The GOAT

I've cleaned up a bit of the studio and am gradually making headway in the office, which is in danger of being overrun by paper. Taxes are a big motivation there. I have also decided to go back to the "New Hampshire Quilt," a quilt of birds based on people I know or admire, places and things that I love or anything else I decide to add.

If you have been reading for any length of time you know that I love to watch tennis, and that my favorite player is Roger Federer, widely considered to be the Greatest Of All Time (GOAT). Right now the Australian Open is underway in Melbourne Australia. Roger has won the last two years. So naturally I am watching. Roger (he's known by his first name) is from Switzerland, and the Swiss colors are red and white, ergo a red and white bird inspired by Roger.

The musical fabric for the wing, with the stringed lyre, is meant to represent (loosely) a tennis racquet, as is the checkerboard fabric of the beak is meant to represent the strings on a tennis racquet. The letters of the body are a nod to Roger's logo, a stylized RF.

In the past I have always used WOW (White on White) fabrics as the backgrounds for my birds, but I have seen birds made with a mixture of WOWs and some small prints on White or some variant, and I thought they looked good, so I am going to use that idea in this quilt. Not every bird will have a patterned background.

And yes, that little "crown" on top of the bird's head is meant to remind you of a crown.

All these little things just go to show you how much freedom you have in constructing and personalizing your own birds. If you want to make one of these birds, you can get my tutorial here, at my Etsy shop. It's an instant download, so you can get started right away, but I should warn you. Bird making can be rather addictive. It's hard to make just one!

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.  

Meet Kathy!

The Internet is a wonderful place.  A few weeks ago I discovered Kathy's blog, Q.U.I. (Quilted Under the Influence). She was working on Roses for Rosita, a Wedding Quilt for her nephew and his wife.

When I saw the blocks, free pieced, liberated masterpieces with stunning free pieced letters - I about fell of my chair from astonishment. These were bravura blocks, and I was blown away.

 When Kathy revealed the finished flimsy, I felt it was a Masterpiece, and deserved quilting that would really do it justice. Kathy replied she intended to do just that.

 A couple of weeks ago she emailed me from Maine. She and her husband have a summer cottage in Maine (without electricity!!) and they usually spend about six weeks there in the summer. She wondered if perhaps we could get together.

"Name the time and the place,"  I replied, I will go any distance to meet you. We went back and forth, and finally it was agreed that she would drive to my house on Saturday, and stay overnight, leaving on Sunday.

Kathy arrived and we immediately started talking quilts.  After dinner, she pulled out the blocks she is working on.  The island on which their cottage sits has only 13 homes, and two other buildings. Kathy has free pieced each of the 15 buildings using inspiration and directions found in Gwen Marston's Liberated Quiltmaking.***  Kathy made these before she started working on Roses for Rosita.

 

Many of these blocks were hand sewn (since there is no electricity, remember) and all  will be hand quilted. Here are three.  Kathy will show you the rest on her own blog when she gets back home.

I was absolutely gob-smacked. They are totally phenomenal.  Kathy's use of fabrics is stunning. Every time Kathy revealed a new house, I raved more. I was so impressed I brought her over to meet my Mother, who agreed with my assessment.  Kathy makes magic with these houses.

I had such a great time with Kathy this weekend. I loved meeting her, seeing her work, learning from her, and talking quilts. We've already decided we have to get together again next year!



***[note: the book is out of print, but is well worth every penny you have to spend to obtain a copy.]

Christmas Present!

Oh, oh, oh! Look what I got for Christmas. (OK, I don't actually have it yet, but it will be on its way to me in just a few days!) I am -so-excited!

Reading Out Loud

Like many of you, I have been absolutely enchanted by the many, many beautiful quilts I have seen over the last week at the Blogging Quilt Festival. Many are from quilt blogs I never knew existed, and many have the most wonderful stories. It will take me quite some time to work my way through the entire list, but I have really been enjoying it. Thank you so much, Amy, for setting this up!

I've had a few days off so I have been making more blocks for my Reading in Bed quilt, which I have retitled "Reading Out Loud." I have done my calculations, and I needed 7 more blocks for the top. I still need about 24 half blocks for the edges, as this quilt will be set on point.

So I decided to lay them all out, just so I could take a look at them all.
The new blocks (more on the right, in the photo above) tend to look a bit more sedate and less wonky. All of the blocks looked very unique and "block-like." Few of them interacted with the sashing fabric the way this one doesWhich is to say, this one plays games with the sashing by almost disappearing.I like that, so I decided that for the last few blocks, I would really play with that concept, and use fabrics for the outer pieces that were only black and white.I am definitely feeling a wonky vibe going on, and I like it! Now to make the half blocks and start assembling this top!

Liberated!

It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here! It's here!


The day after I bought Gwen Marston & Freddy Moran's book, Collaborative Quilting, I broke down and ordered a used copy of Gwen's book Liberated Quiltmaking from an Amazon bookseller. The bookseller I selected was in Maine, and I reasoned the book would arrive quickly.It did. I ordered it on Sunday and yesterday, when I opened my door, the box fell into my apartment. The book was said to be in "Used, very good" condition, and it is actually in excellent condition. (Since you are all going to want to know, I paid $60 + shipping)

Tonya had warned me not to expect the same vibrant color as Collaborative Quilting, but this book more than makes up for it. Gwen describes in detail how to make wonky designs, the little things to think about, like how using a larger triangle to sew to a square for a star allows you more flexibility in the "wonkiness" department. (I always have problems with those.)

I haven't had much time to read, but so far my favorite description is of a "black sheep block," (a block you think is terrible). Gwen writes:

...you don't have to accept it. If your eye is continually drawn to what your mind insists is a serious flaw which will irrevocably damage the overall effect of your quilt, then get rid of that particular block... and make a replacement.

She offers a familiar suggestion... "You can send it to me..."

More Liberated Log Cabins

Here are a few more liberated log cabin blocks. I am having -so- much fun with these, trying to select color combinations I might otherwise never use. I'm deliberately making the inner squares asymmetrical and off-center.

Last night I attended a meeting of the local quilters guild. I had never attended a meeting before, and I landed at a table with a nice group of women, one of whom looked vaguely familiar.

"Did you go to UNH," she asked? Yes. "What year did you graduate?" 1977. "You were in my class with Dan Valenza. You made a sculpture that was a loaf of bread."

HOLY COW!

Yes, yes and yes! The assignment had been to create something using an additive form of sculpture. I created a walnut half in bread. Professor Valenza loved things that were functional, so at the end of my talk about the piece, I pulled out a tub of butter and a knife, tore off a hunk of bread and demonstrated my sculpture's "functionality" by eating some. I can see why that would have been memorable.


The last part of the meeting was show and tell, and I was prepared. I brought Jasmine's Quilt and my little selvage bag with me.

Next time I'll bring the Alphabet Sampler Quilt (which I should finish tomorrow.)

Liberated Log Cabin Blocks

I got home from work last night, and went right into the sewing room where I made these five Liberated Log Cabin blocks. These are going to be fun. It was -so- liberating to sew complementary colors together (blue & orange). I had great fun using temperature contrast (cool blue and warm red), and I finally to to use that crazy black and white swirl fabric, and that multicolored one on the upper right...

I'd say I was in trouble, but I have too many other things to make before I can devote myself to this project.


To wit: the next time I decide to use a white-0n-white fabric on the binding of a quilt, and to do the hand sewing on the front, because I like to show off my blindstitching (yeah, I know, it's an ego thing,) will somebody please whack me upside the head and slap me silly?

It's bad enough I wear bifocals and can't thread a needle without help. I had to move a Very Bright Light near my chair so I could -see- what I am trying to sew. (Let's get real here, I can barely see what I am doing clearly.) The thread wears out quickly and breaks where I least expect it, so I can't sew more than about 16" at a time. The white on white is so THICK that it's really slow going. Add that to the fact that I have arthritis in my right thumb and holding a -pen- makes my hand hurt, and now I am trying to hold a needle... which means I can't work on this more than 30 minutes at a time...

Let's just say I've been dealt a huge piece of Humble Pie.

And I'm eating it.