Four Letter Word List

Here are some of four letter words I ask my students to make. The point of the exercise is to use more than one fabric in each letter, and yet make one cohesive word.

I have 250 words, and the students get one page of ten words from which to choose.  I need the students to pick a word and get to work.

I tried to find words that weren't necessarily literal. The word itself doesn't really make any difference, it's what the student does with it that counts.

Thoughts on Teaching

This is my dear son, and on Christmas Eve a few years ago we were discussing how best to teach students how to make the free pieced letters. He suggested I have them start with "easy" letters to get the hang of it.

I disagreed, because that would tell them that some letters were "hard" and I didn't want to give them a reason to NOT make them. I told him the first exercise would be to get the students to make their own name. "Because they have an emotional connection to their name, and no matter how complicated the letters are, come hell or high water, they'll do it."  My son wasn't so sure.

"Come," I told him. "I'll prove it. I'm going to teach you how to make your name."

So I did. And yes, he made his name panel. We were both drinking vodka and orange juice, so it was a very fun evening.

 I knew I had proved my point when he took out his phone and took photos of the finished name panel.

To this day, I take his name panel to my letter class, and I tell the students the story.  "So what you're really telling us, " one student piped up once, "is that if he can do it, then we can do it too."

Correct.

The afternoon exercise is a four letter word using multiple fabrics, as you have seen in yesterday's post. I give each student a list of twelve words, and they can pick any word they like, and they can swap pages with anybody else in the class. Some words are trickier than others. And yes, Charlotte, students often have to be nudged gently to stretch themselves a bit. If they've done it in class, it will be much easier for them to continue on their own. Not every student needs that push. I had one lady once who wanted to make ALL the "hard" letters (I let her identify them) in class. Her logic was that once she could do those, she could make any letter.

Each student is different, and my job is to help them learn. As a teacher, it is also my job to give them something to think about, so they can take the lessons of the class and continue on their own when the class is over.

Four Crayons

My friend Julie asked if I had lined up all the Crayons quilt and looked at them all together. I didn't. I don't have a wall big enough. Brenda asked if I could put them all in one post so everybody could compare.

Here they are. As I am writing this, I have two rows of two photos in each row so you can almost see all four together. Let's hope Blogger cooperates!

Left: "Mashed Potato" (Low Volume) Crayons 
Right: Bright Crayons

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Left: Black Crayons

Right: Black & White Crayons

For the record, I'm done. There will be no more Crayons quilts.  

It's The Little Things

Can you spot the difference between these two?

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The Big W

I usually make my W's very w-i-d-e, but I wanted to try one that was very tall.

In Art School, I studied Lettering and Calligraphy for a year. We were told to keep a morgue - a scrapbook of lettering samples that interested us. I've long since lost mine, but I do keep my eyes open.

Regular readers know how much I love to watch tennis on TV while I sew. Last year I saw a big tall W used at Wimbledon.

What attracted me to it was the bottoms were not trimmed off, that each leg of the W ended in a sharp point.

So of course I had to try to make one (or two) myself.

What's Behind the Chicken?

Julie and I hear this all the time. The idea that "free-piecing" is a synonym for "sloppy workmanship." Folks who don't know any better say they would never do free-piecing because they think it means you sew things any which way, instead of the "right" way.

I hasten to correct all my students that free-piecing does NOT mean sloppy workmanship. Sewing quarter-inch seams, pressing the pieces neatly, trimming threads, making the flimsy lie FLAT, are all the kind of rules that SHOULD be followed. It's the design rules that can be broken.

Here's proof: This is the back of the Chicken quilt. I haven't counted, but I'm guessing I've got between 1,000 and 2,000 pieces in it. There are 35 different fabrics.

 My students always ask, "Do I press toward the dark fabric?" My answer is, "You press to minimize, and distribute the bulk evenly. And if that means you press toward the light fabric sometimes, then that's what you do."

Here's a closer view. The letters are about 4" tall

Remember, this entire quilt was made without templates, without patterns and it was NOT paper-pieced.  I take one piece of fabric and sew it to another, and keep going. (Yes, I do know where I am going, what I want it to look like and how I am going to get there.)