Challenge Quilt

Last night at Northern Star Quilter's Guild meeting our challenge quilts were displayed and voted upon. I was chairperson this year and the theme was Going Green. Each participant had to use some recycled material in their quilt. Ribbons were given (First, Second and Third) in three categories, Best Use of Recycled Material, Best Use of the Color Green and Best Environmental Message. I was so delighted to win a First prize and one of our fabulous ribbons for The Best Use of Recycled Materials.
My quilt was made entirely of recycled material. My water was made of painted dryer sheets, the sand---- used tea bag papers, crushed egg shells, and thread ravelings. The seaweed-----twist ties and raffia, and the cardboard core from paper towels.  The coral----Styrofoam fruit wrappers. The colored fish-----paper paint samples from Home Depot and buttons, the silver fish----soda cans.  It was a lot of fun to work on.
We had 26 entries and every year I am amazed at the creativity and imagination that go into these quilts. The exhibit will now travel to Lancaster to be displayed at the Quilter's Heritage show, April 4-5, then again at our guild's show, World of Quilts on May 2-3.





Here's a detail of the colored fish. If you click for a larger view, you can read the names of some of the paints.

Art Show

I belong to a group of art quilters, led by Jane Davila, that meets once a month at the Country Quilter in Somers, NY. We have discussed many different aspects of art quilting and decided several months ago to have an exhibit at the Mahopac Library to lead us through all that is involved with putting on a show, a new experience for some of the group. We had to make a piece that would fit on an eighteen inch stretched canvas, but be no larger that 14" on any side. Two meetings ago we looked at all the finished pieces to decide what should go on the postcard. We wanted ones that were bright, colorful and attention grabbing and complimented each other. I was pleased when mine, on the far left, was chosen to be part of this collage. You can see the whole piece here.  It's the second quilt down.

There will be 31 pieces on display. There is a lot of talent in this group, so the exhibit should be terrific. If you are going to be in the area, please stop in. 

Rabbit beads

I finally got around to stringing those rabbit beads I bought in Houston last November. I took them to a nice bead shop in Ridgefield, CT, Sugarbeads, and bought a lot of other beads to go with them. I restrung it four different ways before I came up with an arrangement I liked. It's about 20 inches long. Photographing it on black velvet did not work, for some reason. I could not get a clear shot no matter what I did. White paper worked the best. Click on each picture for a closer view.



My original plan was to have the necklace be symmetrical with these two big rabbits in the center, but I found out the hard way that the guy on the left is slightly larger than the other and that threw off the whole symmetry.



The two barrel bunny beads looked good together on the other side of the necklace.



This is the center of the necklace, a vanilla turquoise.

Necklace

I bought a lot of beads last year in Houston and this year, too, and thought it was time that I did something with them. All of the aqua colored beads and the center ceramic bead are from a Houston vendor and I bought the copper ones at a local bead shop. I strung these three different ways until I came up with a design I liked. It's about 16 inches long and looks rather nice on, I think. Jewelry is very hard to photograph. The colors are much stronger and prettier in person

Celebrity Collage by MyHeritage

I saw this on another blog and thought it would be fun to try. You just go to this website, upload your head shot, the computer scans it and gives you the results from the most to the least. My most was Michelle Pfeiffer. In my wildest dreams! I tried it with a different picture and got all different celebrities, except for Marcia Cross, dreaming there, too. For some reason Marcia got cut out of this picture, even though she was there when I wrote this. If you click on the top of the picture and drag it to the left, you will see her. You try it and see who you look like.

Japanese Garden quilt #2

Yesterday I posted a little quilt done for a Japanese Garden exhibit. I wasn't thrilled with the finished product so today I did this one. I photographed the fish statue when I was in Japan in October. See the original below. I thought the background was too busy so I cut it away. I used a watery fabric that shaded from very dark to light blue and use three different sections. The red strips are reminiscent of Tori gates, although the real ones have no bottom bar and more bars at the top. It's only 8" x 8". I think I'm going to face it or maybe bind it in the same fabric.

Japanese quilt

I have to make an 8" x 8" piece for group exhibit at a museum with a Japanese garden and the piece has to depict something that you would see in a Japanese garden. I've been to Japan recently and have hundreds of pictures so this should have been easy. Not so! I had a hard time picking a picture and settled on this one from a fabulous garden that we visited in Nars, famous for its thousands of stone lanterns. I blogged about it here. I worked on this today (another snowy inside day), but I don't love it. I tried to have the photo transfer blend into the fabrics from my stash. It blends better in person. Here I have offset the photo image.



And here I have it centered. I think I'm going to try something totally different tomorrow. I'll post it if I do.

Ribbons for Challenge Quilts

I volunteered to be chair of the challenge committee for my guild, Norther Star Quilter's Guild, this year because I really wanted this theme. It's called Going Green and the participants have to use some recycled material in their quilt. The size is 18 x 22, either orientation. There will be first, second, and third ribbons given in each category: The Best Use of Recycled Material, The Best Use of the Color Green, and the Best Environmental Message. There will also be a Best of Challenge, shown on the far right. I collected the quilts at Tuesday's meeting and they are terrific! The quilts will be displayed at the February meeting and voted upon by the members. Then they will travel to the Quilter's Heritage show in Lancaster, PA in April and lastly be shown at our own guild show in May.

I thought that the ribbons should be made of recycled or re purposed materials and this is what we came up with yesterday at a workshop at my house. Here's what we used, from the bottom up: a used CD, a plastic plate cut with pinking shears, a six pointed star from an old box of spangles, a cardboard disk covered with silver lame, and different buttons raided from our button boxes (sometimes two stacked) for the centers. The ribbons are strips cut from Mod Podged comic pages and satin ribbons left from another show. I printed the words on my computer and just glued them to the ribbons. We made 10 ribbons in all. I think they're pretty cute.

The quilts can't be shown until after the February meeting because they're supposed to be a secret and the voting will be blind. I have made one and using all recycled materials. I'm hoping to get another one done, using some recycled, not all.

Studio tour

When I bought this house eight years ago I thought that this big bonus room over the two car garage was the studio of my dreams. While I am still very grateful for having this designated space, now it seems too small. I've done some tidying up yesterday, but this is pretty much what it looks like most of the time unless I'm working on a project when it gets quite messy.

This is the entry to the room, a rather narrow passageway. On the wall is a friendship quilt made several years ago, signed by family, friends, and some big name quilters. I still love looking at it.



On the opposite side of that narrow passage is my book storage. On top is part of my dress form collection and my antique thimble collection. Directly opposite the bookcase is a door to the closet, a big, square walk-in in serious need of reorganization and much too messy to photograph.



This is the part of my sewing area that you see first as you walk into the room. More of my dress forms on the wall and an antique printer's box to hold some of my thread.



The opposite side of the sewing area with lots of notions and "stuff" hanging on a pegboard.



Looking at the sewing area face on. The window faces the street, so I have a window on the world, such as it is on my very quiet street. I can swivel my chair from one machine to the other if need be. The ironing board is behind the chair and never gets put down.



Continuing on the same wall and rounding the corner is my office area with my Mac.



Work table with part of my design wall showing. The TV is often on, but I mostly listen to it. It keeps me company. I also have a radio that plays one CD and sometimes I listen to that.



Fabric storage, floor to ceiling. I can't seem to keep it much neater than this. I also have fabric stored in 6 plastic drawer units under the work table and piles on the end of my work table.

Found

I didn't realize what a mess my studio was until I had to photograph it for a project. Everything shows up in a picture, so I've started cleaning. I found a lot of junk that could be thrown away, but also some things I had forgotten about like this little piece. I was asked to demonstrate free motion quilting at a museum a few years ago as part of a guild project. There were several members stationed around the room demonstrating different techniques. I fused on these circles and squares at home and just started quilting away as people walked around the room. Maybe it could use a little more quilting or some beading. What do you think?