Here’s the blue scraps to go with the green scraps of two weeks ago. I had lots of darker blue scraps too, but they are being dispatched in another project. The turquoise scraps still fill my little bin, but at least they have some room to breathe now.

You may remember that I bought this quilt as a top from Wanda about a month ago. I thought it would be weird  to quilt and finish someone else’s work, but it wasn’t at all. In fact, it was really fun and as soon as I started working on it, I couldn’t stop. Firstly, Wanda’s workmanship is impeccable. All the seams were even and all edges and points aligned. There were no poufs to “quilt out.” Basting was easy-peasy. The quilt is not quite twin sized, so I was pleasantly surprised at how quickly it came together despite it’s being large enough to wrap oneself up in.

More significant though, was how the quilt revealed itself to me as I worked on it. Normally, I would already have a relationship with the fabrics from piecing them together. But since I didn’t piece this one, I got to meet each and every fabric and see how it interacted with it’s neighbor as I quilted. I enjoyed seeing how individual stripes modulated in color, and loved being surprised by each pairing that picked up on a hue in it’s partner. It was quite fun.

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I don’t know how many readers are relatively new to quilting and it’s associated gadgets. I may be preaching to the choir, but here are two of my favorites: my walking foot, and the bar thingie that came with it. Walking feet come in several varieties depending on your machine, but they are all variations on this foot-with-box contraption. The purpose of the walking foot is to move the top layer of the quilt sandwich at the same speed as the bottom layer and thus eliminate lots of frustrating puckering. I do all my straight line machine quilting with my walking foot. On this quilt, I kept the quilting simple, because really, with fabric like this, fancy quilting is just unnecessary.

Often, I just use the side of the walking foot as my guide for stitching parallel lines. That’s how I did the first round of quilting 1/4″ from the edge of each zig zag. I wanted to quilt a line down the center of each zig zag too, so I used one of the guide bars that came with the walking foot. It is L shaped and slides through a hole in the back of the walking foot and is locked in place with a screw. You can adjust it so the “leg” sticks out anywhere from right next to the foot, to about three inches away. I also have another guide bar for the other side of the foot, depending on what I want to line up with. (As an aside, my machine came with another two guide bars that fit into the back of many of the regular presser feet too.) Once you get the hang of it, there’s all kinds of uses for these guides. I measured the width of my zig zags (4″) and set my guide bar two inches from the needle. Then, off I went, quilting down the center of each zig zag, making sure the leg of the guide bar followed the seam line. In the photo you can’t see the lovely line of stitching behind the walking foot, but it is perfectly parallel to the edge of the yellow zig. You can see that I am about to pivot the quilt and sew the zag (this is where the needle-down function on many newer machines is also very convenient). I considered more lines in between these, but the quilt didn’t seem to need them. It’s for a kid’s bed, so it didn’t need to be quilt-show-fancy.

I’ve progressed since this photo of two days ago. It’s nearly done now. The design and quilting are nothing complicated, but  think it’s really looking great.

The quilt/craft blogs have been a-flutter for the last few days with all the Quilt Market excitement. Maybe some day I will be able to attend  as an exhibitor or retailer and join in all the fun (and hard work!). I’m not holding my breath though. On Thursday, the Market turns into the Festival, which IS open to the public. This I would also like to attend someday — which actually could happen. For now though, I am content that at least one of my quilts is there.

If you are at the Festival, please stop by the Tactile Architecture exhibit and say hi to my quilt!

UPDATE: Vicky is in Houston and sent me a photo of my quilt with it’s neighbors:

Thank you so much Vicky.

Blurred Boundaries started today and runs through September 4th.

It is a Mixed Media Fiber Art exhibit Juried by Virginia Spiegel and curated by  Lynn Krawczyk.

The definition of Fiber Art has evolved greatly over the past few years, opening up a new range of possibilities to artists working in various disciplines. Fiber artists are incorporating more mediums into their work, creating unique art that reaches across previously defined boundaries. Artists from other mediums are discovering the infinite possibilities that fiber can offer, also creating hybrids that are eye catching and moving. Blurred Boundaries seeks these arttworks for a week long exhibition honoring the ingenuity of mixed media fiber art.

I have two pieces on display:

“Fairytale Forest (click to enlarge) ©2009  32″ x 32″

Pink House ©2009  18″ x 18″

The exhibit will be open to the public during the following hours: 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Exhibit Location: Fabrications Retreat, Raddison Plaza Hotel Kalamazoo, Michigan

Show dates: August 31 – September 4, 2009

The zig zag quilt started out on a whim, but as I worked on it, the taupe and scraps told me that it would be a nice gift for my dad. The timing couldn’t have been better — I finished it in time to get it to him for his birthday.

In my mind, the quilting was to be a lush forest of free form critters and odd forms.

What came out of my hands was a sampler of sorts of the overall patterns I am comfortable with. The scale compliments the echo quilting on the zigzags themselves and it all looks good, so I’m not complaining.

I used various colored threads in the zigzag section. From afar you wouldn’t notice, but up close it’s a nice detail. The free form in the solid areas is taupe to match the fabric.

The repurposed duvet cover I used for the backing had a hole in it. I “darned” a patch over it and it’s one of my favorite parts of the quilt — besides the zigzags, of course!

Spectrum Zig Zag, originally uploaded by Umzavi.

This was inspired by a Ripple Afghan in progress and a half yard of plain taupe fabric. I’ve been able to spend quality time with it the last two days and I’m really happy with how the quilting is progressing.

I thought I’d share my process for adding the stag’s head to my latest quilt. It’s by no means the only way to add embroidery to a quilt, it was just my way for this quilt.

First, I drew the stag’s head directly onto a piece of tear-away stabilizer. I’m a confident draw-er and just went freehand using a photo as reference, but one could certainly find or print something out at the appropriate size and trace it onto the stabilizer.

Next, I pinned the stabilizer onto the front side of my quilt, which I had already quilted with parallel lines or channels. With 40 weight thread, I free-motion quilted the stag’s head, following the pencil lines I had drawn on the stabilizer. The tedious part follows — gently tearing away all the stabilizer. A seam ripper or something pointy is helpful to pick at the teensy bits in tight spaces. I also knot and bury any thread tails left from when I’ve stopped and stared lines of stitching.

Above is a detail of the front of the quilt with the machine embroidery; below is the back of the quilt showing the full picture.

For the nose and the eye, I placed appropriate shapes of fabric in position under the stabilizer to raw-edge applique the pieces as I followed the pencil drawing (you can still see a white haze of stabilizer that I haven’t yet picked out).

Once the machine embroidery is done and the stabilizer is ripped/picked out, it’s time to add the thicker lines with hand embroidery. Follow the main machine stitched lines, but don’t do the ones that define details on the interior of the image.

Using two strands of embroidery floss and a small chain stitch, I was careful to only go through the top layer of the quilt so as not to mar the look of the thread drawing on the back. Make a small quilter’s knot at the start of your floss, insert the needle into the top only of the quilt an inch or two away from where you want to start stitching, exit the needle where you want to start and pull it gently to pop the knot through the top and into the middle of teh quilt sandwich. When you’ve embroidered your way to the end of the floss, make similar knot by wrapping your thread around the needle twice and pulling it down the length of the needle and floss until it is close to the fabric (it helps to stick a pin into the knot while it’s loose to facilitate sliding it down the floss); enter the needle into the fabric at the end of your stitching and exit the fabric an inch or two away (being sure to go through the top layer and some batting only). Gently pull the needle and floss until the knot pops down into the quilt.

Enjoy the many possibilities of combining patchwork shapes with embroidery lines.

This is the first of my One Block Wonder quilts. I stayed pretty true to the book, arranging the hexagons in waves of color to my liking and adding a border. I chose a solid border color to make the quilt look more modern (I considered white for a truly modern look, but was worried about practicality).

(click to enlarge)

I kinda missed the woodland theme of the original fabric though (“Lush” by Erin Michael). So, I machine and hand embroidered a stag after I quilted the quilt. It might be a bit out there, but I really like it!

Madison the cat approves.

The above quilt and matching pillow will be a gift. I used a few more of the hexagons to make a version for our couch:

I almost bought new fabric for the backs of these quilts, but was still reeling from having used nothing from my stash on either quilt top. I did have several white duvet covers picked up at a flea market a few years ago, so I bit the bullet and dyed two to match. I’m not great at dyeing to specifics, but I’m very happy with how these turned out. The stag quilt has a solid steel blue backing, and mine has steel blue overdyed in a tie-dye pattern with olive green. My intention was to have the very geometric hexagons on the front speak somehow to the looser, organic, hexagon-ish shapes on the back.

I’m loving my coordinated couch appropriate for a quilter.

I may not have found my artistic voice, or style yet, but I’m definitely settling in to a process.

Momentum seems to have a lot to do with it. I get an idea and then I have to jump right into it. Or, if I can’t do that, I write it in my sketchbook, make dinner, collect bits, mull it over, procrastinate a lot, get side tracked, and do myriad other things that lack discernible forward movement. It’s all good though, because this slow percolating time helps me refine what it is I’m going to create.

Then, when the mood hits and the planets align, I get down to work. The hardest part is that this is when the momentum really kicks in and once I’m elbow-deep in paints or dye, or firmly planted in front of the sewing machine, I don’t want to stop. More frozen pizza nights than I want to admit to are the direct result of sewing “just one more row,” “I’m almost to a stopping point,” or my favorite, “I’ll be right there,” which really means I’m standing in front of my design wall contemplating the next move.

Knowing that I work in these fits and spurts helps me to get the most out of them, such as grouping like tasks together, or making sure there’s plenty of pizza in the freezer. Another aspect of my process is to gather bits so that when I do get inspired, I can access the bits akin to a painter choosing paint from blobs on her palette (a great analogy I adopted from artist Gerry Chase in her workshop).

One day I’ll be immersed in sun printing, and try out multiple colors and sizes of motifs. Painting and stamping are the same. If I dye fabric, I’ll throw in some extra pieces, or maybe some yarn or lace. Another day I’ll be piecing, and I’ll sort scraps by color, or set aside cut-off strips, squares or triangles that could come in handy in another project. Now, I take crochet yarn to the kids’ TaeKwonDo and hook roots while I wait. I need to have several things going at once so that I can choose one aspect and roll with it for a while, not breaking my momentum to create a single project start to finish, but rather to focus on a day to paint, or to sit at the machine, to crochet or embroider, until I have enough pieces to sort through them to create the composition I’m looking for.

The last two photos are details of quilted, embroidered, fabric and thread collages mounted on or sewn to stretched canvases — similar to Cloud House. There will definitely be more.