Monkey Sees, Monkey Does: a new small quilt plus

    Are you going back to school this busy September;  or are you always learning new things. I try to take some new workshop usually, so I got busy with what Sue Martell and Jo Diggs taught me. The last time I saw Betsy, she asked if I had started making Maine landscapes (I reported on hers August 18) and I took her hint to do a Jo Diggs workshop. Jo Diggs is a master applique landscape fabric artist.

    So I loosely cut out the fabric Sue encouraged me to buy in her sister's shop, and all but copied one of Sue's on the drive to NYC. All I did was layer fabric over muslin and started at the top, adding shapes on, to pin the shapes down. I whipstitched the seam allowances under the main shapes with silk thread that Jo says lies flatter. There are sky, rock, water, tree, plant and sand fabrics available; but you can paint your own white or muslin fabrics with fabric paints so that the fabrics remain soft. I like applique in that you can do it on a car ride or in front of tv news and you don't need a sewing machine. I feel romantic toward hand stitching...all of those little stitches.

     However, when I returned home, I became a monster. I couldn't bear to go slowly...so much to do! Whereas Jo Diggs puts mats around her landscapes, I wanted fabric borders and had to get out a sewing machine to add a twig fabric from The City Quilter. I dug in my bias tape drawer for white and cream. I didn't want machine stitches to show so I used Stitch Witchery on the inner frame and a sewing machine and backside whipstitch on the white outer frame. I messed up a bit (fusible dirtying my borders, messing up my iron) trying to go so fast, but the fabric picture is ok as a memory of trip to Maine on our 50th...not so perfect as Sue's or Jo's,  but one step in learning a new technique.

photo I took of a Jo Diggs landscape...note the reflections 

    

Square spiral: a Reveal Day posting

     If you were asked to design a spiral quilt block, what would you come up with. Below is my offering at Material Mavens. After you try to draw the pattern and color it (it is tricky), I recommend your visit to see, enlarge the photos, and read the explanations given by 12 participants in this international journal quilt group. For my 12" x 12" offering, I wrote:

     Because I am often in a spiral, I felt confident to work with this theme for September. I have earrings galore which have spiral designs. I often feel like a dancer in a spiral; and I like the zany and untraditional that the symbol connotes.

     At a recent quilt show, I obsessed over a seemingly simple spiral block quilt that did not seem to interest others. I casually tried to sketch how to compose the mildly tricky block; so I was pleased to have an excuse to work with the block in detail. All I needed was the two colors of fabrics.

     At the NH Mancuso quilt show, in the last vendor booth which I visited,  there were batik spirals fabrics perfect for the job. I chose colors opposite on the color wheel to hint at, somewhat like yin and yang, the good and the bad spirals in life or the world today. I set the small erratic fabric spirals inside the larger architectural spiral of achieved calm. The back of the quilt is a hand-dyed spiral of a same color which I found in my stash.

Sketching on the road...a new product

     Many times people pack up paints and pens to produce works of art on a vacation; and then they find they never have a chance to use them. As you know, I often stitch Sashiko in the car while listening to a good book on CD as Joe, the car enthusiast drives. For this trip, part of our 50th celebration, I decided I would sketch in the car.

      If you sketch on a trip, I think your memories are more indelible or tangible than when you only take photos. I put a sketchbook, Micron pen .005, water soluable pencils, pencil sharpener and Niji waterbrushes loaded with water in my purse. From the minute we hit the road, I didn't know what to sketch and thought...what the heck...I will sketch anything in front of me without giving it thought!

      Believe me, my sketches look as if I didn't give them any thought. The road goes by FAST and is bumpy! But it was fun to mark the path with pen, then color with watercolor pencils and wet the marks down as well. I don't think this was my favorite sketching solution, but I love having a rough 60 pages of marks and some memory flags to remind me of what to paint when I get to it at home. One should paint her 50th anniversary!  

      After  I wore down the Micron point in Castine, ME, I made the exciting discovery that there are Sharpie fine point pens now that don't bleed through the paper, and more than that, there are Sharpies that come with a retractable fine point so you won't have to look for lost tops under seats in the car! When I couldn't replace some of my Caran d'Arche watercolor pencils in the USA, I found Derwent watercolor pencils in Rockland a surprisingly good substitute. Heavenly. And of course there are different results for sketching on arrival but this was an experiment! Click photos to enlarge.

Making Landscapes to enjoy: Martell and Rasmussen

Sue Martell 

    The World Quilt Show New England X is this weekend in Manchester NH. I had so much fun that I spent two days there.

     It is always a pleasure to visit the cheerful vendors at the Quilt Essentials booth. Betsy Dorr, the owner usually knits and quilts and her sister Sue Martell inspires me with her piles of totally hand-appliqued landscape quilts. Sue is quick to point to the printed fabrics she uses; books on the topic, and the cloth support onto which she collages her fabric segments of "grass," "sky," "water," and "rocks." She repeatedly suggests I get to know Jo Diggs, a respected teacher and landscape artist. I no more got home from the show this year than I found in my e-mail a note from The New England Quilt Museum listing a Saturday morning workshop with Jo Diggs. I signed up! The Commons, a gallery in Eastport ME, carries Martell's landscapes.

Winter's Approach by Sue Rasmussen

   

    Ever helpful Sue Martel pointed down the hall to a beautiful landscape created by Sue Rasmussen, professional quilter from Simi Valley CA. "Winter's Approach" is entirely machine quilted. She used a printed fabric for the sky filled with branches and a shibori type fabric for the mountains. She pieces beautifully and I have been getting to know this artist by her work "on-line."If I had known I would blog about the quilt I would have taken a better photo. If you link to See How We Sew, you can see detailed photos, as well as  read about Sue, her book and her upcoming TV appearance. You will also want to visit Sue's website by clicking on this link.

      I believe both of these artists like the clean edge and the soft hand of a pieced or appliqued image.  I eagerly await my workshop with Jo Diggs mid-September at the New England Quilt Museum. Click on photos to enlarge.

Crafting puzzles of memories

    I have been gathering ideas for a celebration. There will be some small children at the event to entertain or offer a souvenir. Usually I have markers and paper, but I have been so busy with  photos, slideshows, movies and dvds, that I wanted a photo craft to involve them. Back when I used my darkroom for photography, I made puzzles for children. I would enlarge their photo on black and white thick matte paper and heat bond it to wood. I believe I also have used matte medium brushed on the back of the photo and onto wood to adhere the two together, letting the piece dry for four hours under pressure.

Click to enlarge.

     Today I decided to use a heavy duty spray adhesive since it was sitting in front of me! There is only a one hour wait for adhesion. I got out my camera to show what I first gathered together: my old Dremel scroll saw (my favorite tool of all time that I learned to use in 7th grade), two pieces of l/4"thick plywood the size of the photos (these 9 x 12s are birch and smooth), extra strong spray adhesive. I also grabbed a scrap piece of lattice work to see if I could still cut wood; and I double checked to see that I had plenty of blades. 

      First, I printed two photos on thick paper. Of course in art and craft something always goes wrong. This time, the printer started adding white borders around my photos. Or was the computer setting the problem? Nevertheless, I am forging ahead. Can't waste ink or paper. After I cut these out, I will lay them on cardboard from tablets, and put a clear wrap around...and they should be presented in a ziplock bag to hold the pieces for another round. I hope the puzzles please and inspire the children.
 
      I am back from cutting out the puzzles. I placed them on tablet cardboard. These puzzles are difficult!! I am glad they have white borders to assist the puzzlers, but at the same time entertain them for awhile!

Grandchildren motivate one to craft

      Hannah and I recently visited The City Quilter where she got involved with My New Sewing Book edited by Susan Akass and I bought Journey to Inspired Art Quilting by Jean Wells and Connecting Design to Stitch by Sandra Meech. To observe her interest to read to gather what she needed for her projects made this one of the happiest days of my life. But she was off to camp so we brought the other two grandchildren home here to Camp Hicks.

(Click on the photos to enlarge)

       Erika and David hit my studio coloring. In fact, Erika, after letting me draw her, wanted to draw me and her brother with a charcoal pencil. He accidentally turned into a monster, she said.

        In no time at all, I was pulling out all the projects I had played with 40 years ago or had never opened. The best projects were the Fancy Nancy quilt and pillow Erika designed; the Sculpey III, a polymer clay that stays soft until you cook it in the oven; and the wire jewelry created with telephone wire. I had an old pasta rolling machine that made the clay malleable and both children loved passing the clay through the rollers. Erika made several necklaces out of the recycled telephone wire which she wrapped around popcycle sticks and round dowels. She put the beads onto another wire and shaped the ends into hook and eyes to make necklaces.  Although we both worked on beads with the Sculpey III while David cut out the clay with cookie cutters, Erika wanted to make pinch pots and baskets. We had so much fun.

      Today their mother and father picked them up and Erika left with a Sashiko coaster project in hand to sew on the road, just as LinLin did on drive bringing her to visit!

       We had a few failures: the plaster animals that never dried in the rubber latex molds so we could paint them. However, I am so glad to finally have had an excuse and the time to make the polymer clay beads. I would never have gotten to them if not for the children. Ceramic mosaics are next! I also loved introducing Erika to the notion that you can learn a lot studying instructional photos...not just reading the instructions. She starts first grade in September.



     

The Theme is Daydreams

    The international journal quilt I belong to, Material Mavens, has Reveal Day today. We reveal a new topic every two months on the 15th. The topic this time is DayDreams. Visit the group of twelve quilters to see interesting and more complex interpretations!

     I do not daydream. I dusk dream. When I hit the pillow in the evening, at a time I should be sleeping, I start to plan my paintings. I wonder how to celebrate 50 years of marriage, imagine new projects to enjoy with my grandchildren, and think about friends near and far. The quiet period, with nothing to disturb my dusk dreaming, along with my being a night person, can be productive.

     This quilt started out as a nightwalk on a beach in Maine or the Vineyard, but the sand became stars at night. I love the coast...walking and picking up shells. But stars at night with an assortment of pillows, topics dreamed on the pillows from that week in June one day about a month ago (baking, painting plans, quilt shows, friendly spider Charlotte near my computer), are reflected in this piece. I REALLY wanted to portray the bear who made it all the way to the ocean on Cape Cod and was taken 100 miles back into Western Massachusetts, but again made it 100 miles back to a tall Brookline tree before he was downed. He had big daydreams and the admiration of many. Mine should be bigger!