In a recent podcast interview with Pat Sloan we talked briefly about creativity and inspiration. Creativity for me happens when I imagine the possibilities as I plan a quilting project. That happens after I have had an inspiring experience—be it discovering a leaf along the …
Last day of 2018 I’m looking back at photos and recalling what I experimented with in the field of dyeing and painting fabric. One of my favorites is the plunge into ice dyeing. There are no “ugly” results and I love to pull out the pieces, admire the results and never get to the next step of considering how to use it.
My grandmother, a farmer’s wife, did needlework of some kind every evening. She kept a basket of embroidery by her rocking chair along with a hand-made bag of crochet or tatting thread complete with mail order patterns ready to be worked into doilies or edgings …
Using Linda Ambrosini’s pattern to have some fun with different fabrics and textures as well as quilting designs. Her pattern reminded me of a design I did for a college art class using blue apples. I may have to create or re-create that design in …
Art Nouveau Poppy
I have long admired the poppy. The graceful stems that hold that bright red flower have led me to acquire fabrics that include a poppy motif, to hone in on photos of quilts as I search internet sources, and to admire those I see in person at quilt shows. Six years ago I made one version based on a designer pattern. Today I share an art nouveau version made with my marbled wool and placed on my hand dyed vintage linen background. The design was adapted from a Dover publication featuring art nouveau flowers. I used Wonderfil variegated perle cotton from the Sue Spargo collection as well as a tweed thread from Valdani. It satisfies my creative urge to seek out the unusual combinations and still use traditional settings and stitches for a finished project. This piece will be one of the samples for display (and for sale) at my vending booth at the Coastal Bend Quilt and Needlework Guild’s show in February at Robstown, Texas. I plan to finish two more flowers on vintage linen backgrounds to make a trio but now the time has come to pack all things stitching for our winter home.
“In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place, and in the sky, The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard among the guns below.” My first memories of poppies (the Oriental Poppy) relate to the border along …
I didn’t have to wait for the weather to turn cold to try ice dyeing but that is what happened and now I wonder why on earth I kept putting off trying it!!! While the ice was melting I kept tabs on the process and …
Take one dyed vintage linen towel, post it on the design wall for deliberation while other projects are worked on, see a bench pillow at Hickory Stick, dig out some sunflower fabric from #$&+ years ago and, voila, another project is born.
I have been resisting the urge to get back to my fabric dyeing but today I could resist no longer. The creative urge won! I had my color choices in mind, again drawing from nature. The Calhoun peaches first came to mind but at a …
