November Rochester Area Fiber Arts Meeting

Last Thursday was the Rochester Area Fiber Arts meeting, and it was wonderful as always.  It’s always nice to see what everyone is making.

Anne has been painting fabric and adding words:

It’s going to be hard to cut into that fabric. 

Caris completed 3 little pieces: 

They are all very different and I’m really impressed with her composition skills.  The last one was photographed sideways and when I rotated the picture, it looked very peculiar, so I left it with the sideways orientation.

A new member, Glynis, showed some of her hand dyed fabric.  Her 8 year old son Harry helped with these two:

It’s wonderful that Harry is so creative.  Imagine what he’ll be making in another few years.

Marcia made a wonderful wall hanging from arranging vegetable produce:

 
Pat shared a work in progress for our upcoming De CaDence gallery show:

And Sarah modeled the pants and jacket made from fabric she hand dyed:

She has also been making a lot of jewelry lately and this bracelet was my favorite:

There was even more for show and tell, but some of my pictures were on the blurry side.  Linda finished a fabulous face quilt and Diane was working on a piece for the upcoming De CadEnce gallery show also.  So am I.  Elaine was wearing a great jacket and Julie made a really stunning quilt using cyanotype images.    That photo has a great big while post in the middle of it. ;-(

Show and tell was moving so quickly, I couldn’t keep up with all of it.  Next month I’ll be sure to take my vitamins before I go.  That way you all won’t miss a thing. 

Hugs…

Rose Anne’s Face DYB Block Completed

Ah, a new month.  There is something refreshing about the beginning a new month.

Rose Anne’s Face DYB crazy quilt block was completed and mailed yesterday.  Here’s how it turned out:

 

So much was learned on this block.   The  polymer face was painted properly this time.  I really messed up Leslie’s face and am so sorry about that.  This time I sanded, put very thin coats of paint on the face and blended colors.  Would you believe thatface has 3 different colors on it?  It is also sealed. 

Then onto the beading.  Number 6 beads were the base row, followed by a row of size 11.  Then I added the bugle beadswith a small seed bead on the edge.   It sat there like that for over a week.  While it was pretty, it was too round, too isolated, had no movement.  It just sat there on the block doing nothing.  I was happy with the beading, but not how it looked on the block.

A few months ago, I had purchased a book on goldwork and recently purchased a lot of the supplies.  This was the perfect time to attempt my first goldwork embroidery.  I couched the gold strands close to the face with red thread, then curved it every which way, and couched the strands in place with gold YLI metallic thread.  Now that face was smoking hot!!!

As a regular reader of Rose Anne’s blog, I remembered she has a May birthday.  So the next addition to the block was the actual Gemini constellation in the upper right hand corner.  Sparkly silver metallic DMC thread was used for the body withsilver lined clear beads for the stars. 

One more motif was needed to balance the block, so the Gemini symbol was embroidered in the lower left block with thesame thread used for the constellation. 

Unlike everyone else, seams are afterthoughts for me on crazy quilt blocks.  I know I should start with the seams, but every time I do that, I get carried away and don’t have room for the motifs.  Plus, the print fabric in this block had so much interest, I really didn’t want to add a lot of seam embroidery.  It seemed to detract from the block.

The first seam was the one in the lower right corner.  It has red rayon DMC floss, green KNK buttonhole twist silk thread , and crystal beads in the center.  Some gold metallic beads were added to fill in the bottom triangle.

The second seam is a looped buttonhole stitch.  The first pass was done with 2 strands of DMC cotton floss, and the second pass with a lighter color.  It was a simple seam treatment, and I was thinking about adding a third color, but wanted to get the block in the mail.  It was supposed to be mailed by 11/1, but as that was Sunday, I figured mailing it on Monday wasn’t too much over the due date. 

Last but not least, I added gold beads in different sizes scattered across the blue and red star fabric.  I hope that RoseAnne will like this block.  It was an honor to contribute to your wall hanging, Rose Anne.

Now for an update on my leg surgery.  This year, when I haven’t posted to my blog, it’s because I’ve been dealing with medical challenges, and this year has been one for the record books.  The most recent was damaging all 3 tendons in my left ankle.  I just completed my  physical therapy for it.  I tell you, that electric pulse therapy, followed by ultrasound, followed my massage, followed by more electric pulse therapy works wonders.

The ankle is still swollen, but I can walk with no pain, not very far, and not for very long, but I can walk again.  Injuring my ankle, made my knee injury regress, so I’m trying to get that back in shape now.  It’s been a long haul this year, but I’m a firm believer in physical therapy.  Hopefully, the leg surgery will occur next week, and I’ll finally be able to concentrate on strength training.  

Hugs…

Knitted Baby Bonnet

My leg surgery was postponed yet again. I managed to sprain my ankle but good. Seems there are 3 tendons that meet in one spot on the front of the ankle, and I managed to hurt each one of them. It’s been tough being me this year.

Back to the sofa for yet more time spent with my leg elevated and resting, but not wasted. I have enough yarn to last several lifetimes so decided to knit a baby bonnet:

 

That picture is of the back of the bonnet. Isn’t that a nice swirling star design? And this second one is of the side of the head:

 

A nice relief lace pattern with a pretty ruffle to frame the face was the pattern for the sides. I didn’t take a front view as I don’t have access to a baby/doll so substitued a ball of yarn. It didn’t look so great with a bonnet on it. Where’s a baby when you need one? LOL

This was a pattern from an old Piecework magazine, and since I’m pretty much well stuck with being on the sofa for awhile, I pulled out something from my stack of “want to knit” patterns and enjoyed every minute of knitting it.  

Next will be a sweater for myself, or attempting to work with some gold threads for Rose Anne’s DYB Face block.

Hugs…

Pole Barn Completed

The pole barn was finished a couple of weeks ago, but I haven’t been the most mobile this year so didn’t get a picture taken till now.  Here it is in all its glory:

Those walls are 16′ high.  It’s quite something.

Between the driveway and the pole barn is a planting of azure monkshood:

This plant is thriving.  It was under an English walnut tree, which had to be cut down to make the new driveway extension for the pole barn.  My husband left 5′ of trunk at my request, so the plant will still have nice support.  Since we have more than 1,000 trees on our property (and it was a corn field when we purchased it), it was sad that the tree had to be removed, but won’t make much of a difference for fall raking, and the firewood will keep our neighbors nice and cosy this winter.  

The perennial is only 3 years old and is the latest blooming perennial in our yard.  It’s something I look forward to seeing every year.  And here is a nice close-up photo:

 

Hugs…

Leslie’s DYB Face Block Completed

The embroidery on Leslie’s DYB Face block is completed.  Yippee!!! I’m a wee bit late in mailing it, but since Debbie is still out of town, I had some wiggle room.  Here is her little sugar plum fairy:

This block actually made my husband smile when he saw it.  It’s way out of my comfort zone, as I’ve never worked with a 3 dimensional face, but it turned out better than I thought it would.  I was really intimidated by having to paint that face, and I know it’s not a work of art, but she does have personality plus. 

I did the gold seam first.  It’s some trim that came from India and is properly glitzy.  The woven rose/pink yarn was hand dyed and there are some deep burgundy beads finishing the seam.  Next to it is a lace motif I painted, then used pink sequins and gold beads in the center of the 2 smaller flowers, plus a larger gold bead for the middle flower.

The next seam started with gold ribbon appliqued in place.  Then I edged it with 3 different colors of DMC cotton floss.  It’s a seam treatment from Jo’s great seam book.  Jo – from New Zealand – excels at seam embroidery and I’m very glad I purchased her little book. 

Next was the holly sprig along the bottom.  I traced it onto tissue paper to get the leaf position and size in scale for the block, then used rayon threads and glass beads for the holly berries.

Last, but not least, was the plum fairy herself.  The wings have 2 layers of Angelina and metallic thread for hand embroidery over them to keep the Angelina in place.  The dress has Sulky Sliver thread embroidered down the center, with glass seed beads along the hem.  I crocheted a Candlelight collar for her as the holes to attach the face are at the neck and wanted to cover the holes.  Some leaves were added to finish off the collar.

Her hair is short, curly and brown – like mine.  She’s sporting a petal shaped hat with more leaves, and some beads to keep her hat in place. 

I hope Leslie will like this block.  It was certainly fun having this sugar plum fairy visiting for a bit.  The little darling will be going to a good home. 

Hugs…

October RAFA Meeting

My leg surgery was cancelled this week, so I was able to attend the October RAFA meeting, and was it ever a great one. I missed most of the business meeting but we now have elected officers and are preparing pieces for 2 upcoming shows.  Show and tell is always wonderful and there is lots to share with all of you this month.

Sara made some beautiful vessels, but unfortunately, I didn’t get any pictures of them. Everything goes around the room so quickly, it’s hard to get pictures of everything. She was using dyed silk batting and dyed fusibles to shape the vessels and the one that had Shiva paintstick highlights was my favorite.

She also showed a small quilt:

If you double click on it, you’ll see the beautiful quilting she did on this.

Donna had the cutest dolls:

Now these are the best ever dolls because when pin one to your jacket, any and all goodies your bring home from a quilt show, fiber fest, etc… were not made by you. You can blame the doll for making all the purchases and go home with a clear conscience. LOL I just love Donna’s sense of humor.

Caren and Donna also made some fused glass pieces:

Neither one of these ladies had ever tried making fused glass pieces and don’t you think these are spectacular?

Caris was wearing a great jacket – the Nonaim Coat:

That pattern is sitting on my cutting table and was the next jacket I planned on making. I had no clue as to what size I’d need. Caris is petite and she looked terrific in her jacket, plus the fabrics she selected are wonderful. She was very nice and let me try it on. Now I’m not remotely petite but the jacket fit pretty well. I was very surprised as she made the small size. Now I have a good idea what size and adjustments I’ll need to make for mine. Thank-you Caris, and you sure looked good in that jacket.

Nancy showed her finished Chinese Moon Bridge piece:

This is a small piece, around the size of a notebook, and it is absolutely gorgeous. There is a lot of hand stitching on that piece and the Chinese chop on the left is her name. She also told us why the bridges are built that way.  When the moon comes up, the moonlight shines through the hole, and the image is reflected onto the water.  

And last but not least is Janet. She showed two pieces. This first is a children’s quilt:

Don’t you love that the whole life cycle of the butterly is shown?

The second one was started in a QBL workshop and all the shapes are created by thread work:

In case you don’t believe it, here are some close-up photos:

Can you believe it? That took a tremendous amount of time and understanding of how thread colors will recede or pop on fabric.

I came home inspired and full of good cheer from spending time with such creative and sharing people. I hope you all enjoyed the show too. You didn’t get to eat any of the great brownies at the meeting, but you’ll just have to come visit sometime.  The door is always open.

Hugs…

Baby Kimono Sweater

There is nothing quite like knitting baby garments.  I was in a huge knitting slump after my beloved cat Coco passed away and tried to ease back into knitting by making a facecloth.  It was something I needed, and knit it hoping to get out of my slump, but it didn’t work.  After the dishcloth was knit, the knitting needles went back into the cabinet.

While sorting through my old hand knitting magazines, I came across a vintage baby kimono pattern.   Babies = rebirth = happiness = inspired to knit again. 

Is that not the most adorable baby kimono?  The sleeves look like wings and I can just picture an angelic baby girl in this sweater.  The wired bow is on there just for the picture.  I will be sewing a very soft elastic around the neckline to keep the sweater in place.  A silk ribbon bow will be sewn to a removable snap.  This way it can be removed when the sweater needs to be washed, and the baby will be in no danger from a dangling ribbon.  It can be put in place for photos only. 

This was knit with one strand of Soft Lilac Moonbeam yarn and took only 1 ounce. 

A pole barn update – it is totally finished. I haven’t gotten out there to take a photo yet as I sprained my ankle 2 weeks ago Friday, felt better, reinjured it, felt better, went to strength training Tuesday, and reinjured it again.  Now I’m staying put.  Hopefully, it’ll start feeling better soon, because this is the same leg that is undergoing vascular laser surgery next week. 

Hugs…

Making Memories 2009 Block Completed

My 2009 Making Memories Crazy Quilt block is finished and in the mail.  For the last 2 years, members of the Crazyquiltinternatinal Yahoo Group have been donating their time and embroidery skills to create crazy quilts for the Making Memories Organization.  This year the theme was butterflies and dragonflies, and the guidelines allowed us to use our embroidery machines.  This is my block:

It is a combination of sewing machine embroidery and hand embroidery.  The center butterfly was from A Stitch and a Half.  The dragonflies were from Criswell.  My daughter purchased some embroidery designs for me as a birthday present last year and the dragon fly design was in one of the packages. 

The center butterfly is all rayon threads – mostly from Madeira.  Each dragonfly had a different colored thread for the wing outline, then Sulky Sliver was used to embroider the rest of it.  I broke 5, yes 5 needles, sewing out those dragonflies.  It was worth every one of them.  That thread made the dragonflies come to life.

Before you all think this was a quick project, after spending an afternoon sewing the crazy quilt block, one evening was spent going through designs on the computer, the next evening I spent arranging the designs on my sewing machine screen, then test sewing them.  The forth day I sewed them all out on my pieced crazy quilt block hoping and praying I had everything arranged so that butterfly would be where I wanted it – smack dab in the center patch of my pieced block.

Then I added the hand embroidery – the seam treatments.  They were a lot of fun and I enjoyed selecting threads and colors for them.  Threads used were KNK silk buttonhole twist, DMC rayon, DMC cotton floss, Oliver Twist variegated, Krenik metallic, DMC metallic, and some of my hand dyed 12 wt cotton.   That took 2 days.  What takes me so long is deciding what stitches to use and what thread combination look good with each other.  2 seams were totally redone and I enjoyed every single minute of that process.

Last but not least are the tiny butterflies scattered about the block.  We couldn’t use beads on this block and I had the perfect little butterfly buttons and beads that yearned to be on that block. Putting them firmly out of mind, I went back to my sewing machine and found a 9mm butterfly design.  Perfect!!!  Out came the threads again.  This time I used 30wt variegated and solid Madeira cotton threads and some Madeira rayons.

I hope it arrives safe and sound to our esteemed project co-ordinator.  She’s a saint for putting all these blocks together into a quilt.  A big round of applause to Debbie!!!

Hugs…

Ogden Art Group Meeting and Pole Barn Update

Thursday was the Ogden Art Group meeting and Pat taught a partly curving weaving technique that she learned from Anna Faustino’s book Simply Stunning Woven Quilts.  Pat did a terrific job and everybody did their own thing.

Pat is a talented painter and this is what she brought to demo the technique for us:

Lucy used classic grey and black fabric.  It’s an elegant combination, don’t you think?

Then Margaret used tone on tone fabrics.  It’s hard to see in the picture I took.  The blinds were broken so lighting was not the best, but she created a very subtle texture with her woven piece:

 

Karen started a project different from everyone elses.  Her piece will have curves within curves and she used a vibrant color palette:

Maggie and I didn’t start a piece.  She’s packing and getting ready to head off on vacation, and I had just finished a piece using the woven technique for the Blank Fabric Challenge, so didn’t want to make another one.  Instead, I happily took pictures, got some magazines out from the library, and knit away on the kimono baby jacket.

And last but not least, the pole barn now has the overhead door attached. 

All that’s left is for the rest of the gravel to be graded around the barn and the doorknob and dead bolt to be installed on the human size door.

Hugs…

Pole Barn Update and Purse Completed

It’s been a busy week here.  The pole barn is almost finished:

It still needs some translucent panels on the south wall, the big garage door, and more gravel for the floor.  Hopefully, it will be finished by the end of the week.

The Hot Patterns purse is completed:

There are 3 ways you can wear this purse.

#1 – Slip your arm through the holes and it drapes down the side of your body.  This will work well in the summer, but no way is that opening big enough for an arm wearing a bulky winter coat.  I live in Upstate New York, so the purse won’t be worn that way this winter.

#2 – See the little gold D-rings on the side? 2 G-ring clamps with a strap can be attached to those rings, but my local JoAnns was out of them, so the strap has not been added yet.  Instructions for making a tassel and fringe are included in the pattern and that would hang along one edge.  It looks really nice on the pattern picture.  I’ll add that when the G-ring clamps arrive.

#3 – It can be folded in half and used as a clutch.

This purse was a prototype.  I didn’t bother decorating it as I was testing it for size.  It’s way too small for me.  I know, I know, you all think it’s plenty big as it is.  Well, I like BIG purses.  This one measures 12″ wide by 20″ long, but you can only put things in half that length.  It has 2 pockets inside, but the opening is so small at the top, it’s hard to get your hand inside the purse, let alone your hand with anything in it. 

My plan is to make it 18″ wide and also flare the top more.  This might get accomplished, it might not.  I’m not sure I want to bother making it again.  Putting that bias binding around the inside armhole was an ordeal.  The curves are sharp at the bottom and top edges, so that needs to be reconfigured also. 

I’m glad I made it, but I’m not too sure I’ll ever use it, or make a larger, reconfigured version better fitting for my lifestyle or not.  

Hugs…