Heart throbs and Mistyfuse

Last month, for Fast Friday Fabric Challenge, I hosted the challenge and wanted people to explore texture.  For my submission, I did a realistic sort of heart.... I took some strange braided Mylar tubing which I purchased on clearance after Christmas.  I think it was intended for specialty gift wrapping.  I machine appliqued it down, then made the various parts of the heart, hand stitching the blood vessels with perle cotton, then adding machine stitching over the top.  Each segment was stuffed to give it dimension.  I added an EKG line which I based on a "normal" EKG I found on line...(only my nurse friends said that if they saw a line like that, they would be very concerned about the patient.

Hopefully, you can see it a bit better in this version.  This isn't completely finished, in fact the tape you see around the edges was to help me stop quilting at a quarter of an inch from the edge.....but for some reason, my Bernina was having fits....I broke three needles (size 100) trying to quilt through a layer of monk's cloth (the background) fused to Decor Bond, a layer of warm and natural and a backing of plain cotton.  The needle went down on the stroke, hesitated then broke the needle....and I wasn't moving the quilt sandwich.  So, I wasn't able to finish it and off the machine went to see what was wrong with it (according to the Bernina shop....nothing....).

One of the FFFC participants suggested that I add more lines of ekg....which was bobbin work with blue perle cotton. I have added lines in Photoshop (none too well I might add) to see what it looks like.  What do you think? Should I add more lines? Inquiring minds want to know.

Since my hands are not being very happy or useful, I wasn't able to hand applique these pieces down..my preferred method.  Instead, I used Mistyfuse to help me out.

Here's what I did....

I took a little strip of left over Mistyfuse....I know it is hard to see, but you can really get an idea about how thin this stuff is.  You really can't feel it if you are hand quilting through it and it doesn't stiffen the fabric much at all.

I took the piece I wanted to applique, and ironed the freezer paper template over the top, on the RIGHT side.

The freezer paper gives me an edge to turn the fabric against.

I tucked the piece of Mistyfuse under the turned edge, which I am holding here with a chopstick, and ironed the edge down with my little Clover iron.

I know you can't really see it against the Reynold's Baking Parchment...and I apologize...I was using a friend's ironing board and I didn't want to risk leaving anything behind...and I had forgotten to tuck my Goddess Sheet (Attached Inc.'s teflon sheet) in my work bag.

After a few seconds, I pull the "tail" of the Mistyfuse away....it melts and is quite easy to do, leaving the adhesive behind.

If I were really doing this, I would go around the entire edge, but this is being held well.  When I finish fusing the entire thing, I smack it down flat one more time.

Iris says she is working on bringing out some smaller "rolls" of Mistyfuse.  I'd love it...I think I really want 1/2" and 1/4" rolls....This would also be great for fusing bindings...

Once again, I am participating in Nina-Marie Sayre's "Off the Wall Fiber Friday"  and for once, I'm actually posting on a Friday! Yay!

You can see everyone else's posts if you go to her blog here.

Please also keep on checking Pozible's listing for the fund raising for the Tent Maker's of Cairo!  We're almost there, but they still have a bit to go!

Thanks also to Lynn Mosher who took the photos while my hands were otherwise occupied.

Banishing the Design Doldrums

I'm having a struggle.  I agreed to enter the SAQA Regional exhibition, "The View from Here."  The problem is, I was so busy before I left, I only had ideas in my head.. I dutifully printed some photos of shots I had taken to give me inspiration and guides for making the pieces, and thought since I am going to be spending 12 hours in a car, 8 hours on an airplane, and while visiting Montana, there is no television so in the evenings I thought I could stitch.

However, I forgot the photos and don't like the sketches I have done for the concepts.  So...what to do.  Well, since I'm in Montana farm country, the land of rusty bits, I decided I would rust dye some fabric for the ground for one of the ideas I had.

So, here's what those wierd little packages yeilded.  Some possibilities....I think I'm going to add some tea to a couple of pieces to see if that makes a better ground for what I'm thinking of.  I also painted some sky fabric.

And...I made a little piece for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge.  I'm late on that too...no surprise, but I expect to finish this for tomorrow.  I was going to do a school of fish based on a sketch I did for Elizabeth Barton's Quilt University class, "Inspired to Design." But, since Ann Ruthsdottir already showed her piece based on the school of fish, I decided to do something else.

 So...here's my "Leap of Leaping Leopards." I Mistyfused the pieces down, and tomorrow I will quilt it. The background it is sitting on a just a piece of rust dyed fabric....mom had a red table cloth on and getting a background was hard...so just look at the stuff on the blue.

 I wasn't sure if I wanted to put a pale moon in the upper corner or not. My mom is not a person inclined to use yellow, so the only thing I could find to audition the color was a piece of yellow paper.  I'm thinking the edges should be not as sharp, and the color paler.

What do you think?

I think sometimes diving in helps break the design block... at least I'm hoping it does as I really have to get these fingers flying.

I'm participating with Nina-Marie's Off the Wall Friday art quilting blog.  You can find it here.  You can find links to other art quilting blogs on her site.

Challenges

My entry in the Keep It Simple Challenge

Recently, one of the on-line groups I belong to has been discussing challenges and whether or not they are a good thing, or a bad thing.  My response is: it depends.

I actually tend to do quite a few challenges.  I joined the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge in order to try to force me to work smaller (that's been successful) and to try to work more quickly and without as much thinking (this has not been successful....I still take a long time and tend to over-think things).

The major problem with challenges is that if you participate in too many of them, especially ones with lots of restrictions on materials, methods, or subject matter, then you might be working at the expense of your own "authentic" personal voice...in other words, doing what others say you should rather than working on your own art.  You can get caught up in the "busy-ness" and not develop your own style and body of work.

They can also cause you to mess around with materials or techniques which may or may not be yours...but that's not necessarily a bad thing.  Exposure to new stuff helps you determine what is your "voice".  It also brings you a healthy appreciation for those people who do the technique and do it well.

However, I find that usually, I only enter challenges which fit in with an idea I have been banging around in my head.  Thus, the challenge gives me an opportunity to work and develop them, often on a smaller, prototype which can later be developed into a larger work....or thrown out.  AND (most importantly) it has a deadline.  I need deadlines.

I'd prefer to enter challenges which have the end result of having an actual show....but those seem to be few and far between.

However, I'm not above falling into a particular trap....well..hmm...situation? For instance, in April, when I was at the IQF show in Cincinnati, Liz Kettle buzzed by me and said "here, you need to do this," as she shoved a package into my hands...well...she said something like that, I don't remember what.  Did she probably mean it? Probably not...she was probably just desperate to off-load the package and I was the lucky one standing there....

The package was composed of three sets of fine suiting and shirting swatches from high end designers, a single grey necktie, and some buttons.  A little card said it was the Power Suit Challenge and was being put on by Artistic Artifacts.  We were to make an 18" square quilt using the materials and interpret the theme "Power Suit."  Hmmm..... I came up with several ideas, and while I was working on one of them, I decided to scrap it and do something entirely different.

Little did I know that since Liz had handed it to me, I was sort of off their radar.  I had the little tag and I finished mine and sent it in so it would supposedly get to Alexandria, VA on Aug. 31.  They had set up a yahoo group...and had other things to fill out which I didn't have.  So...I merely sent it in.  That show will open on Oct. 23 at the Artistic Artifacts Gallery.  I'm contemplating going.....after all, it's only 8 hours away and I have family there.

The other ideas I had actually fit into another challenge which is now going on with the Quiltart message list...the Unusual Materials Challenge....so...I signed up for that because I had already gathered the stuff to make the quilt and it fit the challenge.  Otherwise, I think the little bag of goodies would probably sit in my sewing room gathering threads.

Does it take away time from doing other "important work"?  Probably...especially dusting.  But on the other hand it fits in with the ideas I have and I am learning while I'm working on it...plus, challenges tend to be smaller.

So, rather than taking away from what I am doing, I see it as a great shove in the right direction....but you do have to be aware of what you're doing...which is why I am not going to participate in the crazy quilt challenge....I'm quite crazy enough already, thank you.

Rectangles

November's Fast Friday Fabric Challenge is almost done. I am embarrassed a little by these pictures....as well as the fact that I didn't get these completely finished. The challenge was to use one shape. You could use any colors or technique, but you needed to pay attention to rhythm, balance and the other facets of design.

I did something completely out of the ordinary for me....I don't usually just do random sort of hunks...and these rectangles fit that. They are cut from quilter's lame, and polyester "silk" and layered, sometimes under, sometimes over a gold organdy florist's ribbon. The base fabric is 100% silk. I zigzagged them down to give extra texture. The whole piece measure 29" wide by 26 1/2" tall.
I then wondered what beads would look like...and I layed these over the top. Hmmm. I also decided it would be prudent to quilt a sample before I settled on the quilting pattern for the large one. So, I made this little 13" x 12" sample. I quilted it...and still was thinking about beads, so I decided to start stitching beads. Now mind you, I took a beading class with Mary Stori in Bloomington, Indiana a couple of years ago, but for the most part, I don't bead. How long could beading take?

Right.

I like the beads on this little piece, but I'm not sure I want to do that with the larger one. I've been working on it while I'm in the treatment room and then again today while I was in the oncologist's office waiting for him to come in.

I kept on thinking "Oh boy, I hope I don't drop these beads. Then, I dropped the little tray full of beads. Just then, he came in. You know you have a good guy for an oncologist when he helped me pick up all the beads. Both of us were scurrying around on the ground. He asked me where I got the beads because as it turns out, one of his hobbies is tying flies.

Anyway, I hope to put these back when they are done. I'm just really fatigued and thought I had better get them up before the next challenge comes by.

Monkey Puzzle Trees

This summer, in answer to a challenge, I started a small 20" x 20" rendition of a Monkey Puzzle tree. The challenge was to do something with a tree from an angle that most people hadn't looked at it before and to use a method which we didn't usually use....In addition, the Miami Valley Art Quilt Network put out a challenge with the theme of "Puzzle." I thought, ahah! I'll do one little quilt which will fit both challenges. I'll use hand stitching which I don't usually do and since it's small, I'll get it done in the week's time I needed for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge. I also thought this would work well as I was going to Connecticut and wouldn't have my machine available.


Well, I used variegated perle cotton thread on a piece of synthetic slubby linen from the 1970s. I outlined all the leaves in violet with back stitch then used running stitch in variegated greens long the leaves. I shaded using a variegated darker, almost sage to forest green DMC embroidery floss (3 strands) for shading the leaves at in a long/short stitch combo. I finally finished it at the quilt retreat this weekend. It took me the better part of the day to do echo quilting around the leaves by machine. I had previously done machine trapunto on the leaves, only putting a single line of quilting down the middle of the leaves and outlining each leaf. The echo quilting is done with a variegated King Tut in red/violet/navy.
Here's the real monkey puzzle bud end of a branch. You can see where I quartered it and designed the quilt based on it.

The Monkey Puzzle tree is Araucaria araucana and is native to Chile and parts of the Andes. It grows in zones 7b to zone 10 and is sometimes used as an ornamental in the U.S. and other places, I think in particular Australia as that is where most of the comments on this tree seem to originate on the web.

I have seen several in Washington state, in fact, this particular specimen is not far from my sister's house. It has an open habit and is sort of odd looking.
I think the oddest thing about them is the "monkey" I think it may be a fruiting body (i.e. "cone" ), but I'm not sure. According to people who have them in their yards, they aren't the nicest plant to deal with. The have very sharp needles (some describe them as being razor edged) and the "cones" can weigh up to 10 pounds each....I don't think I'd like to stand underneath one and get bopped by one! The trees can grow to 70 feet tall by 30 feet wide.

Here you can see the brown "monkey." Interesting...but I'd rather have my quilt, thank you very much!

Chiaroscuro

This month's challenge for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge group was to work with Chiaroscuro (key-are-oh-scure-row). Chiaroscuro is the technique of using dramatic lighting, where the lights are very light and the darks very dark, almost as if a spotlight has been cast on the scene. Some of the best examples are by Rembrandt van Rijn and Carravaggio. Rembrandt's The Nightwatch is one good example, Caravaggio's Judith and the head of Holofernes is another, although I think I like Judith primarily because of the bible story behind it.

At the time this call was issued, I didn't have a whole lot of images to work with. I thought I'd give this photo of Meg at prom this last year a shot. It isn't the best example, only because a stronger raking light is easier to work with.


Here's what I worked up. I used Lumiere, Dyna-flow and standard acrylic paints with textile medium; Prismacolor, Mondiale and Caran d'ache pencils and the earring and the sparkles on her dress were done with a metallic gel pen. I intend to go back and add some crystals for her earrings and perhaps a couple of tiny ones on her dress after I have quilted it.

It is difficult to get the darks dark enough without making it look like she has a good sprinkling of dirt on her. While the shot at left is a little washed out (I shot it at night inside with a flash) not using a flash leaves it too yellow.

I think I will add netting over her hair to give it a shadow effect. I'm not sure what to do to darken her face and skin. While it is a good rendition of the human form, it just isn't dark enough and the highlights light enough to make it a good example of chiaroscuro at the moment. Her eyes are actually green and I need to add a little fleck of white to make it come alive and I need to work with that a bit more.

The mouth is a tad awkward, while a reasonable mouth, it isn't Meg's. I will also work more on her hand.

I think it might have been easier if I had done this larger, it is only 8 1/2" x 11". With a larger format, you can get in and do more detail to make it darker or whatever. I felt like I was running the risk of making her look like she had dirt or facial hair. I think, however, I may try to add some more washes over the top to try to darken the dark areas.

If I could work off the computer screen, I think it would have been easier. The paper print I made put the whole thing into about the same value range, so I wasn't really seeing what I needed to.

I think this is a passable first effort, but certainly one which needs some more work.

Fast or Slow?

I've written about challenges before, but here's my January Fast Friday Fabric Challenge entry. Well...OK, I got it done Feb. 2, so I suppose it is February FFFC.

The challenge was to make a quilt using the fractured technique which Katie Pasquini Masopust originated. Here's an example of her work.

In addition, we were limited to using three colors selected from the six primary and secondary colors (red, yellow, blue, green orange, purple). AND we had to do something with wings...either natural or man-made. Whew!

The piece is made up of small pieces of fabric, divided into segments. Each segment is a different hue of the original... Katie has gone beyond this, but still utilizes several aspects of it in her quilting. She wrote a book called "Fractured Landscape Quilts". While I find her things interesting, fractured quilts are difficult to do well and I have shied away from them even though at one time I owned her book. Since then, she has gone to other things, including Ghost Layers and Color Washes, which I do like very much.

The above image is what I quickly worked out....and it verified for me that I don't like working in fractures. For one thing, I struggled with making the pieced background. I finally trapped the little bits under tulle and went on from there. My colors were the three primaries: red, blue and yellow.

The image I worked with was this shot I took of a Waco (rhymes with taco) aircraft at the Waco Fly-in in 2008. Wacos were used in WWII as training aircraft; they also manufactured huge gliders which were used through the Korean conflict.

Wacos were manufactured here in Troy. Having my wing-nut background, how could I not do an airplane? It did have its challenges however. My picture shows a Waco which has a dual, open cockpit which has been covered. Hmmmm. So I made up a pilot and the cockpit.


I really don't like the piece. I will hang it up in my husband's cubicle.

A number of people have been saying they are dropping out of challenges because they are wasting too much time on them and not developing their own work. I suppose this can be true, but I started doing challenges for a several reasons: I wanted to complete things...I am the Empress of UFOs; I wanted to stop over thinking things....and I think I'm getting a little better about that, just diving in; and I wanted to try different methods and techniques. By doing this it expands my horizons and lets me see if I want to incorporate elements of the technique or not.

I also have hit on something I've felt for a long time. In the quilt world, I think we sometimes place too much of an emphasis on FAST FAST FAST. Just think about all the books with titles of "Fast Rotary this", Quilt in a Day (yah...right! ); Quick projects to do in a weekend."

While there is a place for fast (think working quilts such as baby blankets) , sometimes I think we lose sight of the benefits of working slowly. For one thing, I have definitely decided that I prefer to do hand applique. At one point, my machine applique was quite good, but it still doesn't have the precision of hand applique...or rather hand-applique is more forgiving and allows you to get it perfect with ease. I also don't particularly like raw edge applique unless I want texture, and the jury is out with fusing with me.

Perhaps the reason we have gone over the to speedster side is that our art, and our craft, are so poorly valued. Take, for instance, the comment of one of my husbands relatives when I was working on a quilt as a graduation present. "Oh! You're so lucky, you can make your own things and save so much money!" Right. I pointed out that fabric runs about $10 per yard now, and that a quilt contains about 10 yards or more, not to mention the batting and the thread. Oh yes....and time....What about my time?

Or the comment made by one of the photographers we were talking to about doing my daughter's senior pictures. I said something about trading one of my art quilts for some of his work or something....his comment? "I don't need any blankets."

Given the common belief about quilting, maybe some of it is that we can't afford to invest anymore time in our pieces, if we did, we'd really be in the hole as far as trying to sell pieces...or even having the pieces appreciated.

I don't know...but I do know that slowing down and creating quality pieces in the style in which I like IS something I am going to do. After all, a Waco is much slower than a jet. ; )

Challenges

Today I shipped my Great Blue Heron off to the Quilting Natural Florida II show in the Florida Natural History Museum in Gainesville. It will be on display there February 6 through April 25, 2010.

At left is my 11.5" x 11.5" quilt entitled "Rocky." I did this for the Miami Valley Art Quilt Network's challenge with the theme "chocolate. " Rocky is my brother's chocolate lab and here he is snorking along the banks of Cut Bank Creek.


Here's the original photo. I was standing on the bank about 10 feet above Rocky. I had to take some artistic license as you can see that the only indication that it is a creek is the riffles in the water in the center of the photo. Since the water is so clear, you can't really tell if you didn't know. In fact, my friends were commenting on that....Chris said that she thought the water should be at the bottom because otherwise the rocks were falling on Rocky's head. It wouldn't hurt him as they are painted Tyvek.

The water in the quilt itself is various layers of different sheers. You can actually see the bottom fabric in through the water. The grasses are different specialty yarns and two fringed trims.



This is a detail of a quilt I did for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge. Information on how I actually did it is here. The challenge guidelines were to do a still life with a plant using packaging as an inspiration and color scheme.

The plant is a money plant, also called honesty (Lunaria annua) and the packaging was taken from a perfume offered in Anthropologie.




Here's the overall.

Another piece I did for the FFFC is this one. I meant it to be fun and funky.... It is a quilted rendition of cellular junction (a connection between cells, usually skin cells.).

While I was working on this and another for the microscopy challenge one of my co-quilters in the local Batty Binder's guild said "Is this supposed to be fun?" The answer for me is yes.

I do challenges because I think they make me go outside of what I usually do, or think about things in a different way. They also give me deadlines without which I am afraid I would produce very little in deed.

In fact, I joined the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge to see if I could get over my tendency to over think things.....So far, it isn't working well, except for the microscopy one...But, I'll just start whacking away at them and get it so it is very quick.

So...this is fun for me.

What isn't fun is another challenge I had to face today. Just as I was sitting down to write this, I got a call from my teenaged daughter. "Mom, I sort of rear ended a guy." I told her to sit tight and I'd be right there.

When I got there, there was already a police officer there. I was a little mystified though as I looked at the rear of the silver van she hit with our silver van.

I always carry a camera with me, usually for quilting notes, but in this case I'm glad I do...much better than a cell phone camera in my mind.







Can you see the damage? The blue marks are the transfers from our license plate to the bumper of the car she hit. There weren't really scratches, just the color transfer. He said that he thought she was on the cell phone until he realized that she had to get it out of her purse and turn it on to call me (talking on the cellphone while driving is a big no-no to me).

It's really too bad. While the guy said he wasn't hurt to the officer in the beginning at the end, he said he was going to drive over to the hospital and get checked out because he had a headache. However, he refused to be checked out on the spot or to be driven over. Of course, alarm bells are ringing all over the place for me.

She will have to go to court and will probably love her license for a while as she's almost 17 and hasn't had her license for a year yet. I am going to make her pay for the traffic ticket and any increase in the insurance. The Police officer was apologetic that he had to turn it in as he was sort of mystified at the damage as well.

I count is as a good learning experience for my daughter as I have gotten after her for not slowing down before she needs to. She tends to rely on her brakes too much. I'm grateful that she wasn't hurt...and that the guy didn't appear to be hurt (although he did show me his broken fingernail which broke on the coffee cup he was holding). Still....this is a challenge I'd rather not do.

Another Quilt , another two day art post!

Yesterday I finally finished (except for the binding) my Entry for the Fast Friday Fabric Challenge....you can look on that blog to see my struggles with making it....The topic for this challenge was animals....I had several ideas, which I'm also going to pursue, but I spent quite a bit of time trying to figure out which of my many ideas I was going to do. I ended up trying to do a picture of moonlight reflecting on a goldfish pond. I was inspired by a Chinese watercolor painting I saw a while ago.


I used layers of tulle, Angelina fibers and the sheet form of Angelina, along with the hairy yarn...I can't remember what it is called as I don't knit! I have a couple of other small projects to finish. While quilting it, I discovered that my machine is acting up. I'm going to have to take it in to be cleaned and gone over...I'm not looking forward to it as I know that the shop is going to have it for at least a month and I am not thrilled with the going price for cleaning around here.



The goldfish were my post for yesterday. Here's my post for today...hens and chickens.....