Category Archives: Far Horizons

Baby Quilts, Far Horizons, Landscapes

March 21, 2013 Shaving Cream Printing

Dear Readers,

We may have passes the Vernal Equinox yesterday and the days may include more sunlight , but here in up state New York it is still very cold.   I will really bundle up when I go for my walk today as it is still only 20 degrees in the sun shine.  I have been staying indoors a lot and working in the studio although I do not have a lot of completed work to show.  I have been playing with my thermofax screens.  Again my connections with other quilts- specially members of QuEG’s has born fruit.   At the March meeting Angela talked about using shaving cream as a carrier for ink with her screens.  I have been playing with that too.  What fun! I spent two days this week playing with this idea.  One day was with my friend Ethel.

Pictured here are the tools, a plastic containor, spoons, the screen and fabric.The second shot shows the shaving cream( I got it at the dollar store) mixed up in smaller containers. The mixture is them spread on the top of the screen and using the edge of credit card one draws ink mixed in the shaving cream across the screen forcing the ink and shaving cream through the screen.  

This shot shows the images printed on the fabric.  It drys so fast that one can print a second color on top with out much time passing.  Ethel and I tried also mixing dye with shaving cream and printing it too.  It seemed to work as well,  but the dye caused the shaving cream to break down quickly and them it runs and bleeds.     That fabric is still batching so I do not have a shot of it yet as I have not washed it out.

 

Progress Report: Speculations on Value   I have now finished this quilt.  I really did enjoy the  Mac Tavishim quilting patterns and went back and fixed the messy ones from last week.  I am sure I will use this style again on a future work.

Speculations on Value
19″ X 42″

This close up also shows some old silk screen work on the white area pictured here.

 

 

 

Window Work   I also put together this simple quilt to serve as a window cover in the west window of our bed room. It is made from navy blue fabric and leftovers from a “Scrap Happy” project from the fall.   This is ready for quilting now and  I will add those things plus a sleeve.  Then it will go up in the bed room.  I need to replace the cover on the east window too so that will be a second piece  using even more of the leftovers.

 

 

Baby Quilt   I am making this quit for the  first grandchild of  one of my good friends, Beth.  The nursery  theme is the jungle so that is how I got started.   I have cut and pinned the giraffe, elephant,zebra and lion.  The  Kola, gazelle ,monkey and at the bottom, lizard remain in the paper pattern stage.   I am a bit frustrated as the big sewing machine is not working correctly, but I will pull out the trusted Bernina 1008 and do the zig -zag applique when all the parts are cut.

 

Far  Horizons  This work is coming  along.  I am only showing a close up this week as it does not look much different than last.  I have been doing all the quilting from the back side because I am using very heavy silk thread and do not have any needles for the machine with big enough eyes to do the job any other way.    The thread was a gift from my friend Judy.  Her grandfather was a tailor in NYC  years ago and it was left over from his shop. I have had it for several years and I am delighted to finally be using this wonderful thread.

I am hoping for some warmer weather  by next week.

Keep Creating

Carol

Adventure Challenge 2013, Far Horizons, Felt Work, Landscapes, Purple Trees, Stump Men

March 14, 2013 Day Light Savings Time

5 Comments

Hello,

As I set here at the computer I feel like I am running behind.  The clock has been set forward for Day Light Savings Time, but my body is not making the adjustment.  I wake up, and can not believe that it is so late.   And that in turn makes me feel like I am behind all day long.   I am sure that the fact that my husband is on spring break and we are not setting the alarm also adds  to my slow adjustment.  Mother Nature is not helping either.  I am rearing to go when  it is sunny and nice-  It got up to60 degrees one day, but days like today when the snow is flying again make me want to stay in the winter cocoon -I call bed.  I the fact that I forgot  my camera,  and left projects behind twice this week also add to my feeling of out of balance.   Hopefully I will adjust soon and get into “normal” rhythm with the universe and myself.

Progress Report: Speculations on Value  I have spent most of my efforts this week working on this piece.  It is nearly complete and the two long light blue strips are facings that need to be flipped to the back and stitched down.  The fabrics in this quilt have been piled up together for a long time and it felt good to finally assemble them.   I tried a new quilting pattern on this work too.   Sue Ellen introduced the QuEGs group to a pattern  she called Mac Tavishim quilting  at the February meeting.  In looking over my notes I saw the drawing and thought this would be a good time to try it.    The stitching pattern means one starts and curves out to a comfortable point and then returns in a somewhat reflective pattern to the starting point, to then one  swings out again to the opposite end again.   This process is repeated as many times as you feel comfortable or until the space is full, then you start a second.   As this example shows I need to keep practicing, but I do like the process and think I can really use it in the future.

Far  Horizons   This very simple at this point.  I cut the original curved horizontal piece into three sections, shuffled and flipped one unit, then re- assembled the group.  Now I will begin to add lines and stitches as well as small objects on to the surface as embellishment.   It will be a textural play surface for ” add-ons ” and more hand  stitch explorations.

Purple Trees:  This work continues to move along very slowly.  I like how the trees are shaping up.  The new problem is how to bring the three units plus their grounds together into a final grouping.  I am inching forward as I do not know  what I am doing when it comes to how to assemble this work.

  South West Voices:  This work got buried in the fall in one of my cleaning frenzies.  It just surfaced again this week and I am now quilting away on it.  The quilting here is zig-zag and  some what reflective of the patterns in the multi colored fabric.

Stump Men:  I just keep working on the felting of this project.  This shot is of one of the roots.  I think I am nearing the completion of this project and now need to do lots of looking and thinking about what touches it needs to be complete.

I am looking forward to true spring and not needing gloves and boots when I go for my walks.   Those types of walks are always inspiring to me.

Keep Creating

Carol

Adventure Challenge 2013, Far Horizons, Landscapes, Purple Trees, Quilt Exploration Group (QuEGs), Scrap Happy Quilts

March 7, 2013 Meetings

Hello Friends,

This week has been a very busy one for me.  I  have had an event of some sort every day this last week.   That started out with QuEG’s play day were we all worked with Gelli plates.. ( From Gelli Arts)The smiles should indicate how much we all enjoyed the process.     We worked and printed only on paper  because we did not know what we were doing.  The paint was flying onto the surfaces as we all explored the mixing and mark making fun of working this way.   Linda explored with Saren Wrap and got some wonderful results that I want to try.I really liked working with the styrofoam plates and printing on top of collaged papers.   I can see the potential for use on fabric  as well.  We all went home with stacks of paper with a wide variety of images on them.  There is lots more exploitation necessary I think.   Then I went off to Ethel’s and we did more discharge work and wax painting with her new jaunting tool.( at the bottom of the photo)   On Friday I went off to the Turquoise Street Studio again and did even  more stamping.     My goal is to print with all the stamps I have created.  I worked all day and I still have a bag full.  I am sorting and tossing out some that are weak as I go along.   I will need to spend another day at that at least- but I think I will not work on that when I go the next time.   I want to do more Gelli play first.

Progress Report : Tropical Day Dreaming 

Tropical Day Dreaming
19″ X 27.5″

 


 I had a lot of fun laying out and assembling this bright quilt.    This project uses the gessoed fabric like  Gearing Up, except this time I made it all.  The gesso is painted on turquoise felt with  two different  stencil patterns.  I used the textured gesso on plain white fabric- again with a stencil and then painted the fabric with turquoise and blue paint.  The textured gesso can be seen in the close up.  I free motion quilted a tile pattern all over this quilt.    I do not recommend the texture gesso however as the machine does not like stitching through it.  I even tried a leather needle, but the thread kept breaking .

Another Choice  

I challenged myself to use paper applique on this top.    I had done some wax resist on paper and then dyed  it. ( the white lines in loops were the wax and the blue is the dye.)  I found I could not use the paper as I intended   because it would not stick to any thing with the wax finish so it was shuffled around for at least four years.

Another Choice
24″ X 37″

When I was looking for paper to use with the Gelli printing  it came to the top again.  So I decided to use it.  First I cut the wax covered  paper into triangles.  Then I zig-zagged them down to blue felt.  I played with several  layout  locations, never really finding anything I was happy with.   Finally  on Sat I saw the cut away triangles from my last paper quilt and  added them to the mix.  I was satisfied.   The size if the quilt holds the many parts and I am very pleased with the results.

Purple Trees This project continues to move forward ever so slowly.    I would enjoy a row of days without any commitments- then I think it would come thought.  But I do not see that in the near future so I will just have to limp along on this project.

 Experiment: Far Horizons. This is an experiment as the heading suggests.  I am still working with the wiggle cutting and trying to get it to lie flat.   Now that I am at this point I want to make several vertical cuts and then rearrange the parts.   I am not at all sure how this will work, but  I saw a quilt that I think was created this way and I wanted to play with the idea.

  Scrap  Happy .   I am still working away on the scrap happy quilt.  This first shot show two rows that are ready to be sewn.  The second show shows the same area open up.I only have three more ten block rows to add and the top will be assembled.  After that point it usually takes me about four more hours to complete the quilt.

New Top  This top is my newest beginning.  No name yet but I am working on it.  The commercial fabric with the strong strip pattern is the unifying part of this one.  I silk screened the pale blue pattern on the white fabric with dye.  I like the pattern but was disappointed by how pale  the color turned out to be.  I will screen some more fabric in a darker color in the future.

 Color Challenge   These fabrics will be the start of a new piece this week.  I was reading an old article on color and one of the things the author was pushing was using analogous colors and then adding the compliment for punch.  I realized that I had never  consciously tried this color combination.   I may still add some neutral to this mix, but for the most part this will be the color combo I think.

I  am happily playing in the studio as much as I can  and  I hope the same for you.

Keep Creating

Carol