Garden Lady #10 - part 2

This is a continuation of the making of Garden Lady #10, Winter Interest.

I tackled the dress next.  I found a commercial fabric that was off-white with flecks of gold that seemed like it was perfect for this quilt.  The top of the dress and the bottom of the dress were made as two different pieces.  I used freezer paper underneath the fabric and traced the lines with a water soluble blue pen.  Then I used two different colors of Tombow ink pens to draw the seam lines and shadows.  

When the inking was done, I pressed an interfacing to the back, sewed on the outside lines, and glued the seam allowances to the back.

I put the pieces up on the design wall and liked the way they turned out.

I also bought a couple yards of an off-white tulle and placed a double layer on top to see how I liked the effect.

I like it, but think that I will wait until the piece is quilted and add it at the very last.  (That was a suggestion from one of my artsy quilting friends!)

I hope you like it so far.

Garden Lady #10 - Part One - Winter Interest

Nearly everyone that I asked told me to make a winter scene for the final Garden Lady in the series.  She is going to be #10 and I'm going to name it "Winter Interest".

I found a digitally generated design that I liked on Pinterest.  I tried very hard to find the artist who was the source of this pin, but couldn't find it.  Dang it.  I really want to give credit to the originators of my ideas. It was pinned by Anouklaga, who has pinned many artists on her pages.  It is a very sweet and fitting end to my series of Garden Ladies.  It'll be a challenge to make so many wings!

I traced it and had it enlarged at my favorite blue print shop in Portland.  For this piece, I decided that I would definitely start with the wings.  I like wings to be transparent and so organza was the obvious choice for the fabric.  I made wings for my second Garden Lady the same way, which was to layer 2 pieces of organza between dissolvable stabilizer, draw on the veins, stitch it around the edges and along the veins, soak it in water, and press it into shape.  I found a couple of sheer fabrics at JoAnn's and decided to layer 2 different ones on the wings.  Here are the 2 fabrics, which I know are hard to see in the photos.  One is iridescent shimmering, and I put that one on the top.

I traced the wings onto freezer paper to make the pattern.

This was laid down on my cutting table.  

The next layer was Aquamesh, a product from AES.  

Then the two layers of sheer fabric.  And finally, the top layer of Solvay.  I traced the pattern onto the Solvay with a permanent ultra thin marker (this gets washed away!).

I pinned it all in place then removed the freezer paper pattern from the back.  I used gold metallic thread in the top and the bobbin of my machine and zig-zagged on top of all of the drawn lines.  

The next step was to cut around the outside of all of the wings, leaving a scant 1/4" from the stitching.

It got soaked for a few minutes to dissolve the top and bottom products, then laid out to dry, ironed, and placed on the design wall on top of the pattern.

 I hope you like it so far!

Improv quilt using ombre leftovers - part 4 - Top Complete

This is a continuation of 3 previous posts about the making of an improv quilt using leftover ombre fabric.

I sewed all of the extender pieces to the vertical rows and added the little bits of striped fabric here and there.  I added a 3" border around the the sides.  Actually, I'm not sure that I want to leave the border on the top and bottom....there seems to be too much fabric between the improv blocks and the border.   It's now 51" x 64".   Anyway, here it is:

Later - I didn't like the empty space on the top and bottom, so I shorted both ends.  It's now 58-1/2" L x 51" W.  

I like it much better and hope you do too?

Ombre leftover quilt - part 3

This is a continuation of two previous posts about the making of the improv quilt from ombre leftovers.

I got the interesting idea to insert little pieces of fabric between the rows of the background ombre fabric.  I did a sample with 3/4" wide striped fabric and cut at 1-1/2" long, 2" long, and 3" long.  I like the longer one the best.  It was a little tricky to make them but I think that the effect will be interesting in the quilt.

I ran out of the first piece of ombre fabric in the darker turquoise area and had to use my second piece of ombre fabric that went from turquoise to orange.  I cut strips to match the widths of the vertical rows, and then 3" wide pieces for a border that really enhances the ombre effect.  This was just all pinned to the design board at this point, but it's worth showing you my ideas.

And I just can't help but show you a cartoon from Pickles by Brian Crane on October 25, 2024 that I thought was SO funny.

Anyway, hope you get a few giggles and like where the quilt is going so far!

Garden Lady #9 - FINAL - Caretaker

This is a continuation of three previous posts and is the final one about the making of Garden Lady #9.

After stitching the lady to the background, I did some thread work on the hair and did some shading with colored pencil.

It was finally time to quilt the entire piece with the backing. I know that it seems strange after all of the stitching that was done already, but I really wanted to mash down the background and get the foreground to pop.  Here is the final quilt.  I named it "Caretaker".

It is 32" W x 49" H.

I hope you like it!

Granddaughter went to the Clark County Quilter's Guild Meeting

Our 11-year old granddaughter spent the night with us recently and it just so happened to be the same night as our local Clark County Quilter's Guild meeting.  She could have stayed home with Grandpa, but she decided to go with me.  

On the way, I told her that it was going to be a room full of old ladies, and she said that was fine.  We had a quilt to hold up for show and tell and I asked her to help me hold it up.  She was fine with that too.  I introduced her to a bunch of friends before we sat down.  And at one point, she introduced herself to a member sitting in front of us.  I was talking to someone to the left of me and didn't hear or see any of her conversation.  So, I was quite surprised when one of our lifetime members, Lorraine Spreadborough, posted this on our Facebook page.

And that says it all about our sweet little Granddaughter, Arielle Taylor.

Ombre leftover quilt - part 2

This is a continuation of a previous post about the making of an improv quilt with the leftover ombre fabric.

I thought it might help to show you how I do some of the steps.  I've already sewn the first 3 rungs of this piece.  So, here is how I add the last piece to "square" up the block.  I place the curved edge on top of the next piece, both face up.  I cut the curve through to match the previous one.  The new piece should overhang just a bit on the lower edge.  The pieces are separated to remove any of the cut-off pieces.

Then I match them back up and flip the top piece over the curved piece and pin about 2" from the leading edge.  I place a few more pins to match up the edges until I reach the leading end (at the top in the picture).   I don't pin the rest of the curve.

I start sewing with a narrow seam, removing the pins as I sew.

When I reach the end of the pins, I use my fingers to gently match up the edges, but only an inch or so at a time.  I'm very careful not to stretch either piece.

This is what the piece looks like after it's sewn.  I flip it over and press the seam towards the outer edge.  It wants to go that direction most of the time.  I do use a light spray starch and try again not to stretch things as I go.

The piece does need to be "squared" up after sewing and pressing because all of the bias edges move around.  I don't try to make it the final size until I know where it is going to fit into the quilt.

I placed this one up on the design wall and knew that I needed to add a strip of fabric to fit the other pieces in the row.  I cut this one oversize and sewed it to the block.

I sewed it to the previous block and then trimmed it to fit.  No measuring first...sew first, then trim!

Here it is all trimmed.

And here it is up on the design wall.

Here is the piece with all of the vertical strips sewn.  Now I have to figure out how to sew the background ombre fabric.

I hope you like it so far!

Garden Lady # 9 - Part Three

This is a continuation of 2 previous posts about the making of Garden Lady #9.

I started on the applique lady by working on the hair.  I found a good picture of a ponytail that I used for the pattern.

Here is the hair that will be used as the base before the detail stitching.  I always try to remember at this stage, that this is an art quilt and not a photograph.  

Then I made the shirt.  I used a cool little blue and white stripe and enhanced it with inking and directional cutting.

Next were the legs, wheelbarrow, skirt, and arms.  Sorry, I forgot to take pictures along the way.  When I get in the zone, I'm totally immersed

The pieces were pinned, then fused to the background, and then sewn down with an invisible zig-zag stitch.

I hope you still like it so far!

Garden Lady # 9 - Part Two

This is a continuation of a post about the making of Garden Lady #9.

I continued to cut out blobs and strips of fabric for the background of this piece.  When the top part was all covered, I added a layer of gray organza.  This was quilted loosely and trimmed.  I wanted the top to blur and fade, and a layer of organza does this perfectly.

The next step was to cover the lower half of the background.  I used some of my hand dyed material, and then did my chop and drop collage method of adding details to the garden areas.  I used some darker wool roving to make a shadow by the feet, and added threads, snippets of organza, yarn, antique trims, and thread.  This was all covered with green tulle and quilted.  Again, I did all of this without a backing.  

I copied the figure of the gardener and pinned it in place.  Here is what it looks like with the paper pattern on the background.  I know that there is something lost with all of the goodness that will get covered up.  But I've tried to only cover the areas that will show and then have discovered that not all areas were covered, and that the foreground figure is stuck in place.  I like to be able to place the garden ladies where they look best.

I hope you like it so far!

Ombre leftovers

I had a lot of the Lipstick Cowgirl turquoise to gray ombre fabric left over after cutting out the pieces for the Modernized New York Beauty.   I just loved the fabric so much that I decided to make another quilt with the ombre as the background.  The pieces left over were mostly the gray to the lighter turquoise, plus some of the darkest turquoise at the edges.  The trick was to design a quilt using what I had left over.   I looked at several ideas, and then just decided to do improv.  I had been looking at some of the elongated or melon shapes that some quilters are now using, and decided that was the direction for this piece.  Here are some of the pieces that I've made and put up on my design wall.

I made all of these pieces as rectangular blocks.  I have no idea how I want to sew them together, or how large I want the piece to be in the end.  But, I like the start of it!

And I hope you like the start of it too!

Blueprint Shop Moved - Crisp Imaging in Portland

I got a little bit of a oh-no moment this morning.  I drove over to Portland to my favorite blueprint shop and the lights were out and the space was empty.  Yes, a huge moment of panic.

Fortunately, there was a map and note taped to the door that said they had moved, but just around the corner.  I found them and was so glad.

A little bit ago, Rose City Blueprint was bought by Crisp Imaging.  So this move to a slightly smaller space wasn't a surprise.  I love going there to have my drawings blown up to size.  They handle my order the same day, sometimes in 10 minutes.  It's super cheap and so much better than going to any of the print and copy stores.  I have recommended them many times and hope that any of you that need to have things done will give them a whirl.

Here's their new address (it hasn't been updated on their web page):

5541 NE 122nd, Portland, OR   Suite 320

It's really close to the intersection of 122nd and airport way, just a few blocks from the I205 intersection with airport way.  So convenient from my SE Vancouver location.

Garden Lady #9 - Part One

I got the inspiration for this garden lady from a photo on Pinterest.  All of my other garden ladies were facing sideways or to the front, and I thought that a view from the back might be fun.  Here is the inspiration photo, converted to black and white.

My favorite print shop in Portland has changed names, but luckily is still in business.  They are now called Crisp Imaging, and it looks like they are now part of a chain of imaging/blueprint service providers.  I think I posted that previously, but I wanted to remind myself and my local readers of this excellent source for enlarging drawings.

For this piece, I decided to collage the background directly onto the batting.  I pinned up the batting, then outlined the basic design lines.  

Then, I pulled out a pile of green fabrics and yarn to get me started.  

I sprayed the batting with a temporary spray adhesive, and started cutting and placing blobs of fabric. I just cut the pieces free hand and place them to get the feel of mixed foliage.  Here are some of the darker blobs place in the upper right hand corner.  

Here is what the background looked like after the first day of blob collaging.  Wait, did I just make up a word for a technique?  

And here is the background all ready to add a layer of organza.

I hope you like the progress so far!