It was stitched with a variegated Sulky 12wt cotton thread which is hard to see in the photo.  There are also little bead cluster added to the point of every other stitch. 

To put the piece in perspective, it measures 2.75″ x 3.75″.  You can see the little copper wire loops at the top if you look at the picture closely.  Now to decide what to do with this little gem.  I do like how it came out, but can’t decide what to do with it.  Maybe this should be my crazy quilt journal project – 12 months of little crazy quilted gems.  Hmm, I’m liking that idea quite a bit.  Stayed tuned for further developments.  LOL

Hugs…

You see my idea was to embellish a beautiful embossed cotton fabric to add another layer of interest to the fabric.  And this is the result:

I’m really pleased with the effect.  I wouldn’t want to do this for yards and yards of fabric, but it would be lovely for a patch in a crazy quilt block, and I think it would be wonderful on a jacket band.  Not the entire length.  I’d scatter a bit towards the bottom on one side and up by the face on the other side.  A few inches of metallic thread embellishment would serve to draw attention to the areas on the jacket you desire.

So no fabulous art piece was created, but I did experiment with different fabric, different threads, and learned what worked and what wouldn’t for this idea, and I had fun doing it.  In my book, that makes for a successful TAST experience.

Hugs…

Here is this week’s sample:

 
For some reason, I was thinking about spirals, so decided to draw one on my fabric and follow around the line with the buttonhole stitch.  I wanted the spiral drawn line to stand out, so added dimension and strength to the line by adding glass seed beads (Mill Hill Color # 330).

And for those of you who would like to see how I added them, I took some additional photos of the stitching in progress.

Even though this is in the middle of my stitching, imagine this first picture is the start of your buttonhole stitch.  The needle thread is coming up from the back – on the drawn line – and this is the time to add a bead to the needle:

Slide the bead down the thread:

Make a the buttonhole stitch with the needle, and nestle the bead into place with the needle tip:

If you like, you can hold the bead in place with your thumb:

Pull the needle through the fabric, and that’s all there is to it.  Add another bead on the needle, slide it into place, take another stitch and before you know it, you have a beautifully embroidered spiral design. 

I hope you enjoyed seeing what I did with the buttonhole stitch, and my little mini tutorial is helpful.

Hugs…

 
This was my take on the classic fly stitch.  I elongated the stitch and made a very short tail on it – much like a stab stitch, so that it disappears in the embroidery.  I worked one row, turned the hoop, and sewed in the opposite direction for the second row, making sure the needle went in the same holes at the top of the stitch as the previous row.

There are lots of variations for this.  If I had made the stitch the same width, but halved the length, I would have ended up with a squatter, rounder effect.  I like this diamond effect though, and plan on adding at least 2 more layers of stitching to this piece.  Something will be added to the middle of each diamond, and where the little stab stitch is will have either a bead or a rounded stitch sewed with metallic thread.

What I learned:

I don’t like using a hoop.  That stitch lay beautifully in the hoop.  The thread tension was perfect, and the stitches were nice and even.  The minute I released the fabric from the hoop, the threads loosened and it wasn’t perfectly straight anymore.  Obviously, I had the fabric stretched too tightly in the hoop.  It was a spring hoop, so there wasn’t much I could do to loosen the tension.

It was awkward for me to hold the hoop and sew at the same time too, but saying that, I will try a different hoop for this week’s stitch.  This time I’ll try a hoop where I can adjust the fabric tension – a screw hoop.  And I’ll make two samples – one with a hoop, and one without so I can compare results.

Thanks so much to Sharon Boggins for offering this challenge again.  I’m experimenting with lots of different ideas and the “what if I try this” concept will help me learn a lot more about embroidery.

Hugs…

Two major creative challenges I’m participating in  during 2012 are the  Crazy Quilt Journal Project and Take a Stitch Tuesday.   I enjoy hand stitching and am looking forward to both these activities.

I’ve also signed up for a World Wide Crazy Quilt Round Robin – Build a Seam.

Ricky Tims, Alex Anderson and Libby Lehman are coming to town this summer, and I sent in my registration for that.  I’m going just for the experience of being part of one of their seminars.  I’ve been a member of The Quilt Show since the beginning and would love to meet Ricky and Alex in person, plus I love Libby Lehman’s thread work.

Another art quilt is in progress, and last but not least, my destashing is slowly but surely progressing.

Regular blog readers know that I have a lot of “stuff” in my house.  In my defense, I still have a business, and half of my ”stuff” is my inventory.  The thing is, I have a LOT of everything.  I’ve been trying to lighten the load since 2005 and am proud to say another 229 pounds of my treasures have left the building.  That makes for a grand total of  2,733 pounds out of here.

This slow but steady progress isn’t very visible in my home.  The shelves are still full and the closets too, but I’m going in the right direction.  I honestly think it’ll take me another few years to make a serious dent in this endeavor, but who knows?  I just might reach my goal of 5,000 pounds out of here before 2020. 

I wish a very Happy and Healthy New Year to all of you.

Hugs…

Family members didn’t exchange a lot of gifts this year, so the special present I received from my WorldWide Crazy Quilt Yahoo Secret Sister was extra special.  Can you believe the beautiful tin Jacque made for me?

It was filled with Snickers Fudge – yum.  And here is another picture of the other goodies Jacque sent:

The little Cloisonne hummingbird on the right was inside the ornament in the center – at the top of the picture.  And the beautiful copper bracelet on the left actually fits.  I’m thrilled.  I just love copper.

There are two copper animal cookie cutters, a book mark, a cross stitch design, and some trim.  Thank-you ever so much for all the goodies, Jacque.

Hugs…

Last week,  I visited my aunt in her nursing home as she was being signed into hospice.  She is 91 years old and approaching the end of her life on earth.  Much as I want to cure her, there is nothing I can do to change the ravages of time.  Her spirit is strong, but the vessel weakens. 

My mother was strong till the end.  She didn’t cry, and she didn’t want us to cry.  She was still offering comfort and love to her family till the end. 

I pray for the strength to accept the things I cannot change…

To comfort myself, I’ve been working on a Quilt of Valor.  I love my new sewing machine, and wanted the first project made using it, to give someone else joy too.  There was a great patriotic wall hanging in the July/August 2003 issue of Fons & Porter’s Love of Quilting magazine called Heart of America.  The Quilts of Valor have to be larger, so I’m tweaking the pattern a bit to fit the criteria.

The center flag portion is completed and I’ve been making the 4 heart blocks for the corners this week.  This is how the heart block started out:

I wanted more red in the blue stripes, and selected a built in pattern from my Pfaff Creative Sensation and carefully sewed down the center line of the striped fabric.  I love how it turned out.  If you can’t find a striped fabric you like, you can always create one of your own. 

Then I fused the left blue flag field piece in place. 

Then I satin stitched around all the fabric.

Then I cut out stars and fused them in place, and satin stitched all around them. 

And here is how the finished heart block turned out:

There is a big difference between the two blocks, isn’t there? 

I didn’t follow the pattern exactly, but pretty closely.  I moved the white star to the blue background instead of having a white star float over the red stripes.  It shows up more.

I also changed the star sizes.  The one on the right was supposed to be a really small star, but the photo of the quilt showed it to be the same size as the other small star on the block, so after fusing and cutting out 4 of the really small stars, and realizing the proportion was off, I put them aside, fused more fabric, cut out more stars and like how it came out.

Hugs…

Show and Tell was terrific – as always.  Beth made her first lap quilt:

Brenda was knitting scarves:

Donna – our Queen of Thrift Shopping – made a cashmere throw from the leftovers she had from making one her husband:

She buys cashmere sweaters, washes and felts them, then assembles them into a warm and cozy quilt.  She backed them with some Radiance fabric she purchased from me that she hand dyes.  It’s a unique fabric that is 50% cotton and 50% silk – one side feels and dyes like cotton, the other like silk.  She has the cotton side against the cashmere, so the two cling to each other with very little quilting.  She ends up with one side warm and cozy, and the other total silk luxury. 

Frances made a stunning quilt:

The hands of all the children in her church – from the very youngest up to 18 – were traced, and then made into fabric appliques .  They were arranged in a cross and crown design – the symbol of her church – IUCC.  

Janet shared 2 pieces with us.  Her first is Echo:

You can see the letters on the second row.  I had difficulty seeing it, but then I usually do have difficulty deciphering hidden letters.  The quilting on this is absolutely wonderful.

Her second piece is Sing:

I’ve liked that piece ever since Janet started it.  It puts a smile on my face, and guess what?  I purchased it for myself.  It was a present for me, from me.  She hand sewed hundreds and hundreds of small sttiches in the fabric background and the piece literally makes me want to sing and dance with joy every time I see it. 

Judy showed us the quilt recently featured on her blog.  I linked to hers as her pictures are much better than what I took.

Julia made a jacket:

It fit her nicely and had wonderful drape.  None of us can find the pattern though.  If anybody would like to share a source, please leave a comment.  Quite a few of us are interested in making one.

Mary showed a drop dead gorgeous applique quilt:

She used to work for Nancy Davis Murty – making a lot of the quilts for her pattern covers – and let me tell you, this woman can applique like nobody’s business.  It’s all by machine and her stitching is phenomenal, plus her color selection is ooh-la-la – over the top – perfection.  Gee, can you tell I liked everything about this quilt?  The center is Nancy’s Summer Poppies pattern, but Mary wanted a square quilt and added to the pattern. 

Sally is taking knitting lessons and this is her first project:

She’ll make good use of that hat in Upstate New York.

And last but not least, Sarah made this quilt:

Her church has something called a White Christmas.  Members bring presents to give to others who might not have the money to buy presents.  She said it was an easy quilt to make.

I hope you enjoyed seeing some of the Show and Tell from our December meeting. 

Hugs…

I forgot to take photos of a neat technique I learned at last month’s art group meeting, so tried it out again this morning and took photos this time.  It’s an easy way of turning any size fabric tubes you’d like to make – courtesy of Norma’s demo.

Fold your fabric right sides together, and sew a 1/4″ seam – or smaller if you’d like – along the cut edge.  Then go down about a 1/4 of an inch from the top of your sewn tube, and clip a little V shape into the folded edge:

Insert a bobby pin – remember those?  Would you believe I still have a full bag of old school hair rollers with bobby pins in them in my house?  But back to the instructions.  The little bit of fabric at the top is caught in the bobby pin and the bobby pin is slipped inside the tube:

Now you start pushing the bobby pin through the tube, gathering the fabric and slipping it over the bobby pin:

That part was difficult for me when Norma first showed it to me.  I could not get the darn thing started.  At home, I realized I needed to gently start it by making sure the fabric was turned and starting to go inside the tube.  

Voila!!! A nicely turned fabric tube:

I hope you like this technique.  You can make any size fabric tube you’d like, and it saves you the money of having to buy a tube turning gadget. 

Hugs…

My photographs do not do justice to her work.  I’ll post the pictures in order of her making them – I hope I remember that correctly – and then will make a few comments after you’ve seen all the photos. 

And the show begins:

 
Jane hand quilts all her quilts, and the last 2 pictures are minatures ranging  from 14″ squares to the much smaller whole cloth quilt at the end.  That could not have been larger than 8-10″ x 12-14″.

And a big thank-you to Marcia for holding up the minatures for me so I could take better photos.   As usual, if you double click on the photos, they will enlarge for you.

I’ve been a member of GVQC for over 30 years, and I can count the number of times we’ve given a speaker a standing ovation.  Jane received a standing ovation.  Brava, Jane!!! 

Hugs…