a postcard but you could do this any size you like.

So snag that black and white feathered heart imagine for yourself and play with it......stitch, colour ( use pencils, inks, crayons, paints, whatever you have) or even maybe try Zentangle patterns on it. Enjoy!

#200

2011-01-28T12:00:00.001-05:00

yup, I have actually reached post number 200!
Today's post is about working with black fabric, the first thing you need to know, is that you will always want to purchase more fabric than you think you will need for a project (black fabrics are really difficult to match if you find you have not bought enough) I realized too late, that I don't have the yardage required for what I had originally planned, so this piece will have to go in a different direction. In an earlier post, I showed one of these hand appliqued feather blocks, here are four of them now joined to create the center medallion.
Those colours? some are commercial dyes and many are my hand painted fabrics. Another thing I discovered about using black fabric is that with such high contrast, every flaw is magnified. YIKES!
Now I suppose post number 200 needs to be celebrated, so I think I must have a giveaway. Leave a comment to enter, its just that simple. Please be sure I have a way to contact you
The prize?
how about a copy of Zentangle Fabric Arts

(you can read the post about my involvement in this book here)

For any of you who may already own this book, let me know in the comment and if your name is drawn I'll send you something else. I'll make the draw next Friday.

"My Tweets" Block 1

2011-01-23T12:21:00.001-05:00

Those of you who know me, know that I rarely use patterns created by others, but this year I have decided to take on my very first BOM. Erin Russek over at One Piece at a Time is hosting a block of the month called "My Tweets" .......an applique quilt featuring lots of birds, flowers and vines.
Now, of course, you know I am not going to do exactly what everyone else is doing. While I really enjoy hand applique I also want to draw, paint, ink, bead............and well you get the idea. I began block one with some paints, inks and brushesOnce I had the image completely painted I added applique here and there.
I want to wait until I have several blocks to this stage before deciding how "finished" this is. I am looking forward to seeing how this will evolve over the next 12 months.

Washing Yardage

2011-01-20T11:56:00.001-05:00

Let me begin my stating that this was NOT my idea......I read, or heard of this method for pre-washing yardage some time ago. I wish I could remember where because I would love to give them credit. This little time saving trick worked so well for me I had to pass it along.

I had a piece of fabric just over 9 metres long, needing to be pre-washed. You know what happens when you throw that full length of fabric into the washer......you end up with a big twisted mess that has to be unwound to then go into the dryer where it just twists up again so that by the time it is dry you have to spend a long time at the ironing board trying to get rid of all the wrinkling.
To avoid this, a little prep work is all you need. Here is what I did.
I opened the fabric up so that it was the full 45" long, serged the raw edges to prevent unraveling, and then began accordion folding in roughly 1m lengths along one selvage edge. I set my machine to a long stitch, used a contrasting thread in the bobbin and proceeded to stitch the selvage edges closed through all layers. ( Not sure if it was only supposed to be done at one end but I did this to both ends)
What went into the washer was a piece of fabric that measured about 45 x 40 inches and 9 layers thick. I checked it a couple of times during the wash cycle to make certain it stayed in that shape. When it came out of the dryer I unpicked the basting threads and left the piece draped over the ironing board still folded, to finish drying (the selvage area was still damp)

The only pressing I will need to do is what I would generally when beginning any project. You can bet I'll be using this method to pre-wash my fabrics in the future

Marking Solution

2011-01-14T15:19:00.001-05:00

How do you transfer a design onto dark fabric when even a light box doesn't work? Here's what I did. Wanting to transfer my markings for applique placement, I created a stencil.
This allows me to easily see exactly where I am placing my design and mark it. In this case, I kept it a little "inside" my finished design so that I could place my applique pieces knowing that I would not have to worry about any of the lines showing on the finished block

You might think this would be a bit of a pain if you only plan to use the design once, but it is a great solution for doing multiples of applique, quilting designs, trapunto......well you get the idea.

Getting Back on Track

2011-01-09T11:07:00.000-05:00

I had fallen a little behind in doing the weekly responses for The Creative Prompt Project.
I thought that while I will continue to pick away at the list of ones I've missed, I would at least try to stay up to date with the words for 2011. Jaye posted the first one of the new year on Friday........here is my response. Can you guess what the word is?

The answer is here

Do you love applique?

2011-01-03T14:57:00.002-05:00

Well, if you do, you will not want to miss out on this opportunity. Over at One Piece at a Time ,Erin has so generously provided her patterns as free download-able PDFs for a beautiful block of the month applique quilt, but you will need to hurry as they will only be available till January 5th.... you can find all the info about this quilt and the downloads here
I am still pretty new to applique so I can use all the practice I can get.......I did a quarter of one of the blocks just to see how it would look.For this, I used the Invisafil threads. I LOVE them for hand applique. They are a fine, 100wt polyester.... your stitches will just disappear!

Autumn

2011-01-01T12:06:00.001-05:00

Yes, I know it is Jan 1st, and that it is winter here, but yesterday I awoke to loud honking of a flock of Canada geese flying overhead...........silly birds should have flown south some time ago, which sparked this response to the CPP prompt word #91 Autumn
This past Friday, Jaye of Artquiltmaker, posted the 100th prompt word since starting this project nearly 2 years ago. You can find the prompts words for 2010 here and 2009 here
Jaye is always happy to welcome new participants (doesn't have to be a drawing...........you can post anything that a particular prompt word brings to mind)
It really is a terrific exercise to keep the creative juices flowing!

Creative Gift Wrapping

2010-12-26T12:37:00.000-05:00

How do you wrap a gift card? Gift cards can be a great choice to give to someone who loves to shop, but they sure don't look like much on Christmas morning. So here is what I did for a gal who has a great fondness for turtles. First I did this doodle.From my fabrics, I selected this terrific print but my hand painted blue fabric seemed "too" blue so I overdyed it with a bit of green textile paint to tone it down.After printing the turtle in a few sizes onto a sheet of TAP, they were then transferred to the new fabric.Bubbles and wavy line quilting worked great.here is the finished bag that the gift card was tucked into.

New addition

2010-12-18T13:38:00.001-05:00

New, is #96 on the list of word prompts for The Creative Prompt Project.

This Little Princess, one of the most recent additions to my toy sewing machine collection is roughly 85 years old but looks just like NEW!, which prompted me to draw this.

I seem to be a little behind

2010-12-12T15:08:00.002-05:00

It has been quite a while since I last posted a response to the weekly Creative Prompt Project.
I really need to try to get back on track. Here is my response to word prompt #93, Twinkle
Christmas lights are twinkling everywhere you look these days.

Drum roll please..........

2010-12-12T09:49:00.001-05:00

......and the winner is, sbsudbury. Congratulations Sharon,........email me with your snail mail address and I'll get that card off to you right away.

Love these pencils........still not so crazy about TAP

2010-12-08T14:33:00.000-05:00

Been playing with some new (to me) products as of late. I LOVE these Inktense pencils. Use them just like a regular pencil, but when you wet them, the colour blooms and becomes permanent once allowed to dry. If you desire a watercolour effect, allowing the pencil/colour to bleed......then water works great.........BUT if you don't want the colour to run and bleed out in your fabric you may want to try using something else to "wet" the penciled area. Here is a test I did. I first made several circles on a piece of fabric and coloured them using the Inktense pencilsNext I used various "mediums" to wet the areas and see how the pencil would be affected.
I have left these images large so click on them to get a better look. As you can see, there was lots of running with the use of water (and my brush was NOT saturated, I used as little as possible) The other items actually all worked quite well and the only one that significantly changes the hand of the fabric is the Golden Medium. I even washed the finished piece to see how well it would hold it's colour......result? Excellent!
Now......about TAP, Artist Transfer Paper. I thought that I would be able to dampen the TAP and then use those Inktense pencils because they "dissolve" in the water........but even though I worked as gentle as possible, it still rubbed the coating off and you just end up with a mess.........so, I have found that the TAP works very well when using it with your printer but even though the reviews say you can draw on this stuff, you really can NOT, unless you are using a very fluid medium like ink, paint, or markers. Pencils, crayons, pastels and paintsticks all just scrape the coating off .....I found it quite disappointing.

I did make some cards though. After discovering that I could not do what I had planned with the images printed on TAP, I decided to go ahead and transfer them to fabric and then colour them after. Here are the finished cards.Most of them are spoken for, but this one is up for grabs. If you'd like to find it in your mail box, please leave a comment in this post. I'll announce a winner Sunday.

Seaonal Doodle

2010-12-03T13:56:00.000-05:00

I have not been doing much in the way of doodling lately....not real sure why.......but I had an idea that I wanted to try so I decided to do this seasonal doodle to play around with
I scanned the image and placed several onto a page, then printed it onto a sheet of TAP

See those pencils? Oooooooooooooo those are the Inktense pencils that I have been wanting to try.
Some people like to roam the malls.....not me, but I DO so love to browse through aisles and aisles of art supplies. Got these at one of my favouite shops Mercury Art Supply

So in an earlier post, I told you that I was disapointed to find that I could not use pencils on the Tap........the pencil just scraped off the coating........well I think I have found away around that. Check back next week if you'd like to see what I am up to.

Need a "Special" card?

2010-12-01T12:07:00.001-05:00

Did you make cards when you were a child..........you know for Mom and Dad, Grandma and Grandpa......they always said how much like enjoy having a card made by you. Why did we stop, sure the card shop has a great selection but sometimes you want something a little different, something Special.

I thought why not use the process of making fabric postcards to create a greeting card in the same manner. Those of you who have purchased the book Zentangle Fabric Arts Quilting Embroidery will recognize this design. I took my design and after drawing it onto fabric, I doodled and added colour using ordinary crayons, backed it with a piece of Timtex, did some free motion stitching...........all the same steps as I would for a postcard...plus a bit of beading to make it sparkle.

The final step was simply to stitch it to the front of a blank card (I got a pack of blanks cards with envelopes at the "Dollar" store)........I think this is perfect for those occasions where you are specifically asked to bring best wishes only

Still TAPping

2010-11-22T10:56:00.001-05:00

In an earlier post, I spoke about a product known as TAP (Artist Transfer Paper). Although there were some things I did not like about it, I know I will find many uses for it. Recently I took one of my feather designs, drew it directly onto fabric and coloured it using ordinary crayons. I quite liked the way it turned out and decided to use the TAP to duplicate this one.So I scanned the original and then printed a couple of the images onto a sheet of TAP. Cut one out and transferred that image onto fabric using a hot iron.The original is on the right and the TAPped version is on the left, finished as a postcard. I must admit this was kinda cool!

Lino Cutting

2010-11-15T11:56:00.000-05:00

I am still playing with feathers. I wanted to create a stamp of one of my feather designs, so I broke out my lino cutting tools. Here you see the stamp as I began the cutting process. The lino block I am using is 4 x 6 inches in size.
The finished stamp with textile paint applied. Instead of "stamping" onto the fabric, I laid the fabric (a sheer) on top of the wet stamp and rolled a brayer over it.With just a little more refinement to the cutting, I think this is going to work quite wellHope you are not tiring of feathers, because I have many more to show over the next little while.

Do you Tap?

2010-11-11T16:29:00.001-05:00

This post is going to be about a product known as TAP .....Transfer Artist Paper, but first I want to tell you about Heather Ordover. Heather has a site called Cr aftlit a podcast for crafters who love books. She recently contacted me to let me know that she had in fact mentioned me in one of these podcasts, Cool! She just had so many wonderful things to say about what can be found here on my blog that I think she may have actually made me blush, so when you get a chance please go on over and check her out.........you just may find yourself tuning in to listen to Heather as you happily while away the time working on your current projects.

So........Tap. Have you heard of this stuff? Have you, do you, use it? I have been wanting to get my hands on this for a long time and was so excited to find it last month, that I bought a couple of packages. I am going to reserve judgment as I go along using it in various ways. I will tell you what I like about it and why I am also quite disappointed with it.
First of all what is it?...... well it is a paper that has a coating on one side. You can put it through your printer, you can draw and paint directly on it and then, using an iron you can "transfer" your image onto all sorts of surfaces, fabric, glass, wood, metal, paper...etc .......but I really only care about using it with fabric at this point.I must tell you that it is a kind of expensive medium to play with as 5 sheets at 12.95 plus 13% tax means that they are costing me nearly $3/sheet so you can bet I'll be using every inch of this stuff.The first thing I did was try to draw directly onto this and found out very quickly(to my great disappointment) that a pencil or crayon dragged across this paper just causes it to "scrape" the coating off.........not real happy as it was one of the things I wanted this stuff for. So the next thing I did was run a sheet through the printer. I created some text for a label and a couple of feathers to experiment with. The results going through the printer were good. Nice sharp, clear text, but when it is ironed onto fabric (as in this label) you still see the "edges" where it was cut from the paper and it is a little stiff........I thought it was not suppose to change the hand of the fabric much....well trust me it does! It softens a little after washing but I honestly did not find this really much better than the T shirt transfer papers that are out there. I left this photo as a large file so if you click on it, you can see what I mean.okay, so then, I went on to using some markers, inks and paints. I printed these quickly drawn feather outlines onto the TAP and then went over the lines with a sharpie marker. The marker glided over the paper fairly well but the coating will gum up your marker in a very short time. Next I got playing with paints. The yellow and orange feather was created using Setacolour transparent paints straight from the bottle.........with the green feather, I decided to really test the paper. I brushed a clear gel over the entire surface and then went in with all purpose inks, added more marker here and there and let it all dry.

Once the green one was completely dry, I went back in and scraped away some of the colour........this actually proved to be quite interesting. I cut the pieces out fairly close to the image and have saved every scrap of the paper for later use. I WILL use it somehow.Finally you see the images after they have been ironed to fabric. I have to say that the images really do transfer beautifully.I can see where this stuff would be great for collage work, but I was not impressed with it on a plain solid fabric. (as in that quilt label) Also, you should know that if you plan to do any micro-stippling on this stuff, you will need to be prepared to get lots of little Tap Dandruff on you.
I will continue to play with this product and post the results.

I was at Quilt Market in Houston

2010-11-04T15:45:00.002-04:00

well.........no, I wasn't really, but I almost feel like a little bit of me was........why?
Well, you see, I have been fortunate enough to have been involved with the creation of a book called Zentangle Fabric Arts, Quilting and Embroidery published by Suzanne McNeill of Design Originals. I am delighted to be one of the guest artists/designers
The book has just been released this week and is available on her site Design Originals as well as Amazon.com
Here is Suzanne at Quilt Market in Houston last week promoting the new book. (open to my pages) :-)
These photos were sent to me by Linda M Poole , Author, Artist, Instructor, Quilter and Fabric Designer. Linda was attending Quilt Market and snapped these for me. Thanks Linda I am so excited to see them
I did a design exclusively for the book (see those postcards in the background?) and Suzanne has also featured a close up shot of my quilt "Graffiti"

In Suzanne's post today, she even has included a link so you can check it out on YouTube

I have not seen the book yet but there is one on it's way........I can hardly wait till it arrives!!!!
Thank you Suzanne.........It has been a great experience.

Paper Towel as Fabric

2010-11-02T11:59:00.000-04:00

Whenever I play with paint, I keep the paper towels used in clean up. I always think I will use them in some way. Yesterday I decided to create a paper/fabric postcard using one of these pieces and a recently purchased stamp.
This gorgeous stamp was purchased from the fun ladies at the Colouricious booth during the Toronto Creative Festival. visit their we bsite to see the amazing array of fabulous hand carved blocks they have available.
I began with this paper towel
To the stamp, I applied textile paint with a sponge and just began randomly placing the stamp, pressing lightly in some areas and harder in others.A mat with a 4 x 6 opening helped decide what part of the printed paper towel I wanted to use
Finished postcard and close up. I simply stitched a tight little stipple to enhance the appearance of layered leaves

Playing with Colour

2010-10-26T11:32:00.001-04:00

Lately, I have been experimenting with adding colour to black fabric. My original plan was to discharge the black and then add colour back in................this stuff will not discharge. It is good quality quilters cotton but for some reason it does not want to discharge. I've tried discharge paste, gel bleach, and even hairdressing streaking solution.........nothing worked. So I began playing with paints and not having a lot of success. The best result I have had so far is by painting a motif onto the fabric using an opaque white, once dry I added colour by using Tsukineko all purpose inks applied with those Fantastix applicators.
I don't generally like those applicators but on this black fabric I don't need to be precise (don't have to stay inside the lines)I plan to add some thread work to see if I can get a little more colour "POP"
Below is a postcard that is on it's way to a friend who will soon be celebrating her 80th birthday, I had to send it out a little early because she is jetting off to Mexico.........how cool is that?

Wicked Cool!!!

2010-10-20T13:03:00.003-04:00

I received a fabulous surprise in my mailbox this week from Mary over at Quilt Hollow. I had not won a giveaway or anything, she sent this to me "just because" .........isn't that the BEST!!
The whimsical print even has a poem and some real cute little ratties on it.....Fantastic!Well, I gotta tell you that this little bag has the most cool closure I have ever seen. This is a "Snap Happy" pattern from Stitchin' Sisters, go check them out.
Have you seen these before? The secret is that a metal measuring tape is used to make the bag "snap"closed........I think this is absolutely brilliant!!!!!

I LOVE this so much, I had to make one for a friend..... I am sure I'll make plenty more of them.
I don't actually have the pattern but my years working in the garment industry has left me with some fairly good pattern making skills.I made a slightly larger one using coffee themed prints......I included a little pocket inside that is just the right size to hold one of those prepaid coffee cards. I think these make great "just because" gifts.

Thanks again Mary...........I always say.........Quilt bloggers ARE the best!

Edit:
I just found out that the patterns for these bags are available at The Marsh Store (one of my personal favourite spots) so if you are in this area, why not drop by and pick one (or more) up.........make one for yourself and a few to have ready for friends and family.

Seasonal Doodle

2010-10-14T09:20:00.001-04:00

Wanting to get a postcard ready for our guild exchange this week, I came across a cute pumpkin fabric and was inspired to do a little doodling.

I did this one quickly in my sketchbook
and then repeated a similar one directly onto a piece of my painted fabric to create this card.
Do you participate in postcard exchanges with a quilt guild or fibre-art group? You just never know what will show up in your mailbox

Ta-Daa!!

2010-10-10T10:10:00.002-04:00

Look what was hiding under that blue paint.
Now I ask you........why on earth would someone have felt the need to paint this in the first place?This is the natural wood, no stain or varnish, I have simply used a little Lemon Oil to bring back it's beauty. You can see some of the wonderful grain here and the great decal on this piece.
You just never know what you might find under painted furniture........sometimes the paint is covering something nasty, it can be a gamble and a lot of work......this one was well worth the effort.

Stripping!

2010-10-05T11:55:00.001-04:00

Yup, that's right, I am stripper!....... okay........wait, it's not nearly as scary as that sounds.
A short time ago I came across this terrific sewing cabinet, trouble is that it had been painted. I took a chance that it would be a very nice piece once restored and purchased it.
You can see that someone was really into decorative painting, each side was painted a little differently. Fortunately the original decal from White Sewing Machine Co. is still in tact on the inside of the lid and had not been painted over.With the hardware removed, I used a heat gun and sand paper to get rid of as much of the paint as possible.
It is looking pretty good. In order to get the last remaining bits out of the corners and grooves, I will have resort to the use of a chemical stripper. I want to do this outside so if the weather cooperates, I hope to have this finished by the end of the week.

Testing

2010-09-28T10:07:00.002-04:00

Do you remember those Black & White prints I over dyed with paint? It is all part of a test process. I do like to use paints quite a bit in my quilting and really want to get a good sense of how they will stand up over time and maybe a little abuse.
I plan to let it live in the light, use it as a table topper and wash it often to document how the painted fabrics hold onto their colour ....even the "off-white" background is a painted fabric, it was originally a white tone on tone.I used some of the original black and white prints when I pieced the back.
This quilt measures 30"x 30" and is known as a "Schnibbles". Mary over at Quilt Hollow sent me this pattern called State Fair .......she confesses to being a "Schnibbles Addict".
To see more Schnibbles, head on over to Miss Rosie's Quilt Co. but be careful............. you may become one too!

And the Winner is..........

2010-09-23T08:54:00.003-04:00

KIM! I used a random number generator and your number came up. Congrats to you and thank you to everyone for their wonderful comments.

This card will be on it's way to you shortly

A Little Behind

2010-09-22T11:37:00.002-04:00

Have you been wondering where my responses to The Creative Prompt Project have gotten to? I am just a little behind ........well, a lot actually, but I will try to get caught up. It may require being very "creative" so for word # 81 "Middle" I think this photo says it all.
Prompt words, #s 82, 83, & 84 are Curve, Compass, and Crimson. I have combined all 3 with this doodle. A Compass is a great tool to draw a perfect Curve and this one has a piece of Crimson lead!
I will be posting the winner of the postcard tomorrow morning, so if you have not yet entered, there is still time, just be sure to leave a comment in my Sept 16th post below.

Playing and Sharing........(maybe with you)

2010-09-16T16:05:00.001-04:00

A couple of weeks ago I got to spend a few days with a fibre-artist and long time friend. Not only did we have a wonderful time catching up but we also got in a little "play time"
Sometimes this is when some terrific spontaneous designs can happen. We were testing out a number of different supplies, when I quickly drew a feather that I could paint to see if there would be much "bleeding" across the lines. Once I got it home, I realized that I really quite liked it, I added a little doodling and turned it into this postcard.I decided to make a couple more based on that same design
This one is using some tiny scraps left over from a previous painted fabric project, the little circles were coloured using Sharpie markers.This one was done using a marbled fabric, the colour placement was not planned, I drew the individual feathers onto the paper side of fusible and simply pressed it to the marbled fabric and then cut out the feathers, sharpie markers were again used for colouring the circles.
Here comes the "sharing" part of this post...........would you like to have this postcard? I am afraid the first 2 are spoken for, but this third one will go to one of my blog readers. To have a chance to find this card in your mailbox, just leave me a comment. Are you a regular visitor or have you just recently come across this blog? I know that there are lots of you who visit often but don't always leave a comment and that's okay, but if you want a chance to win this card you'll have to let me hear from you. Remember to be sure I have a way to contact you. I'll announce the winner next Thursday, Sept 23rd so you have lots of time.

This n' That

2010-09-13T14:48:00.000-04:00

I attended a couple of Antique shows in the area this weekend and came away with this pretty little machine along with it's original box and clamp all in excellent condition.
I also scored this beautifully carved wooden box. It is from Wheeler & Wilson sewing machines.
The fall issues of The Canadian Quilter and A Needle Pulling Thread magazines, both have wonderful layouts showing the winning quilts from this year's Grand National. It is always exciting to see one's work on the pages of one of these slick publications. You can learn more about The Grand National quilt show here And finally, here is a little peak at what I am doing with those black and white prints I painted a little while ago. More on this later

Pointing the way to a fun Tutorial.

2010-09-04T12:31:00.001-04:00

I notice as I work my way through blog land that there are always some terrific tutorials out there, but who has time to actually make all these wonderful things? Well, here is one I came across that just seemed so quick and easy that I had to give it a go.
Cynthia at Idle Hands Empty Brain walks us through a super simple and fun to make thimble holder (or any little treasure really)

Go on over and check it out. I made mine to hold my thimbles, I added a small lobster claw so that I could attach it to my needle book. Made a couple extra for friends.
Mind you, I only went green as far as using the plastic lids, I must confess that I machine sewed what could be done by machine and of course did the rest by hand. You can have lots of fun adding nifty little beads and trinkets too, maybe you have a favourite earring that has lost it's twin or other broken bits of costume jewelery, just one more way to recycle and re-use

I think these could easily be made in several sizes and have quite a number of possible uses.

Don't toss that out!!!!

2010-08-28T16:41:00.001-04:00

A little recycling finishes the Row Robin quilt. A short time ago, a friend called me to say that while helping her daughter move they had discovered this huge roll of Thinsulate Insulation hidden away and forgotten up in the attic (you know the stuff that goes into coats, gloves, and so on) She could not take it and her daughter did not want it........If I had no use for it .....well it would be heading to the landfill. So this baby is living at my house.
I knew it would be great for free motion quilting practice and maybe some small pieces but what about an actual quilt? I decided the Row Robin quilt was a good one to "test" this stuff on.
It has been machine quilted on my domestic machine and been through the washer and dryer. It came out great, you would never know that this is not expensive batting. It kept it's shape, no stretching, no bearding, no distortion and it is uniform in thickness. In case this experiment did not have a happy ending I did not want to waste expensive fabric on the backing so I purchased a 100% cotton sheet at the thrift store for that purpose.
Something else I had wanted to try, was using a water soluble thread trick, you see, normally I spend a good long time thread basting by hand my quilts to prepare them for the free motion work, mainly because I hate using pins. But not this time! I pin basted the sandwich and then with regular thread in the bobbin and the wash away stuff in the needle I stitched in the ditch (sort of) to anchor the whole sandwich together then removed the pins, now I was ready to do the FMQAfter the quilting was complete I took an artist paint brush, dipped in water and ran it down the water soluble thread stitching lines. The basting thread on the quilt front dissolved which made the thread on the back simply release completely. TOO easy!!! Here is a close up look at how this was quilted.

Still Playing with Paint.

2010-08-23T12:00:00.001-04:00

No brushes this time though. I decided to do a little over-dyeing (but with paint of course). Pulled some pieces from my pile of black and whites. Mixed up several different colours and made sure the paint was evenly distributed through each piece, (used that technical technique of sopping up the paint and squishing it a few times) the pieces were left to dry and then heat set. These are for a small project I want to start soon.

Painting Workshop on DVD

2010-08-16T12:49:00.000-04:00

Recently, I purchased the DVD "Painting Fabric for Wholecloth Quilts" taught by artist and instructor Judy Coates Perez. Her work is completely amazing so when it arrived in the mail I could not wait to give it a try.
I have been playing with textile paints for a little while and really enjoy the process, but thought it was time for a lesson.
Along with the instructional video, you also receive a download of an image that can be used in this project. Once I had the outlines traced, I painted in the background.Next, I worked on the foliage, flowers and little flying creatures.
Here is the finished piece. (These photos were taken under different light conditions. The finished piece is most close to the true colours.)

I choose to work with different colours than what was on the sample. I thought I might learn more by not simply copying Judy's work exactly. The piece you see here measures a mere 7.5" square. I definitely want to attempt this on a larger scale.
Earlier this summer I took an on-line colour theory workshop offered by Judy and was delighted to find that I was able to apply what I learned from that in completing this exercise.

This was just so much fun! I may leave this one alone and do another that I will quilt.

Am I Going to Go ........Straight to Hell????

2010-08-11T12:51:00.003-04:00

Quilter's Hell? I am not sure if I have committed a horrible offense. Here is what I have done.
This past January our guild decided to have a "row robin". I have never participated in such an endeavour before but here is what we did. We broke into several groups of 5, we were each to create a row to pass about the group. You could also include instructions, likes and dislikes, scraps, and so on. I simply said that I really would like a "scrappy" look, do not care much for blues, and provided some "background" fabric so no matter what, the finished piece would be cohesive. (my row is far right)
Each month, each of us would then add a row to one group member's quilt and pass it on to the next. At the end we got our own row back along with 4 others that we could then turn into a quilt.
Above, are the rows I received. I arranged and rearranged but could not quite make it work.
There were a few problems.........the most challenging being that none of the rows were the same length and some seam allowance issues.
What was my solution?..........What was my offense? Well, in an attempt to get a more pleasing balance, I took two of the rows and CUT them right down the middle. Gasp!!!! Yup I actually did that. Took another quilter's work and sliced it in half. I also added a number of strategically placed diamonds...........shhhhhhhh!
Here is the "flimsy" ready to back and batt...........my plan is to finish it with a colourful scrappy binding.....I sure hope my row robin teammates will still be speaking to me when they see it.

How to Paint your own Gradated Fabrics......The Basics

2010-08-06T15:46:00.002-04:00

In case you thought it was a difficult process and that I was kidding when I say it's simple to do, I thought I'd just take you through it step by step.
First of all, don't worry if you don't have the same sophisticated equipment I use......I am sure you have something that will work.
You will need to round up a container to actually mix the paint in ( here I used the "lid" from a store bought cake ) but any plastic container that gives you lots of room to splash will work, gather up some paper towels, an old raggedy towel to protect your work surface, some rubber gloves, a container of water, something to measure with (I used one of those little cups that come with cough medicine), a sheet of plastic ( I used a clear leaf bag cut open), stir sticks or Popsicle sticks to scoop out the paint from your measuring cup(don't want to waste a drop), coarse salt ( optional) and of course some white pre-washed cotton fabric.
Okay, so after you have eaten the cake and Popsicles you are ready to begin.
This time, I actually measured everything (I normally just eyeball it)
For this session my fabric pieces are essentially fat eights, each measuring 9 x 22 inches but of course once you get the hang of it, you can easily increase the amount of paint/water mixture to accommodate larger pieces of fabric.I measured 12.5 ml ( 1 Tablespoon) of pure paint and into the bowl it went followed by 7.5ml of water. Swirl it around to mix it all up and throw in your first piece of fabric. This will be your darkest most saturated piece. Sop up the paint mixture and squeeze out the excess ( back into the bowl of course) do this a few times to be sure you have good colour throughout your fabric. Again, be sure to really squeeze out the excess, you don't want to waste anything and you won't want to wait forever for your fabric to dry. Now take this piece and lay it out flat on your plastic sheet. ( I lay my plastic on a piece of Styrofoam so it is easy to pick up and move should I need to)
You are now ready to create the next shade, add another 7.5ml of water ( or just a wee bit less) to your paint mixture, swirl it around to mix well and toss in your next piece of fabric. Repeat as before, sopping up paint and squeezing out the excess.

Just keep repeating this same process with each consecutive piece of fabric, adding that extra water each time to continue to dilute the mixture. See how my last bit of paint looked......very weak but just right for my lightest shade.Once you have laid all of your pieces of painted fabric out to dry, you can decide if you want add some salt. Sprinkling a bit of coarse salt (pickling salt) onto your damp fabric will cause some interesting effects. The salt will "draw" the paint and move it about, a little goes a long way.......and you never really know what you will end up with or you can just leave it be as a "solid" and skip the salt altogether.
That's it, just clean up your little mess ( I rinse everything thoroughly with warm water in the laundry sink and re-use it time after time)
Okay, now you have to wait for the fabric to dry so you might as well go see if there is any of that cake left.
Once your fabrics are dry, you will need to "Heat Set" them to make them permanent. Simply press for a few minutes with a hot iron. ( if you used the salt, you may need to scrape/pick off the dried crystal that remain before heat setting")
Sometimes, ( okay, most times) I get a little carried away with the salt and will need to rinse my fabric after heat setting to get all of the salt completely out.
Here is the result of this paint session that created these gradated oranges.

Painted fabric with a dyed look

2010-08-04T12:00:00.002-04:00

I have a project in mind that will require little bits of lots of different colours. I came across this Bali Bonbons (top of the photo) which is comprised of 24 ....2.5"strips. I thought that this was great as there were lots of shades but did not even notice until I got home that there were no blues or oranges. So I set about to augment this group by making some gradated blues that could blend in.
It is a very simple process. Start with your darkest shade, which in this case is a Cobalt Setacolor transparent fabric paint diluted a little with water. I took slightly dampened fabric and just kept squishing it in the paint till it was completely saturated with colour, squeezed out the excess and put it aside to dry. Add a little more water to the paint/water mixture to "lighten" it and repeat the process. I continued doing this until I had these gradated shades of the same blue. While they were laid out to dry, I threw some coarse salt on to get the mottled effects.
Once heat set these are colourfast..........unlike those commercial dyes I purchased..... I tested them and they all bled, so I had to pre-wash and set the dyes before I can begin my project.
Plan to make a few oranges next.

Combining Prompts

2010-07-27T12:04:00.000-04:00

The Creative Prompt Project words number 76 & 77 were Night and Flutter. I decided to combine the words. At night this moth will flutter in the glow of the porch light.

Marking Feathers

2010-07-19T12:40:00.000-04:00

I have spent a little more time designing feathers and I wanted a way to mark them so that I could repeat a feather over and over if I so desire. So using my Jenny Haskins Magic Heat Cutting tool and some Mylar I created a couple of stencils. They can be used from either side and they should stand up for a very, very long time.
I pounced the design and as you can see I have lines that are clear and easy to follow.

I realized today That I had not posted last week's doodle. This is my response to the 75th word prompt which was Violet

Wan't to see the show?

2010-07-15T11:34:00.001-04:00

The Grand National Quilt Show 2010............."Off the Wall" is now available to view online.
You can access it here or by clicking on the link placed on the upper right of my side panel.
It is in PDF format and will take a few seconds to load, grab your favourite beverage, relax and enjoy the gorgeous works by fabulous artists from across Canada. Quite often we don't get to know what an artist is thinking as he/she creates a piece, here you can read their statements and see what techniques were used for each work.
I hope that you will enjoy the show!

Feathers, Feathers, and more Feathers

2010-07-09T11:59:00.001-04:00

I LOVE the look of beautiful, graceful curving feathers on quilts but for some reason, drawing/designing them has mystified me. I am determined to be able to do them on my domestic machine, so I have been practising on paper by filling shapes and spaces with feathers. Here are a few that I have drawn.I stitched out a couple as well. This is going to take more practice but I WILL conquer the feather!

I have spent more time drawing than sewing this week. Here is my response to last week's prompt word ........... Celebration.

Glyph

2010-06-30T11:59:00.001-04:00

Yup "Glyph" is the Creative Prompt Project's word of the week. A Glyph, is essentially a pictograph or other symbolic character/sign, sometimes cut into a surface or carved in relief.
I had a bit of fun with this one. First I drew my zodiac symbol........ Capricorn.
Next, I finally got around to trying Lino-Cutting. It is something I have wanted to try for awhile. I began by purchasing the basic lino-cutting tools and a piece of linoleum to carve.
I drew a fairly simple pattern which, once carved, resulted in this block/stamp.
I lightly brushed transparent fabric paint onto the block using a fairly stiff brush so that odd little lines would be left behind. I started with one colour and gradually added another as I continued to make the print. Here is the stamped fabric. I can see where the carving needs to be "cleaned" up a little, but I am quite pleased with my first attempt.
Can you imagine the fabulous possibilities that might be achieved by employing this method of print making?

Paper Backed Fusible.........make your own.

2010-06-24T17:32:00.001-04:00

Recently I was working on a project that required paper backed fusible, but I had none on hand. I did, however, have some fusible web and thought I'd see if I could make that work. It is simple really, all you need is some fusible web and parchment paper.

Lets say you want to cut out one of these little sewing machines to fuse onto a project........just cut a layer of fusible web at least the size of your fabric piece. Place the fabric right side down, add the fusible web and then add a slightly larger piece of parchment paper. From the paper side, fuse it all together with a hot, dry iron.

Now cut out your shape.
The paper will remove very easily leaving you with fabric that now has fusible on the back. Place it where you want and iron in place........see? simple!
That is what I did with this leaf. Once it had been drawn and painted I wanted to cut it out to fuse it to this fabric, the fusible web/parchment paper worked beautifully. This postcard is on it's way to say Happy Canada Day to a friend.

The CPP word this week is ICE...........with July fast approaching, the only ice I want to think about should be cool and refreshing so I decided that a Popsicle would be just the thing.

All about Colour and "Eye"

2010-06-16T12:32:00.002-04:00

I am currently taking my very first online class. I seized the opportunity to enroll in a colour theory class being offered by Judy Coates Perez. (if you are familiar with her work, then you will know why I jumped at the chance to take this course)
I am absolutely thrilled with the way the course is set up and the exercises she has laid out for us. This is a real "hands on" ........work at your own, pace learning experience and I am thoroughly enjoying it. The photo shows some of my "homework"
I am looking forward to gaining a better understanding of colour and perhaps one day to have an "Eye" for it.
If you want to know more about this class and what we are working on, you can read about it here

Can you guess what the CPP word is this week? It is Eye

A Doodle and a Surprise in the Mail!

2010-06-10T16:00:00.002-04:00

Those of you who are regular readers of this blog are well aware of my ongoing participation in the Creative Prompt Project. When I began, I never dreamed that nearly a year and a half later I would still be enjoying doing responses to each weekly word.
The latest one, is also #70 in the line up. The word is "Salmon".........now, when I think about using canned salmon to make sandwiches, for me, it is all about the bones. It seems that there are just so many little bones that need to be removed

A little while ago Jaye at ArtQuiltmaker asked if she could use a couple of my doodles for a project she had in mind...........A project that she wanted to do for me as a gift! She asked for a few of her favourites and a few of mine so that in the end I would be surprised.
I sent her some files, but had no idea what she was up to until today when this arrived in the mail. She has made this for me as a thank you for my continued participation...how wonderful is that?

What a terrific pencil roll this is. She printed onto fabric, a couple of my doodles, used some black and white graphic fabric (which I LOVE) on the inside and a very nice home decor fabric on the outside. The question is what shall I keep in this?........ Micron pens, Paint brushes, Watercolour pencils????
Thank you so much Jaye! It is Fabulous!
Love your label by the way!

Quirky

2010-06-04T12:00:00.000-04:00

Quirky is this week's word for the Creative Prompt Project.
I think we all, each of us, have our own quirks.......so for my response, I did a sort of self portrait.

Using Lutradur

2010-05-30T08:00:00.001-04:00

I promised I'd show the progression of "Celtic Roots" from start to finish. It all started with this package of Lutradur. I bought it last Fall with not a clue what to do with it. But as you know by now, I love to experiment with just about anything I can get my hands on.
Lutradur is a Mixed Media sheet that you can cut, paint, fuse, stamp, fold, stitch, ink, run through your printer and who knows what else. It feels and looks almost like very stiff dryer sheets

So with my idea to create a sort of 3D tree with Celtic knots for roots and lots of plaids as foliage, I got busy drawing my design.
To make the "tree", I began by using a small amount of fusible web to fuse two slightly overlapped sheets of the Lutradur together so that I would now have a large enough continuous piece. (All of these photos should be large enough to see some detail when you click on them) Can you see where the pieces are joined? I drew my tree and roots onto the Lutradur and then roughly painted the trunk, roots and earth. No need to be all that careful as I knew I would be cutting it out and adding stitching later.
The Lutradur is painted and ready to be trimmed to the finished shapeFabric selectionBeginning to build the layers........each foliage piece overlaps the one before it

Everything is pinned in place to see how it all will work out
The Lutradur tree is folded out of the way so that I could easily quilt the sky (which is my own hand painted fabric)
As I hand appliqued the foliage, I left openings for the branches to be tucked into

Filling in the "earth" area with lots of stitching using a very dark brown thread helps to make the roots really stand out

Above is a look at how the tree branches tuck into the foliage, I had to quilt a section, tuck in a branch, quilt the next section and so on.

With the piece being an irregular shape I knew the binding would be a bit of a challenge. I felt that the bindings would need to match the various areas to get the effect I was after. It was a little tricky to do but if you leave yourself lots of "wiggle" room you can manipulate it so that it goes exactly where you want it to. Below are close up shots of the binding. Notice how the angle changes as it wraps the to the back.

and finally the finished piece. Celtic Roots is roughly 16"x 21" made for the Wee Quilt Challenge, This years theme, was Celtic Connections. Since no matter who you are, we all are connected to family (for better or worse) I chose to do a family tree of sorts and asked how many plaids you might find in yours. Some wild thread colour was used in the quilting of the foliage to represent those "colourful" family members we all have. ( as with all Wee Quilt challenges, use of plaid is a must)
These challenges are great fun and I almost always learn something new with each new piece I create.
It should be noted that you can cut very intricate patterns in Lutradur with a heat/stencil cutting tool, but for this piece I chose to keep my entire Lutradur piece intact, and instead get a raised appearance with the heavy stitching in the background.
I hope this answers many of your questions, but if you have more, just ask.

A Doodle and Wonderful Surprises

2010-05-27T13:23:00.002-04:00

Jaye at ArtQuiltmaker is still hard at it providing us with weekly prompt words. Have you gotten involved yet? Give it a try, it is a fabulous way to get inspired. There are now a list of 60 plus words, so no excuses.........at least a couple have to spark your interest. You can do as many or as few as you like. Click here for more info, here and here for the lists of words.

Prompt word # 68 is Oval.
It occurred to me that safety pins are kind of oval in shape

A little while back Jaye was having a giveaway and I was one of many who were to receive some beautiful silk pieces she had acquired from a tie factory that used to be near her. I thought I might get a few pieces but OMG, just look at what I received in today's mail. I had to show you both the right and wrong sides of these fabrics. What will I do with them??? Don't know just yet, but I will for sure try to use these in something fabulous. oh.......and more ovals????
Click on the photos to get a better view.

This is turning into a pretty great week. Yesterday I attended the Scottish Tea/ artist reception at McDougall Cottage in Cambridge, Ontario, where the 8th annual "Wee" Quilt Challenge is being displayed until Labour day. Once again, the artist's have outdone themselves with their gorgeous interpretation of the theme "Celtic Connections"
These "wee" quilts can be no larger than 24"x24" and must include plaids...........it is absolutely amazing to see what can be done with such little real estate.

I am completely delighted to tell you that my piece "Celtic Roots" was awarded an Honourable Mention
Here it is hanging at the show.
In the next day or two, I will show how this original design progressed from a tiny little sketch to the final quilt. It was a great learning experience and I enjoyed working on this one all the way through.