A book for my mother

We got some wonderful blank cloth books in the quilt store and after seeing a blog by Bee, I just had to try my hand at decorating pages. I opted for old photos of my parents - my mother in particular. I used buttons, ribbon and embroidery for embellishment.
I started out by cutting the doubled pages apart and sewing the framed pictures to the background of each page. I tried spraying the background of this page with paint but I didn't have much control over the paint. The reason for slitting the pages is so that your stitching doesn't show on the back side. When the pages are all completed, you sew them together again in pairs.
This one has old hand made lace around the picture. It was handed down through the family and probably made by my father's mother.
I had a great time playing with fabric, embellishment and design. Next time I will show you more pictures from the book.

Happy quilting!

Green

I took an online class by Susie Monday about using graphics on fabric. I decided to print the word green on thick handmade paper from Thailand. I used different fonts and different shades of green. In some places the paper was a little too thick going through my printer so there are dark ink marks but for the most part, the lettering worked well. I cut out the individual letters and glued them to the background fabric after playing with the arrangement.
I sewed down the skeleton leaves to my batik background and did some hand stitching with my hand dyed threads. It was a wonderful opportunity to use what I had learned in a project. Be sure to check out the other pieces for this challenge at www.12connected.blogspot.com

Tidal Force

I created this quilt for the SAQA show called Creative Force. What is more creative than Mother Nature at work? I used two photographs that I took while on the Oregon coast as my guide. The quilt did not get into the show but only 50 quilts were chosen from more than 350 so I don't feel too bad.
I did a lot of intense quilting on beautiful hand dyed fabric. I used Angelina fiber to get the splash of the waves and added seed beads by hand.
Here you can see the Angelina better.
It took me 12 solid hours to quilt the whole thing but I listened to some good books on CD in the process and I truly enjoyed watching the quilt unfold before me.

Galaxy

This is a close up of the quilt that I did for Kreinik using their blending filament and braid. I wrapped some metal washers with the braid to get those perfect circles.
I used the blending filament to couch down the braid and because the colors match, it was perfect.
Here is the whole quilt....looks like outer space to me.

Compartments

The art critique group chose compartments for the next challenge word. We revealed them on Friday and these are the results. Sadly once again blogger has decided to tilt some of my pictures and I don't know how to correct that. This is Nancy Pagani's wonderful quilt made out of tea bags. I wish that you didn't have to tilt your head to the left to see it correctly.

This is a close up of Tina Somerset's Kangaroo quilt.

Luckily the full size is the right direction.

Shirley Snowden opted to create bowls and they remind me of Chihuly's glass pieces.

Rona Barnes made a purse with lots of compartments.


Lola made this container using wire and beads.
My piece is made out of wool felt.

Here is Elaine Turcke's piece using photo transfer and a 3-dimensional apron.

Debra Wolfson used her own dyed fabrics and thread.

And Betsy is our painter in the group. We certainly have a wonderful mix and I love the way we all processed the word in different ways.

Pillows

I have been making pillows using some wonderful thread made by Kreinik. The kitty was drawn by my friend, Jayne Wangen years ago and we made patterns for hand embroidery from it. It is called Purr-fect Pillow after our cat by the same name. For this pillow, I sewed every line twice using Kreinik's blending filament.

Sunny Smiles is another of Jayne's designs. This time I used braid and sewed it down with the blending filament. I love the thickness of the braid and the sparkle in all of the threads that I used.
I found the threads to be strong and easy to work with. I have a small art quilt to show you using these threads in the future!

Happy Mother's Day everybody.

Dunderhogan #9 - Flying High

My latest challenge was to create my own fabric and use it in a quilt. I stenciled with Lumiere paint and rubber stamped with paint to create the texture on the bodies and the borders. I used embroidery floss wrapped around those white plastic curtain rings to create the eyes and I used wire for the balloon strings.
It was fun to return to the Dunderhogans again.