Sunrise Over the Urban Canyon

Today is another Reveal Day for our Material Mavens group.  The theme this time was Canyon.  I had thought, of course, about depicting a literal canyon.  I've traveled so much in the West, have been fortunate to have visited the Grand Canyon several times, but also other national parks in Utah with stunning and unique canyons.  I have some spectacular photos from these travels.  But somehow, none of them seemed to inspire me.

I WAS inspired by a Google image of a "slot canyon," but when I wrote to the photographer for permission to use his image, he never replied.

But then the words "urban canyon" hit me.  I immediately began sketching some ideas.  Once I had a rough sketch that I liked, I drew it off more carefully on graph paper.  Then I used tracing paper to trace templates.

My first version didn't work.  Husband Bob when he looked at it couldn't make head nor tail of it.  The problem was that I had use some fabrics from my stash and others that I had purchased just for this purpose that had window-like designs for the buildings.  Really great fabrics!  But they were too busy and colorful.  As I said on the MM blog, "he couldn't see the forest for the trees."

So I started over with plainer fabrics.  I decided to focus on black, brown, blue, and gray.  I had recently learned that objects at a distance in a landscape are appear paler and more gray than those in the foreground, so my grays were reserved for the distant buildings, as well as for the street, the sidewalk, and the center stripe.

I had fun with using various decorative stitches to secure the buildings to the background, a gorgeous batik that reminded me of a sunset or sunrise.  I had first fused the buildings down with Wonder Under to a wonderful batik fabric that reminded me of a sunrise, and used the decorative stitching for my "quilting."  Too, I wanted to emphasize how you can see both fronts and sides of some of the buildings, so I used couching to emphasize this line of demarcation.

I used a Sue Benner technique, learned in a class taken last fall, to finish the edges.  I chose six different colors of threads and zigzagged along the edges and left "tails" of the threads at every corner.  For the backing, I used a cityscape fabric that I have long treasured.  It was bought in the late 90s and depicts the skylines of D.C., NYC, and Seattle.  I chose the latter skyline for this backing.

As always, click to see enlargements of the photos.

the Seattle city-scape that forms the back

the quilt showing the tails of thread

Working Neat/Working Messy

I have always wished I were one of those people who could, when quilting, "work neat."  I seem incapable of doing this!  Whatever project I'm working on, and especially if I have two or three going at the same time, my studio soon looks as if a tornado had hit it!

Yesterday I straightened up my studio, since I had company coming over for dinner.  I felt sure some of the women would ask to see my latest quilts, and I was embarrassed by the chaos.  So I straightened it up at least to the point that someone coming in wouldn't wonder about that possible tornado! (As it turned out, only two women came in, and these I invited!)

So while it is in decent shape, I'll enclose a few photos!

I actually started out in the hall.  I reorganized my bookshelves, which had gotten to be truly chaotic. On the shelves you can see are my quilting books, one shelf for traditional and one for art quilts, plus my quilting magazines, and miscellaneous how-to-do books from drawing and painting to crocheting and knitting, and lots of decorating books, as well, from the days planning this house.  (We've lived here four years now.)

Now we move into my studio.

When you walk in, you can see my cutting table in the center of the room--an Ikea portable kitchen cabinet that
has drawers and shelves in the side you can't see.  In the corner of the room is my computer, where
I am right now!  

On the left wall is my Bernina sewing machine and one of my Elfa drawer
"towers" which houses white and off-white fabrics, as well, in easy reach from the machine,
various necessities such as bobbins, scissors, pins, etc.

To the right of the door I have just put my radio and CD player in its
new home--on a never-used "TV tray".  This used to be on the shelves in the
hall, but I never liked it there.  Its cords were unsightly, stretching to the nearest
outlet--an eyesore that could be seen from the dining room, next door
to my studio.

Here's a better view of my design wall.  I made it from insulation panels, nailed to the wall and covered with flannel.
It goes from right above the electrical outlet to the ceiling--10' ceiling in here.  My 10 Material Maven
quilts are here most of the time, though sometimes covered with more flannel, if
I need to pin a biggish quilt on the wall!

My ironing board is sort of moved here and there in the room.  Here
is is in front of a second-hand dresser I bought here in town, made of blonde wood 50ish
furniture that, in this case, in incredibly sturdy and well-made.  What a buy!
It has a total of 8 drawers, which hold all manner of things from art supplies, to
grandkids' crafting stuff, to the CDs onto which I once saved all my photos, and on and on and on!

Beside the door and on the back wall of the room are my Elfa drawers
that hold my stash--or part of it!  These drawers are loosely organized by colors and/or by types
of fabric.   My threads are on top, as you can see.  On my cutting table I laid on the "painted, cut, and stitched canvas"
quilt that I have started since getting home from Quilting Adventures.  I am eager
to finish all four of these, but baby quilts keep taking precedence!

With Apologies to Robert Frost!

This bush of "knock out" pink roses was covered with blooms!
Our bushes of red knock outs aren't blooming yet.

Today is the first day of spring!  As I walked this morning, camera in my pocket, I snapped the few signs of spring that showed themselves.  Also as I walked, I thought of Robert Frost's poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening."  As I recited it to myself, I thought:  I could parody this poem!  Well, yes, but wow, is his rhyme scheme hard to pull off!

Despite the challenge,  I began the parody in my head while finishing my walk, but completed and tweaked it on the computer.  Here it is, and the snapshots that inspired it are above and below:

Whose yards these are I think I know.

Their owners are at work, although

They wouldn’t mind me stopping here

To snap these photos, even though

It’s early yet, so rather queer

To capture spring when it’s just here.

Most grass is brown and still looks dead,

But as I walk I see some dear,

Sweet blooms of yellow, pink, and red,

And even blue.  I need to spread

The news, to all make clear

Spring’s come!  This yellow, blue, and red

This pink—show that spring’s not near

But rather on this day, it’s here!

I go inside to sew and cheer:

Hurrah!   Truly spring is here!

When I passed by this tree yesterday, the scent of its blossoms
was heavenly!  Notice the blue, blue, cloudless, Texas
sky!

Petunias do well in Texas in the spring, but once summer
gets here--they usually don't survive.

This yellow "knock out" rose is the first to bloom on its bush.

From my computer desk, I can see this lovely
tree across the street.

Look closely!  These are the first blue bonnets I've seen so far.  Soon this field and
others will be covered!

My neighbor told me yesterday that these dianthus came up from

seed from last year's plants.  Though supposedly annuals,

dianthus survive here, after being cut back in the fall, to

bloom again the next spring.

The Lost Art of Letter Writing

This is my latest quilt for the Material Mavens art quilting group that I am in.  Today was our reveal day, and our theme for this time was Communications.  I chose to focus on letters written from my parents to my Aunt Sallie and my paternal grandmother.  They were written during the 1930s, when Daddy was looking for a job on a newspaper and then from Mother, after they married.  I also included a picture from that era.

For the crazy quilt background for the snippets of letters and envelopes, I fused some of Mother's handkerchiefs to pink and blue fabrics, as well as some old lace of hers.  Then I cut them into crazy quilt shapes and sewed them together.  I embellished the background with machine embroidery stitches on some of the seam lines.  Then I fused down and appliqued the letter snippets and a few envelopes, as well as the photo.

These wonderful letters were given to me by my cousin David, who sorted through his mother's letters after she died and put them into categories according to which sibling the letters were from.  He then put them into a notebook and gave the notebook to the various families.  Thanks to David!

The back of the quilt is also pictured above.  The fabrics that are under the hankies can better be seen on the backing.  I used the pink fabric that reminds me of Mother's Pink Tower china (which she willed to my niece Laura!), and the blue fabric with blue bonnets and other flowers makes me think of Daddy, who loved gardening and flowers so much.  I also used some 1930s era, genuine, feed sack fabrics, again in the signature colors of pink and blue.  

The close-up allows one to read some of the choicer quotations from my parents.  Daddy is often depressed over the financial situation in the country and for him personally, unable at first to find a newspaper job.  He relates to his sister Sallie how a new job soon ended, and he tells her, "Don't tell Mom!"  (Some things never change!)  And Mother, a new bride, lists for her sister-in-law many of the delights of marriage, including trying new recipes.  She projects into the future and imagines herself as a granny whose grandchildren speak in "dulcet tones" about the hours spend in Grandmother's kitchen!

This latter statement is poignant for me.  Her first granddaughter, our beloved daughter Mary Katherine, who is no longer with us, DID indeed spend hours in her kitchen.  She loved especially to make cookies and candy with her grandmother, and I have recipes in her hand-writing, copied down from some of my mother's.  

Interwoven Lives--My Latest Art Quilt

Today is Reveal Day in my Internet art quilting group, The Material Mavens.  The theme this time was Interwoven.  I decided to print the names of all our members on silk ribbons and then weave them together, such that all the names were visible.  I put a fusible product on the back of each ribbon, after it was printed, and then worked on the weaving.  This was quite a challenge!  I had printed the names at either the right or left sides or in the middle, thinking then it would make the weaving easier.  Not so!  Despite that, getting the ribbons right, without obscuring any name took me several hours.

Once I finally had a design that suited me, I carefully moved each ribbon onto the turquoise silk background fabric.  Once all the ribbons were in place, I fused down the ribbons.  The background fabric is recycled silk from a second hand store's collection of blouses!  I bought quite a few 100% silk blouses and now love using old fabric!

This quilt as depicted here is actually slightly changed from the first one I posed!  I wasn't happy with the original binding, and so I substituted another. I actually used a tie-belt from a lovely silk dress my mother had made for me some 20 or 30 years ago.  The fabric is lovely and the dress is perfect still, but unfortunately I have outgrown it!  I'm sure this fabric will reappear in a quilt someday--its lovely flower and butterfly pattern doesn't show here, but I do like the slight contrast with the background and the way the binding defines the edges.

Another change in this quilt is some added hand quilting.  At first I simply "echo quilted" around the weaving, but the corners and edges looked too empty.  So I hand-quilted circles, some alone and some over-lapping.

You can see all the Interwoven quilts--a superb group this time!--on our blog, which can be found at http://thematerialmavens.blogspot.com/

A Quilt called "Haathi"

"Haathi" is Hindi for elephant.  I've been working off and on on this quilt all fall.  I don't know if it rightly belongs on this blog, where I post my art quilts, or on my other blog Alice's Looking Glass, where I usually post traditional quilts plus accounts of travels and books I've read, etc.

But I am posting here because it was quilted in a non-traditional manner!  I had intended to embroider the center medallion and then machine quilt the three borders.  But then, getting frustrated with my first attempt at machine quilting,  I had an Eureka moment:  Why not hand quilt with embroidery stitches?  I confess that I do not enjoy machine quilting, and hand quilting with tiny stitches and regular thread is beyond my capabilities, now, with my arthritic hands.  And so I used Perle embroidery thread (in several different weights) and several different embroidery stitches.

I made this quilt for a dear friend who has been so generous and hospitable to us out in California.  I look forward to presenting it to her when we are there for Christmas!

I used several different embroidery stitches in this quilt.  Under the close-up pictures I will name the stitches used.

around ball:  running stitches; lines within ball:  back stitches;
"smiley face" lines:  stem stitches; round shapes above them:
star stitches
Around the elephant I first embroidered a running stitch, and then I wove a
second, heavier thread through those stitches, forming the "laced running
stitch"

The decorative stitches here on the elephant's blanket
are all running stitches

....but, alas, the tips of the Friendship Stars in the cornerstone
got cut off when the binding was done.  I'm not happy about this....but,
it's a minor thing!

My Travel Quilt #2--Bergen, Norway/Group Quilts

This was the quilt that I made after the Postcards one, and it's the one that I posted on the Material Mavens blog on our Reveal Day.

This quilt was a challenge to make, because of the many different layers involved and the fact that I embellished with embroidery.  The sky (hand-painted cloth) and water (batik) were fused to the batting.  Then the individual buildings were cut out from already fused fabrics (batiks), as were the watch tower and the front of the dock.  I cut the swans, which look more like ducks, and the buoy out of fabric with Wonder Under already applied--cut these freehand.  I stuck in some greenery at the right just to fill in the space.  The buildings are embellished/quilted with perle embroidery in a variety of embroidery stitches.  Going through all those layers was difficult, and I later learned that had I used wool batting rather than 100% cotton, and had I not over-fused the elements, this task would not have been so difficult. I machine quilted the sky and the water.  The binding was fused, and I matched it to the areas which butted up against the binding.

This pictorial quilt was based on a photo of Bergen, Norway, a photo that was one of my favorites.  The area depicted was the Hanseatic Wharf, which has many lovely wooden buildings that have been lovingly restored.  Here is the photo:

As you can see, because of the size of our MM quilts, I simplified and rearranged many of the elements in this photo.  I started at the left and put in the yellow building, some of those behind it, the two white ones, the bigger yellow one (that now is brown), but then I added in a yellow building that isn't in the photo.  I put in the buoy and the two sailboats, the watch tower, but I left out the tents that are stalls where various goods were for sale.

I do like this photo, and it would be a great one to base a group quilt on--one like so many that we saw at the Houston quilt festival.  Three of my quilting friends are interested in trying a group quilt project out!  Here are some that were in Houston:

I am assuming that 10 different quilters produced this quilt.  I love it that there is a variation in the length of the panels,  but all the roof lines are leveled up~

This quilt was likely made by 15 different quilters!  Wow!  They did a great job of lining up the horizon line, the road, etc.  But for this many quilters to make a quilt that fits together so well, but that also portrays the various quilters' styles, is wonderful!

And here's one of a single house, produced by 24 quilters.  Again wow!  The fence, roof lines, and sky are lined up well.  But again, love how each quilter's own style and choices of fabrics varies enough to make the quilt all the more interesting.