"Infinity" is a winner!

The last few weeks have been busy, busy, busy!  With our local guild quilt show and then HMQS in Salt Lake City I have been smokin' at the heels!  I wanted to share a quilt that I quilted for my customer Joan Anderson that won ribbons at both of these quilt shows.

"Infinity" won 3rd place in Applique at HMQS, Salt Lake City and Best of Show at the Desert Sage Quilt Show!

Beautifully hand appliqued by Joan Anderson, she used batik fabrics along with ultra suede and wool.  I quilted her quilt with all free-hand quilting for the feathers,  McTavishing and pebble fill.  I used a stencil for the double cross-hatching. Yummy Glide thread made everything just shimmer and Quilters Dream Wool batting gave it the perfect loft!  The outer border swag was all hand guided and the mini-piano key was done with a ruler.  After quilting, Joan added her gorgeous hand-done dimensional flowers and beading.  A lovely sparkle runs through the entire quilt with over 1000 Swarovski crystals that Joan applied, and I have a feeling that she'll be adding more!

Joan's Beauty......

Well, I promised you more pictures of Joan's beautiful show quilt so here are a few more sneak peaks!  This gorgeous quilt was definetely a labor of love for Joan (along with a piece of my soul added to it).  She completely hand appliqued all of of the blocks, borders, flowers and stems and as you can see in the pictures there are many places where additional dimensional flowers will be added.  The quilt has been delivered to Joan; she is now blocking and binding her quilt and will be adding her final touches before the show.

 Dimensional flowers will be added to the stems in the inner border and blocks.  The outer swag border was hand-appliqued on....amazing work!  I quilted it with a swag shape and tiny fillegree fill.  The outside cream border has been quilted with piano keys.

 The inner border has a beautiful vine climbing up two corners of the quilt .  With feathers connecting each section, the background behind the vines were filled with double crosshatching, McTavishing and Pebbling for variety and depth.

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 Each of the 9 blocks that surround the center focus block had a background fill of double cross-hatching....whew!  I was seeing double after a while.  This frog and bird with the basket turned out to be my favorite!

The entire quilt was done in batiks with the exception of these
 yummy berries, which were wool.

Freehand feathers filled all of the inner borders.

This quilt can be seen at our upcoming local quilt show (along with many other gorgeous quilts) next month. If you're in the area I hope you can join us.   If you are unable to attend I will be posting more pictures after Joan has added her final touches to her quilt.

Happy Wordwide Quilting Day!

Well, as the post says.....Happy Wordwide Quilting Day.  I'm home doing as I'm told (for once..) and quilting, quilting, quilting.  I know you haven't seen much of me lately.  That's because I'm working on a drop-dead gorgeous show quilt which should be done TONIGHT!!!  I'm so excited, and so is Joan who has been patiently waiting for it.  Soooo..........  stay tuned and we'll have more to share soon.

Joan's Sneek Peek

Deana's "Colors In Fall"

I  just wanted to share this beautiful applique artquilt that my friend Deana pieced.  She was inspired by a photo of the quilt "Windswept", originally made by designer Nancy B. Dickey. I quilted it with Superior Metallic and Variegated Rainbows threads to simulate the veins in the leaves.  The background and borders are quilted with SoFine thread.  I also extended the leaves out into the outer border to draw the eye out to edges.  Interesting enough, I did not see Nancy's original quilt prior to quilting Deana's quilt.   Hope you enjoy.....

Quick Table Runner

I just wanted to share this quick table runner idea.  I took the batik fabric left from my sister's quilt and cut everything into 2-1/2" strips using my Go!Cutter strip dies.  Randomly sewed the strips together, subcut the strip sections to 15" wide then kept sewing the sections together.  I also made a very long table runner/dresser runner for her to match her quilt.  This little runner is a leftover from leftovers!

Here is a picture of the original quilt that I made for her.  The pattern is from Karla Alexander's book "New Cuts for New Quilts"  It's made from all batik fabric and is quilted with the pantograph pattern "Waterworld".

New Toys!

My new Oliso iron finally arrived!  I just love it - it has little feet that retract when you touch the handle.  This allows you to leave your iron in a horizontal position at all times.  When you are ironing large pieces of fabric or small pieced blocks that allows you free use of your hands.  Takes a little bit of getting used to, but once your're accustomed to it you'll find it very hard to go back to a conventional iron.  It turn itself on and off and steams like a dream.  This is my 2nd Oliso; the first one is 5 years old and was beginning to show it's age a little.  When you use an iron everyday in your studio it does take some wear and tear.  I will be taking both Oliso's to the retreat so that everyone can play with them too!

Last night during "Cupcake Wars" I decided to cut out a project that I could sew during our retreat free time.  I used my Go!Cutter "Tumbling Block" die and cut up all the red and white fabric left from my stash.  Using the free pattern that came with the die I will make a twin size quilt to use as a quilted sample for by booth in April.  I was curios as to how long it would take to get organized, iron the fabric and cut:  1 hour!  Just enough time to hear the end of "Cupcake Wars"

Last weekend I started this table runner project using the Go!Cutter "Rose of Sharon" die.  It's very quick, as you only have to make 3 blocks, set on point with a nice focal fabric.  I finished the fused raw edges with a very small zig-zag and Superior Rainbows thread.  It's still a little puckery, but that will go away when I quilt it!  Love that fused applique!

Dixie's Exploding Pineapple

Just thought I would share Dixie's quilt with you.  A beautiful purple and cream batik quilt.  The purple blocks are "Exploding Pineapple" blocks.  Dixie made this quilt in a class at the local quilt shop.  She brought it to me for quilting, wanting to display it on the back of her sofa.  Her custom quilting includes modern feathered wreaths designed especially for this quilt.  The borders are quilted with feathers and piano keys.

Unidentified Sea Creatures

I thought I would share an update on my beaded piece.  It's been very slow going, but nice to have some hand-work to play with.  The one thing that I didn't think of is my eyesight!  Boy, are these beads tiny.  It certainly takes good light and strong glasses but I'm enjoying the work.  I've tried to make my creatures similar to sea anenomes and various corals and it's been fun to just imagine what they should look like.  I've also added some beads to the fish, but I'm not sure that I like that yet.  enjoy....

To bead or not to be....

My wonderful mother and sister heard about this upcoming project and sent me a mountain (well, may just a small mountain) of seed beads to work with.  I have this Batik panel that I bought in Hawaii a few years ago with the intention of someday making it into a small wall-quilt for my bathroom.  Now that I have Friday's free to work on hand-work (while my daughter is skiing) I decided to work on a bead project.  I just recently received Nancy Eha's new book "Bead Creative" and decided now would be a good time to practice beading on a small quilt.  Not having the time (or patience) to actually piece something I decided that the Batik panel would be the perfect practice recipient.   Stay tuned for more updates.....

After a quilt quilting session with Quilters Dream blend batting and Superior Threads the batik is ready for beading. 

A small section; partially done after 7 hours of beading.  I'm sure glad that I decided to start with a small panel!

The selection of seed beads that my mom and sister mailed to me.  Jackpot!

Nancy's book is a wonderful resource for quilting on art quilts.

Happy New Year!

My New Year's resolution this year was to start a blog and keep up with it....so, welcome to my blog!

Every year during Christmas I try to work on new techniques.  This year I worked on my Fast Friday Fabric Challenge #52.  We are challenged to complete a piece of artwork within one week, based upon a set of requirement for that particular month.  The challenge occurs the last week of each month.

My piece, "Lava" was created from a single piece of my own hand-dyed fabric. I distorted the fabric by slicing is up, staggering the pieces and then sewing it back together. The black strip signifies "nothingness, deep in the earth; where the lava comes from". It is heavily quilted, using 10 different threads to add to the color patterns. I used many metallic threads; gold, bronze red, garnet and black to signify the metals found in lava. I found this challenge exceptionally challenging; the more I studied "Color Field Painting" challenge, the more I became confused. Hopefully this fits the the description; it was fun and I am happy with the piece. Just need to finish the edges and label it. It measures 22"x26".

I thought I would also share the 1st challenge that I have completed, that being the FFFC Challenge #49 which was based upon the technique "Chiaroscuro".

 "Frog on a Leaf" was created from a photo that I've had for quite a while. The frog is appliqued from my hand dyed fabrics and thread painted. The background is a tonal batik which has been heavily quilted for texture. I also added Shiva Painsticks and Inktense watercolor pencils for highlights and shadows. It measures 12"x13".