Heart book and practice

My sample book is finally finished and I am pretty happy with the results. Sadly blogger has decided to show the pages turned sideways so you will have to twist your neck to look at them. Ah well....

Anyway, I will be teaching these techniques at Quiltz as one hour hands on classes starting in February.
I also found a wonderful website by Leah Day. She posts new free machine quilting patterns regularly with a video demonstrating the how-to of it all. Email me if you want her blog address. I did these two pieces in a matter of minutes and plan to continue practicing with others. She already has over 100 of them on the web and plans to create 365! Worth checking out for new ideas.
I have been working on a few pieces that will be unveiled in the New Year. Speaking of the New Year...my resolution is to continue with the Dunderhogan series and come up with a more serious one too. I want to use my dyed fabrics and do a lot more free machine quilting and embellishment. What are your goals for the New Year?

I would love to hear from you.

Dunderhogans

I have been wanting to create a series and over Thanksgiving my son Jordan suggested that I do a whimsical one. We came up with this creature who we named Dunderhogan since my father used to call us that when we did something silly. All the creatures have washers for eyes, stripes on their antenna and fuzzy belly buttons. I wove the backgrounds out of two fabrics before creating the Dunderhogans. I did this series in conjunction with my critque group. We were studying the color wheel so the first one was black and white and he is The Original.

The second Dunderhogan was all green fabric or monochromatic.

I call it "Going Green".

The third Dunderhogan was created using complementary colors and I call him "Check it out". It is amazing how the backgrounds change appearance depending on the value of the fabrics used.

The fourth Dunderhogan was a double-split-complementary color scheme and I really had to think about that one. I plan to do more in this series using other restrictions rather than color. I learned a lot from this exercise and had fun in the process.

scarf, t-shirts and more

It has been very cold and icy here lately. This is a picture of the stream in my backyard. I am guessing that a neighbor had a water pipe burst because I never get this much water flowing until the snows melt! It is beautiful to look at and very solid.
Another t-shirt quilt for my friend Therese in memory of her father.
This scarf was made from a silk hanky. I spread the fibers between two pieces of Solvy and sewed them together with metallic thread. It is delicate but warm.
And lastly a picture of a part of my show that is hanging at Grilla Bites. I was surprised at how large the walls were and had to run home for more quilts. It is great to be able to show my work to the public.

Symbiosis challenge

My critique group chose the word Symbiosis for our challenge this month. We all created 12 x 12 pieces and they are phenomenal. Tina Somerset used foiling to get that sparkle on her spiderweb and she stenciled leaves over the top using paintsticks. Very effective.
Shirley Snowden used dyed fabric for her background and black and white felt for her zebra. I love the rear view!
Nancy Pagani used wonderful batiks for her piece and I realize that blogger turned it 90 degrees so you have to tilt your head to get the full affect. Sorry Nancy!
This one by Lola Sonnenschein is obviously turned too. It is very dimensional and the next picture shows how her spider stands off the piece.

I opted for black and white velvet and a chance to use some of my button stash.
Darn it! We have a bird on his nose! He is actually on the back of a rhino. Elaine Turcke made this one and she bound it with a chiffon ribbon.
This is a photo that Carolyn Wolf manipulated in photo shop. I love the colors that she used.
Betsy Beyer had fun needle felting onto mesh wire. Her piece stands on it's own and you will have to ask her for a detailed explanation.

We were all very pleased with our work and hope to hang a show one of these days so you can see it in person.