Daily's, Diva Meetings, Quilt Exploration Group (QuEGs)

Continuing QBL Effects August 7, 2014

August 7, 2014 admin 2 Comments

Hello,

Summer is marching forward at an alarming pace. I am still feeling the effects of Quilting by the Lake as my buddies share their work from the classes they took.

This shot is of Linda’s project from Rosalie Dace’s class using Kandinski as inspiration. Liz was in that class too. They sure both have different works from the same workshop. Liz also did a hand works class . I really like her pieces from that as well. they were not the only ones who took classes.

Linda and Sally were both in Valerie Goodwins class the first week. One of the projects form that class was to make a sampler of the types of effects on could add to the surface to alter the look. This is Sally solution. They are both working on bigger works using some of these techniques now. Sue Ellen took a painting class where they learned how to create different effects with paint on fabric. These arr just a few of her many examples. They were wonderful.

Barbara is taking a class on line and she is learning how to cut through many layers of cloth to create a different type of effect. This work is in progress. She created the color change in the center section with extensive thread work and a little paint.

Lynn has finished a long time needlepoint piece. She says it has been so long in the making that she is not sure when she started- but it has been at least 10 years.

Corrine got a new stump doll for her home in Arizona.

Susan told us about her teaching and showed us her sampler of garlic paintings in this accordion book that she uses for presentation.

Liesa has been having lots of company this summer. She still managed to produce this great work about her concern for the melting ice poles.

She feels it is not menacing enough to produce the effect she is looking for.

I spent two days with Susan playing in her studio this week. One day was with her friend Linda. They played with Gelli plates. I worked on college and did cards. I was down to only two in my box. The second day I was with Susan, I experimented with writing tools on fabric and wrote quotations and drew pictures.

Progress report: Rafter Room This work is now ready to quilt. I have been making big pieced backs for years. At QBL , when Rosalie Dace was giving instructions about way to finish quilts she said,” Make the back interesting and relate it to the front with leftover pieces or similar colors. ” This is my back for the Rafter Room piece. It is nice to hear one’s ideas confirmed every once in a while.

Daily News Daily News is still a work in progress. I have about sixty of the units that still need backings. It takes about half and hour to add the velco to a square, stitch that to the finished front square, trim and then flip the unit right side out- then to finally stitch it closed to complete the process.

I took Daily News in its present state to the meetings I had this week and told the gals my story about the process. I then let them add the blocks for that day. It was fun and I got a lot of good feedback from that action.

The last image with the two squares on point were added by Liz when I showed the work at QuEGs. The velcor works on an angle and that adds a whole new way to go with the process. Friends sure can add to the wonder of each experience we have.

Let me know what you think of my blog by writing a comment.

Keep Creating

Carol

Uncategorized

Quilting By the Lake 2014 July 2014

July 31, 2014 admin 1 Comment

Hello,

QBL for this year is again complete. As usual I had a wonderful and creative experience. It all got started three weeks ago now when we started setting up the show for another year. I always find it a bit surprising how we can transform the gym into a study of color and pattern in the course of two days.

Then on Sunday we all begin with a banquet and get to see the old friends that help pull us back year after year. Classes begin on Monday morning and then we start our real growing, stretching and learning. I took classes this year from two fine teachers. Week one was a Color class with Rosalie Dace and week two I worked with Valerie Goodwin- Exploring Design Principles.

We started with two days of design exercise. This shot is of a technique that Rosalie taught us to achieve thin lines of color in one’s work. The picture is of some thin lines by Sally Abrams using the technique. We started our final project on Wed. I challenged myself to work with Orange and Purples and pinned all of this up on Wed eve before I left the class. I decided it was too much to work with all of these colors and pulled back and limited myself to mostly the purples with oranges accents. Then I applied what we had been taught about value and selected some Fuchsia of the same value as the orange to partner with it. I went to my usual building technique and started to layout my new project. I did insert some slender lines, but mine are not as good as what Sally demonstrated from what Rosalie taught us.

There were events to supplement our classes every night. Monday evening after show and tell we left the audtorium to find a double rainbow in the western sky. The second bow is very pale and to the right , but it is there. Then on Tue evening before the Mini Mall there was a third rainbow in the evening sky. What a great time to be studying and thinking about color.

I did pass out my little Creative Assistants again this year. Not only was I rewarded by lots of hugs and smiles for the little fellows, Rosalie surprised me with a little doll of a similar nature from South Africa. I feel so honored by this gift as I know she has limited space in her suitcase because she comes to the states to teach for six mouth stretches.

Along with all the planned stimulation there are also lots of sharing of ideas and discussions going on about all sorts of other ideas at meals and in dorm rooms. The atmosphere is super charged with ideas.

Then we start week two. I was in class with Valerie Goodwin and we started with design exercises using the seven design elements in paper. This first one is Rythem

Then Pattern.

This third one is Movement

We then posted the results in the hall under the correct titles and talked about them.

Contrast

Emphasis

Then we followed up the paper exercises with fabric ones using her techniques for building up the surface.

Balance

Unity

She further challenged us with two word contrasts as our final project. For that she added a twist, because not only did we choose a two word combo, but she then gave us all a second two work combo that she felt we needed. Then it got real quiet as we tackled our individual challenges. Mine

words were Transition/Culminaton and Expansion and Contraction. QBL is so full of helpful folks and it happens everywhere.

This shot is of two of my classmates Robin and Chris, talking possible solutions.

Randy is another long time friend that was in my class and she was just across the table

from me. It was wonderful to watch how she worked on the problems.

Of course I visited my friends and did all the other activites of QBL the second week as well. I enjoyed Valerie’s talk at the Schhweinfurth Art Center too.

This photo is of Donna Lamb the director of QBL and the Art Center talking with Elizabeth Busch at that event.

I visited friends in other classes and looked at what they were doing on Walk About Day.

It is always fun to see what is happening outside one’s own classroom.

Ethel with work from Rosalie Dace’s week two class.

The last evening of QBL we have class show and tell where folks show off the last days of work . This shot is of Barbara with her friend Kitsy,

in the bathroom where she changed into the dress she had created, fitted and put together in Studio Class. She looked great at show ans tell.

Then there was the final event- teacher apron auction to raise funds for the QBL scholarships for next year.

Dorothy Caldwell

Elizabeth Busch

Victoria Findlay Wolfe

Valerie Goodwin

Philippa Naylor

It was a wonderful two weeks and am so delighted that I can attend. I always get so much out of going to this conference. For years it was the only contact I had with other quilters from one year to the next and it served me well. I would encourage anyone who is at all interested in this art form to attend this next year.

Keep Creating

Carol

Daily's, Dusty Roads, Rafter Room, Regina's Lace

Light Thinking July 10, 2014

July 10, 2014 admin 1 Comment

Hello,

This week I seem to be very aware of light. It all started on Thur eve when I went to dinner with my fellow artists Barbara. We sat outdoors as the evening was perfect. With awe< Barbara said “We have reached the Golden Light time of day.” Then she took this photo of me to prove her point. I so agree – I look like I am painted in gold. I was reminded the next evening of the power of light when I sat and watched fireworks exploding above my head for the fourth of July. The following evening I watched Mother Nature’s own firework display as the lighting bugs put on a show for us. The quarter moon moved across the sky and presented us with reflective light that night too. If that was not enough of a study in dark/light contrast, I saw one more example of the power of light and dark when we experienced a powerful thunderstorm with many streaks of light crossing the dark sky, on Tuesday. We need light to

Dusty Trails 22" X 29" $225.00 — Dusty Trails
22″ X 29″
$225.00

see color. I think I was taking it for granted and not really paying attention. But, this week I was reminded how many forms nature can present that wonderfully powerful tool to us.

Progress Report: Dusty Trails I have enjoyed working on this project. While I was doing the quilting I realized that almost every technique that I do to alter the surface of my work was represented here. There is liquid dishwasher soap drawing in line work on the dark browns. There is hand carved stamp work in the copper colored paint on the dark brown shown here too. I have an example of silk screen printing in the cream and brown section. The blue is hand painted inner facing and the skinny strip at the top of the first closeup and the thin strip at the bottom of the second one show, soy wax batik work. I do enjoy altering the surface of the fabric as well as embellishing the surface of my work.

Regina’s Lace This is a “saved work” for me. I did all the piecing of the white, purple and turquoise over a year ago. I did not feel it worked as a top that I wanted to put any more time into, so I had set it aside and it became buried in a stack of other pieces. I had even moved it to the scarpe bag to be cut into strips and turned into a part of a Scrap Happy project. But while looking for a place to use some wonderful lace pieces Regina had cut from old samples and then given to me. I came across the back ground piece and the two seemed to work together very well. I am now have a good time doing free motion flowers in the quilting part of this project.

Rafter Room I have an opening into a rafter room just off my bedroom and it needs a new cover so I started this project. When I begin a project I select the fabrics first. Then I choose one to be the feature. In this case that is the bold black and white print. I cut as many images as I could out of that fabric and loosely pinned them where I thought they might go in the composition. The measuring tape is pinned along the top and side to help me keep the size in mind as I am working. In this case I added the purples to the starter pieces to square them off as my beginning step of assembly. Then I add strips of fabric to the blocks along one side or another building my blocks. I try to work across the entire surface so I am looking and checking the color balancing as I go along. I continue to add and build the sections getting bigger and bigger with each addition as I fill in the blank spaces. This process means getting up after each seam, walking to the ironing surface , pressing and then pinning the pieces back on the pin wall. I then step back and check how the top is coming together. The pieces start to connect to one another and grow larger as the process continues . I just keep repeating the process until the top comes to completion. This process works for me and I enjoy doing it. It took me about three and a half hours to put this 24″X 60″ top together.

Old Sandstone Church I will be starting Quilting By The Lake ( QBL) on Sunday , and I am excited about that. I will have a class with Valerie Goodwin during week two. I enjoyed working with her before two years ago and think this class on Color will benefit me as well. I pulled out her new book “Art Quilt Maps” and worked through her recommended steps this week to start this piece. I only have two of the techniques she suggests here. I have a sketched out the building that will be the next step of the process. I will not get this completed until after QBL- but I am glad to have done a refresher before the class so I will get the most out of the experience.

Daily News I am still working away on turning and stitching shut the Daily’s for this piece. It is fun to change the work every morning with the squares that I have completed the evening before.

Let me know what you think by adding a comment.

Keep Creating

Carol

Baby Quilts, Daily's, Diva Meetings, New Iris, Quilt Exploration Group (QuEGs)

Seeing July 3, 2014

July 3, 2014 admin 1 Comment

Hello,

As we head for the 4 of July celebrations I have been thinking about seeing. I read “We don’t see what we see. We see what we want to see.” by ALan Fletcher. My first response to this was surprize. But as I though about it I agreed. I then though- Oh this is not so true of artists- we pay more attention to what we see. Then to test myself I tried to visualize my walking shoes that I wear almost daily and recall how many holes were there for laces. Five I though with confince…. but when I checked there are six, although I only have my laces in five of the holes. So I drew them as my drawing exercise this morning. This will help me really “see” them I though. And that is true, I really did see them, but in the looking at the shoes I shut out all the things around the shoes. I would be quickly overwhelmed by the visuals if I did not do that editing and selecting of things in my world. In the end I have to agree with Mr Fletcher- we all are confinded by our choices of “what we want to see”.

This week was the first Tuesday of the month of July so I went to meetings. QuEGS meant and we all had lots to share. Liz is making progress on her memory quilt for her friend. All the blocks are made now and she will begin the final assembly soon.

Linda C. showed us her crazy quilt and amazed us by flipping up the work to show the paper and that showed the planning pages she had under the sewn squares. Several of us admitted we would not have planned out as much as she did, but would have let the process tell us what to do next. We all have different procedures we follow as we work. This work will be a stunner when it is complete. The good thing about seeing the processes of others does help us all of us to think more carefully about our own work and consider if we can improve by following the the examples around us.

Angela is still being influnced by her tip to Hawaii. She showed us several beautiful silk painted flower pictures this week.

Then I was off to my DIVA meeting. Cheri shared her “Miss Liberty” wall piece and her new lady lizard( in the for ground) She mixes fabric and yarn in her sculptures and I think that is a great idea.

Alice had her fabric books to show us. They are so delightful. I enjoy how she mixes commercial fabric images- the water lily- with her own hand painted materials- the turtle.

Ruth assembeled all the units she had created in the class she took last month. They do make a pleasing little collection I think. And what a great visual review of techniques to have on the studio wall so one does not forget about them.

Progress Report: New Iris I am happy to say this work is now complete. I took it to both meetings on Tue and asked for ideas on the beards for the iris. I had thought that purple was the color to use, but the others felt yellow or white would be better.

New Iris 28" X 22.5" — New Iris
28″ X 22.5″

I tried both colors before I settled on the yellow. The yellow sure does pop forward on the purple flowers and draw the eye. That is what contrasting colors are suppose to do, but I do not think of it most of the time while I am working.

I like the depth this quilt has – all the applique on top of what I once thought was a completed work, helps that idea. I will try to keep this more in mind in the furture too.

East Window This work is done now . I made this quilt to put over the window in the east bedroom in the winter. I used a special batting that has a foil liner in the center to reflect heat into the room and cold out. There is not a lot of quilting on this work. I only stitched in the seam lines( in the ditch) to connect the top and back. I would have done a lot more machine drawing on the surface if it was not for window use.

Baby Quilt This one got completed this week as well. I was surprised when I finished putting the last hem stitches in last even and realized I had finished off three this week. The bad news is I have no new beginnings.

I try to be practical with baby quilts and make them so they can be easily washed. I also add a sleeve so they can hang on the wall if the parents choose. This is the second child for this family so there are two bears, one for each child. The bigger one is helping the smaller bear and that is my way of saying that they should care for one another and the older one is a part of the process.

I like the simple outline applique technique that is easy to use with this style of quilting. It goes quickly when the layout of the parts is done. One only needs to think about the layers of the pieces so there are as few starts and stops as possible. Here I did the mane first, then the ear, then the body, and last I added the reins and the eye details.

Daily News I can now see that it will take a lot of time to finish this piece. It takes a seven min. to machine add the velcro spot, and stitch around the two units , leaving an opening. When I set down to do the hand work I trim the corners and turn the block right side out, before stitching it closed. I get between four and five of them done in an hour. I know I am working as fast as I feel comfortable with– but the process of finishing up seems a long way off at this point.

Please leave me a comet in the area provided at the bottom. I would love to hear your thoughts.

Keep Creating

Carol

Baby Quilts, Daily's, Dusty Roads, New Iris

Choices June 26, 2014

June 26, 2014 admin

Hello,

It is another gray and rainy day here. There are lots of reasons to feel down. I am having trouble with the tension on my sewing machine. It is very humid and my hair is droopy. The sky is gray and all this rain even makes the Martha Washington Greniums hang low. In my effort to empty some of the excess rainwater from them , I accidenty spilled it all over my feet and my sandels are all wet. Inspite of all this stuff I still feel happy. I am making progress on my projects even with the thread problem, because all the rain keeps me in the studio a bit more. The birds are singing and I even saw one taking a bath in one of the mud puddles on my walk in the rain. I noted too the circular patterns of falling rain in one of the puddles and thought it might make a good starting place for a quilting pattern. So why I feel so good? I believe it goes back to what my Dad always use to say to me as a kid” It ‘s not what happens to you that matters so much as what you THINK about what happens to you that matters.” I am choosing to be happy about the possibilites of today.

Progress Report: Dusty Trails I am to the quilting stage of this project now. I was tempted to just quilt in the ditch, but staying in the seam lines with the quilting seemed like a cop out. So I am using is wandering stitch pattern that reflects the seams instead. My title has more to do with color than the stitch pattern.

New Iris I am all done with the hand applique of the new leaves and flowers. I was considering adding some of the fuzzy trim to the flowers as the beards of the iris. The color has more red in it than the existing flowers but I really like the texture. I guess it is again a decision I can only make after I try it and see how it looks. That really is the best approach any way.

New project-Baby Quilt My niece had a new baby last week and so I am busy creating a baby quilt for the new child. He as an older sister so I am putting two teddy bears on this one. The three butterflies allow me to add quilting for stability in the sky. One might also be able to teach a little counting to a little one with this work.

New work- East Window I am creating a new window cover for the east room window. When I work on these types of quilts I first do a wrogh layout of where I think some fabrics will end up. I am trying to start quilts now using fabrics I have altered in some way. This time I used some marbleized fabric, a piece from the soy wax class, and some painted fabrics. When I have selected these materials, I chose things that work with them. I think of the second choices as fillers and I cut them into strips of one and a half, two and a half and three and a half inch sections and sew them into long mixed units. This method means I can just add the units to the fabric sections as I go along and do not have to keep stopping and cutting new fabric. This method does create some unused material at the end of the assembley. But I always just add that to my scrap basket and it becomes part of the material I use in my scrap happy quilts that I give as fund raisers . I always enjoy my time doing the assembly process of quilt construction.

Daily News I have finished the base for the Daily’s now. It is a black rectangle with 30 black velcro units on it. I put the quilt on the door to my studio so I see it first thing every day and my new habit has become to change the layout each morning. Its a fun exercise and it means that I finish several more blocks every evening during the news like before.

Keep Creating

Carol

Daily's, Dusty Roads, New Iris

Quarter Moon June 19, 2014

June 19, 2014 admin

Hello,

This evening we will view the last quarter moon for this month. I have always wondered why the cookies that are half choclate and half white are called Half Moon cookies? Quarter moon would be more accurate. Oh well, I know they are all good to eat no matter what they are called. The other seasonal event this week is Summer Solstice. That happens on Saturday . Hurray! Bring on Summer.

I spent last Friday with my friend Susan. We made silk paper. Susan is very interested including text and words in her work, so I did some experimenting that I might not have tried other wise. The 3’s are letters on tying paper that are tarped between layers of silk. Then I thought why not just write words – so I tried my name as you can see. It is doable. I will use my name to make a new name tag to put over my work area at QBL.

Then on Monday I drove down to visit Regina. She is amazing and I had a wonderful day. She gave me this stack of sample l dress tops to play with. Her techniques is to cut off all the beads and use them in other work. I do not know just what I will do with them- but I love the challenge. Regna loves texture almost as much as I do. This wonderful little evening bag is a good example of that. She weaves rag rugs that are all over her house. She has an embroidery machine and has wonderful examples all over the place too. I went home with my head spinning full of ideas and aw.

With all my travel I have not done a lot of work in the studio this week, but that seem to be the nature of summer. I want to be out of doors and enjoy my environment.

Progress Report: New Iris’s I am adding applique iris on the surface of this quilt now. I am going to add the greenery first and then the flowers. I may need more blossems – but I will only know that with lots of looking and thinking.

Dusty Roads This was formerly labeled as new work one. I can see where I am going with it now so it has a name. This is a good example of many of the surfacing altering techniques I like to use. There is rust work, eraser stamping, silk screen printing, direct painting, and fabric from the soy dye class in this piece. The dark brown with the white lines is drawing done with liquid dish washer detergent. Most of the blue areas on this work are painted interfacing pieces. I sure had fun mixing all of them and it made me realize that I do work in color families most of the time.

Daily News I am working away on the back unit to put my little squares on now with this project. It is all black so I did not do a photo of it- not very interesting at this point. When it is done I will start to shoot it with the various squares velcro-ed on the surface.

Enjoy the beauty of the season.

Keep Creating

Carol

Daily's, New Iris

Tomorrow…..June 12, 2013

June 12, 2014 admin

Hello,

I am greeting you with flowers because my husband did the same to me this week. I enjoy the rich deep color of red roses.

I realized that tomorrow is the full moon and it is Friday the 13. I wonder how often that happens?

Saterday was our second play date at the Verna Fire Hall. We again were exploring the Gelli Plate and its many printing wonders. There were 10 folks this time and only three of us were repeats from the time before. This shot is of my work table at noon before I fired up for my second layer of fun and surprises. I made a mistake and left half of my paints at home. But I chose to see that as a challenge and because I did not have any red, orange or purple all the pieces will work together do to the limited pallet.

I had a wonderful surprise yesterday as Patti stopped by. She presented me with a gift of two of the squares she made using the fabric yarn I had given to her last week. She sure is enjoying her new pin loom! Both of these squares use the the same weff fabric yarn- but the color she used for the woof really makes them appear different. The black sure tones down the color!

I went to visit Nancy this week too. She works on a tabletop to lay out her work. I do realize she has a much more realistic feel for how the project will look on the bed by doing it that way, but I really like working vertically myself. This quilt will be the summer quilt for her own bed when it is done. She is building a rainbow layout across the main part of the bed top with some black and white added in for interest. This is also the quilt she made the clouds for last week. They are set to go in the pillow sections of the quilt. She lent me this book on color to read before I take my color classes at QBL this summer. It is written for paintes, but I am enjoying it throughly. I am sure thankful I live in a time when one can just go purchase paint off the shelf instead of collect the materials, grinding down the pigments and mix the formulas to get the desired colors.

Progress Report: New Work One I thought I should revisit some of the fabrics I made in the soy wax class earlier this spring and use them. I pulled one and then I noticed how it worked with the rust fabric I did last fall and a piece of the stencil work I did last winter as well as some stamping work I had done the winter before. So I started this possible lay out. It was too monochromatic so I added some blue to the mix. The blue is from my stash of self embellished fabric too. Things will surely shift and change from this starting point- but I try to be open to the changes the fabrics suggest as I work along.

New Work Two I piled up a second collection of fabrics as a starting point for yet another new quilt. It is not “talking” to me in the same way the brown one is so this may not go beyond this point. I just have to live with it a bit.

New Iris’s I was not happy with the way this quilt was going. It was coming out too much like the first one I did earlier this spring. So I let it hang on the pin wall for two weeks. Then I decided to add another layer to the work. I painted purple Iris’s like the ones I saw in Monet’s garden last month. I then sewed organza to the back of the flowers and truned them to create the new blossoms. That process is very time consuming when the shapes are as complex as these are. It takes about 20 min to do each one. I will start to applique them to the top of the quilt this week.

Daily News

The title of this work has changed because of how I want to finish this work. I decided I want it to be a flexible work that could change. To that end I have finished these squares off with each of them having a velcro patch in the center of the back of each “block”. I have only started this process and so I will be doing the flipping of the units and sewing them shut by hand for a while. Soon I will build a back unit with its own corrisponding velcor units placed four inches apart all over its surface so one can add or subtract any square from any location at any time. I think I will limit the back unit to 30 squares( or velco spots) to invite as many possible playing combinations as possible. ( and one does not need to fill all the spots) I hope it is fun to play with when I am done.

Keep Creating

Carol

Daily's, Diva Meetings, FAD (Fiber Art Dames), Quilt Exploration Group (QuEGs), Three Trees

Enjoying the Spring June 5, 2014

June 5, 2014 admin

Hello,

I have been enjoying being out of doors and doing lots of yard work this week. Being gone always means lots of catch up for me and that seems to be how I have spent most of my time. That and meeting with my friends that is. The first Tuesday of the month was this week so I had the usual QuEG’s and Diva meetings plus the FAB group has moved to the first of the mouth too. It is good to see all my friends and it is very stimulating.

Barb started off the QuEGs meeting with her three “sliced block” tops. She sure seemed to be having fun with them. Then we moved on to Linda who is taking an on- line class where she is doing prep work for a quilt about her Irish Grandfather. The notebook is a work of art all by it’s self I think. She is collecting lots of ideas to work from for the project.

Then we looked at Liz’s strip blocks. It is a memory quilt using her friends father’s shirts. The outside strips of each block are from the shirts. The florial prints in the centers represent the friend.

Then we looked at Sue Ellen’s work. This new fish quilt of hers really is a joyful one I think. This photo does not show it- but the green has a wonderful reflective quality that really adds to the feel of water in this piece.

Next we looked at Sally’s wonderful work. She has finally finished piecing her “One Block Wonder” top. I love how she used the fabric in such a way that the quilt goes from light to dark in a diagonal sweep across the top. She continues to work hard on her Machine Embrodery too. All the lemons are drawn in thread as is the green sprig and the pie crust. Her work always blows me away.

After the meeting I drove south and picked up Susan who is now back in Central New York and we rove to the Diva meeting together. Where I got my second jolt of creative stimulation. Sharon who is going to graduate school had lots to share. Photos, prints and quilts as she prepares for the many art shows she partisipates in during the summer. She is one busy gal.

Donna is taking a class in Spirit Cards and this a shot of one of them. I am sorry that there is so much glaire here. I like too how all the groups I belong to are so accepting of a wide varitey of different materials as well as styles.

Anne peresented this finished piece at the meeting too. I think the machine work really adds a lot of secondary interest to the surface. I admire how she uses her fabrics.

Susan spent six weeks in Mexico and she built this day journal of that event. She challenged herself to try lots of different techniques on six inch pellon squares with each square representing an event for each day of the trip. I think it is a wonderful way to stay on track and to be creative at the same time. This close up shows foil she found in Mexico behind the painted and cut out pellon sheet.

The FAB group meant this week as well. I taught them how to make silk paper. This shot shows Victoria working at that. Nancy made clouds with the silk roving that she intends to use on her new bed room quilt as a part of the sky.

Victoria and I are in a color class later this summer. She is preparing for that by doing a bit of progressive dying for that project. I think this color run is great. It will be fun to use them in class later.

Patti is the owner of a new pin loom and she has been weaving away. She loaded it up and started a new project during our meeting. I can hardly wait to see the finished piece.

I like all the color that she is using here. With all the visiting going on, I did not do much work on my own stuff. I am OK with that one needs to fill the well every now and then.

Progress

Three Trees and a Singer 21" x21" $80.00 — Three Trees and a Singer
21″ x21″
$80.00

Report: Three Trees and a Singer The title of this quilt has changed from just Three Trees to the new one because I added a black bird. It is very small in this image, but it is there on the far left tree about half way up. I added the bird last because I thought the work needed a little reason to look with a bit more care.

The bird is in this closeup. The trees are all based on pictures I took in the winter of trees in my backyard. The trees are all full of leaves now I am glad to say. The photo to the left here shows all three techniques that I used to create the trees. The brown is a wool I started with and the black is yarn that I stitched down on top of the wool. Then after I had stitched together i sewed it to the background. Then I loaded the bobbin with thick tread and from the back I free motion drew the limbs onto the surface of the quilt. I enjoyed creating this quilt.

Daily News ( Formerly Daily’s) These are the last of my Daily’s. I say that because I feel I have learned what I needed to from this project. I am calling the work Daily News because I worked on the pieces every evening during the time the news was on TV. Now I have to figure how what to do with the pieces I have created. I have 240 four and half inch squares. They are not finished so this can’t be the end. I do not want them to simply end up in a box and I do not want to simply sew them together as I have enjoyed placing them next to one another in various arrangements. I am thinking of several possible solutions and I will spent this week making my final decision about that during this time. That and planning the next possible mini challenge.

I hope the week ahead is full of good creative time for all.

Hugs

Carol

Daily's, Fundations XIX Mossy Stone, Fundations XX Asurite, Growing in the Dark, Machine Drawing, Paper Quilts, Spring Iris's, Three Trees

Back in the Studio May 29, 2014

May 29, 2014 admin

Foundations XIX -Mossy Stone 33" X 29" $340.00 — Foundations XIX -Mossy Stone
33″ X 29″
$340.00

Hello

It is good to be home and after I recovered from my jet lag I enjoyed getting back into the studio and working. I think having something partly finished helped me get started too. So I will jump into the Progress Report.

Progress Report: Foundations XIX Mossy Stone As this image shows I am now done with this quilt. I am not sure about how to declare the size, but have settled on measuring the distance at the longest points to come up with the numbers. This quilt has a very large number of fabrics in it as well as threads, yarns and some silk paper. I enjoy the extensive thread work that finishing the quilts in this series requires. The thread patterns create nice direction and flow directions to my eye and when I get to that step it is almost meditative in nature when I am working away at it. I do not see the end of this series any time soon- it is just too much fun to see how many fabrics I can use and how many textures I can include in the process.

Growing in the Dark – Paper Quilt

I took a day workshop in using the Gelli plate on the weekend before I went off to Paris. I made a lot of wonderful paper and fabric printed images. I decided to challenge myself and use some of them to do paper quilts again. I have not done that style in over two years so it was a bit of a challenge just to recall the process. The Gelli Plate process is full of chance and I really like that aspect of using them. Paper is in the bottom section of this shot and fabric in the top- they do take the paint /ink differently , but I like them both. This work because of the nature of the stiffness of the paper requires that one work smaller. I can only roll so much under the machine arm. The paper also is a much flatter material so it goes together much more quickly . I added in some of the silk paper as you can see here and it works well with the other materials. I have pulled another pile of paper and fabric from the workshop to start another soon.

Three Trees This work is coming along. I made the base of the trees on wash away with a dark gray green wool and then added black yarn on top with machine stitching. I then trimmed the away as much of the wash away as I could before I submerged them in hot water. When they were dry I arranged the trees on the surface and sewed them down. I loaded my bobbin with brown embroidery thread and the top of my machine with black. I turned the quilt over and did free motion drawing of smaller branches in the trees using the outlines of applying the trees to the top as my guide. This shot of the back of the quilt helps show what I did. This closeup shows all three processes. The dark green is the wool, the black is the yarn and the brown is the thread. This project proved to be a very good way to get back into the free motion process for me.

Foundations XX- Asurite This is my new inspiration stone for the new work in the series. The first step is to cut the bucrum in the shape of the stone. Then I start pinning the background fabrics to the surface. I did the light area first this time and used two different blues and some hand dyed that had blue, white and gray in it. I then pulled a pile of blue fabrics that I thought could work and piled them on the floor below the pinwall. Having them at my feet meant I could pin look down and cut the next piece I wanted with ease. I continued building on the surface until I had the whole color areas built in. The next step was to begin to stitch and pin more into the work and start to build the surface. I like to work in this free form way and let the process guide me along. It does mean that I stop and pin the work up frequently and look at the work, but I like that step as well.

Spring Iris I am doing the free motion outline step of this work now. I was so happy to see the Iris in Monet’s garden and I took a lot of photos. I think I will try to add a bit of applique on top with the photos in mind. I am not sure how I will do this yet- but I am thinking on the process.

Red Canvas I started the painting process of this work in the fall as a play day with Cheri. Seeing the great way she used what we started that day at the Diva Meeting in March got me to pull the canvases I had created out again. I cut them up and then zig zagged them back to create a bigger unit. I then painted on top again to add more depth. I was still not happy. So I have now done some hand work and I think I am nearing completion. I added beads, buttons and some altered metal to the surface. I need some assistance as to how to finish this work so I will take it to the Diva meeting and get some help.

Daily’s I think I am done with this series as far as making the little units is concerned. I have eight more and that will complete the thirty blocks I have with the two triangles on them. I have done this daily work for eight months and feel I am ready to find and ending place and move on. I will take this week as I finish the blocks to decide on a way to complete the project and to think about a new daily or weekly challenge.

Keep Creating

Carol

Uncategorized

Paris in the Spring Time

May 22, 2014 admin

Hello,

I have not been home 24 hours yet and I am still a bit out of it as far as time is concerned, but I enjoyed myself a lot on this trip. We got ourselves settled in at the Hotel Atlantic and went of a Metro trip to the center of Paris and walked to Notre Dame Cathedral. It is much larger than one expects and all the carving in the stone is amazing as well

as a wonderful interior. We ended up walking all the way around the building. We ate dinner on the south bank of the Seine and enjoyed watching the tourists stroll by us in our outside cafe. The second full day we got on board the train and went out of Paris to see Monet’s home. This photo is of his garden pool. There were so many colors and textures. All the gardens were so very beautiful with purple rose and lots of iris in bloom. I took tones of photos and know that I will use some of them as jumping off places for new work. You could not take any photos in the house, but it was a grand feast for the eye as well.

Then next day we went to the antique market. This shot of the diving helmet is only one of the many wonderful items we looked at. Jen is an a dealer and she knew some of the booths we visited. She was the only one who purchased anything, but it was like visiting a museum where one could get really close and even touch the displays. Jen was also our French speaker and that made our visit so much easier! She is fearless about Paris and willing to just take off in new directions so that we tried areas of the city that even she, in her seven years of travel there, had never ventured into. This wonderful sculpture was in the square where we went underground for the metro every day at the St-Lazare station. It also served as our marker when we came home in the evenings- a welcome sight that told us we were close to home. Jen had enough confidence in us to send us home on the Metro without her on the third day.

Went to the Grand Promade the next day and started our walk to the Louvre with Nepolian’s Egyptian Obelisque. The visual feast of the Louvre is amazing. We did see the Mona Lisa and spent the morning looking at paintings. After lunch we walked many gallery’s full of marble statuary. I thought this face was very lovely- but I have so many photos that again it was hard to choose just one to present. We then went down to the Seine and took a boat curse. We got off walked up to the Eiffel Tower along the river enjoying the parks, the bridges and the sun set along the way. This shot is of Barb holding up one of the scuptures- even though I did not hide the base at all. It is a good shot of how happy we all felt about the weather and the experience. Everywhere I looked there were textures and images that I just enjoyed.

It was 9:00 in the evening when I took this shot of the Eiffel Tower with all the sparkling lights going off at dusk. It was beautiful and great to watch. I was so glad that we waited until evening to see this and did not visit the tower earlier.

We went to visit one of the biggest and oldest cemeteries in Paris the next day- Cimetier Du Pere Lachaise. The stone work there was wonderful too. Every bit of land was packed with muslims. They represented about 250 years of different types of grave types used in Paris. I was espically fasinated by the ceramic wreaths. There were many types of flowers represented from roses and poppies to violets. The ceramic work was so very thin as these roses show. Many flowers showed the effects of pollution and were black- but that could be rubbed off. We only experienced one day of rain on our trip- that was on Tuesday before we came home. We spent that day shopping at all the stores on Avenue De Champs and Checking out the Arc de Triomphe. It is having some work done on the top so I cut that off in this photo. Again wonderful stone work here.

Every day we walked the staircase in our hotel. We were on the fourth floor and I just loved looking down. We decided we liked the back stairs the most as the wood did not seem to be as worn as the front stair. I did take my pedometer and we counted the steps each day. They were all well beyond 10,000 and one day we did almost 15,000. I loved all the different roof lines and doorways. It was a very enjoyable trip and I have lots of great memories as well as a ton of photos.

Hugs

Carol

Cre-8

Continuing QBL Effects August 7, 2014

Quilting By the Lake 2014 July 2014

Light Thinking July 10, 2014

Seeing July 3, 2014

Choices June 26, 2014

Quarter Moon June 19, 2014

Tomorrow…..June 12, 2013

Enjoying the Spring June 5, 2014

Back in the Studio May 29, 2014

Paris in the Spring Time

Creative Fiber Collage Artist Carol Boyer