Lost and Found quilts

I have located a couple of quilts that I didn't have on the list of quilts that I've made.  They weren't in my books of stories about the quilts and pictures.  Somewhere back in my box of old photos, I'm sure there is a picture of them??  Anyway, I made lots of quilts over the years and many of them were for classes that I was teaching.  So, I'm surmising that I must have been in a hurry to produce them for class samples.  Then when I got buried in quilts at the house, I gave a lot of them away to my friends and relatives.  Two of my friends recently came over for lunch and loaned back the quilts that I had given them.  It was all part of the process of gathering up the quilts for the solo show that was held in October.

To my surprise, they both had quilts that I recognized but had no record of!  Of course, neither one had a hanging sleeve, and only one had my signature.  (Sigh).

It was fun seeing all the quilts loaned back to me, and even more fun to see all the people!  I hope you have your quilts spread out among your friends and family too.

Fabrico Markers

I purchased some Fabrico markers for highlighting and shading quilts a few months ago.  One of my friends uses them a lot on her quilts, and since she has won so many top awards, I thought that I should learn how to use them too.  Fabrico markers are a product by Tsukineko, which makes other products that are used by art quilters and paper crafters. I usually use Derwent Inktense pencils with fabric medium to add depth to my quilts, and have written a blog or two about how to use them.  The Inktense pencils are really easy to use and they don't bleed when you use fabric medium.   These markers also do not bleed.

I made a little butterfly quilt and after appliqueing down the pieces to the painted background, I thought that it looked totally flat and fake.  I wasn't trying to make a realistic butterfly, per se, but I wanted to make it look less like a cartoon character.  I used the markers and found them easy to apply, but I had to go over the area a few times to be able to see the shading.

Here is the picture of the little quilt before and after the shading, but before the quilting.  It's faint for sure.  You can see it more on the body than on the wings.

I hope you try new products too.

Embroidery designs and supplies

I have done a little bit of hand embroidery over the years.  My skills are pretty basic, I have to admit.  I can do daisy chains, back-stitch, French knots and a few other combinations of those.  So, in order to come up with some new ideas, I turned to Pinterest.  I really like being able to quickly find ideas on that site, don't you?

Some of my quilting friends are avid embroiderers and have taken classes from Sue Spargo, who is well known for her wool applique.  And others have taken classes at Crab Apple Hill from the owner Meg Hawkey, who is well known for her colored and embroidered patterns.  My friends own expensive and beautiful embroidery supplies such as hand dyed pearl cotton, embroidery threads, ribbons and beads.  Nice hoops, white color crayons, and a whole bunch of stuff I don't even know about.  Don't you find that each hobby comes along with its own set of supplies and once you get into it, you are blown away by how much stuff there is to tempt you?

I just use my old-fashioned DMC embroidery floss.   You can buy it just about anywhere and it comes in tons of colors.  I have an old metal spring hoop.  It seems to be working for me.  Here's what my set up looks like:

I hope you have a few basic skills in embroidery too.  It's a skill that used to be in every young woman's repertoire a couple of generations ago.  Back then most women also had to know how to can fruit and vegetables, make butter, milk the cows, feed the chickens, take care of 10 kids, cook 3 meals a day, bake bread, make soap, do laundry by hand, sew clothes, darn socks... you get the picture.   So glad life has gotten easier for all of us.  Aren't you?

Passion Unfolded - The Quilts of Joanne Adams Roth

Passion Unfolded was the name of my solo show held in October 2018.  This show was sponsored by Clark County Quilters, and is such a wonderful event for a member who has made at least 100 quilts (or a group of quilters that have made that many).  I was honored and excited to be the selected artist for this show.

Granddaughters

Nancy Tubbs introducing me

Jack and Dottie Cox

Dee and Vern Brunner

Steve and Dessie Carptener, Bill McCabe

Granddaughters

final day in casual clothes

Sisters Jeanne Lematta and Colleen Wilson

Brother Bob Adams and son Bill DeJarlais

Sister Colleen Wilson, son Bill DeJarlais and me

Al Roth, Joanne Roth, Bill DeJarlais, Jeanne Lematta, Colleen Wilson,
Bob Adams, Beverly Adams, Becky Adams

Judy Mezen, lifelong friend

I exhibited 114 quilts spanning 50 years of quilt making.   Most of my early quilts were bed sized and hand quilted.  There were quilts made for high school graduation presents, anniversary quilts, quilts made for classes that I taught, lap quilts, wall quilts, and many of my recent art quilts.

It was so much fun to collect all of these quilts back from the owners.  It gave me a chance to see a lot of people and reminisce about the making of the quilts.   I also was able to get some of them washed to nearly new condition again, add hanging sleeves, and in some cases, add a signature label.

During the show, I was really thrilled to see all of the people turn up and to see so many of my quilts exhibited in one place at the same time.

A huge thanks goes out to Clark County Quilters for sponsoring this event; to Nancy Tubbs who organized the show and the helpers; to all of my friends and family for loaning back their quilts; and to my husband, Al Roth, for putting up with all the interruption in our lives and home while gearing up for the show, during the show, and its aftermath.

On Going Projects: Passion Unfolded--Joanne Adams Roth Quilts

On Going Projects: Passion Unfolded--Joanne Adams Roth Quilts: One quilt in her power line series On Sunday, a friend and I went to the Clark County Quilters Featured artist's show. The title of ...

Shadow Selfie #7 - Pump It

This is the 7th quilt in the Shadow Selfie series.  I wrote blogs about quilts 1-6 previously.

I got the idea for this quilt from a picture taken on a bike ride.  The background and the shadow are hand painted with fabric acrylic paints onto PFD (Prepared For Dying) fabric.  It was heat set after the paint dried.  I learned this technique from Susan Brubaker Knapp, an excellent teacher.

I picked green and shades of yellow green for the background because, if you've been reading my blogs, you know that lime green is my favorite color.  And I love to ride bicycles.  The shadow selfie series is becoming a bit of a visual journal about my activities.

So here it is:

Shadow Selfie #7, Pump It, by Joanne Adams Roth 2018

I hope you like it.

Sister's quilt - Part Two

This is a continuation of the blog I wrote about the design and idea for a blue and light quilt for my sister, Colleen Wilson.

I dove right in and cut all the background pieces as 13" squares.  Over-sizing the background allowed me to applique the paisley pieces or do trapunto quilting and then trim the squares to the hexagon shapes.  I like to do the trimming after I do the applique, just to make sure the blocks haven't shrunk during all of the stitching (which always happens for me).  For this hexagon quilt especially, I want to preserve the edges that are on the bias until just before I sew them together.

I've appliqued 6 navy blue paisley pieces onto the background, using my machine applique method with the dissolving foundation.  I pulled out all my embroidery supplies, which had been pining away for attention, and got to work.  I've usd blues and tans and whites, plus some embellishment supplies.  I even snuck in a little bit of purple, and plan to sneak in a tiny bit of lime green.  It wouldn't be a quilt from me if it didn't have a little of my personality showing through.

Here are they are:

I hope you are like where this quilt is heading. I know that I do.  Just not that sure I'm totally on board with making a queen-sized quilt after all my fun small ones.   Nevertheless, it feels really good to make something that someone special in your life wants.  And a fellow quilter and sister is just the best combination.

I hope you have friends and relatives that like your quilts too!