PIQF 2011

Our fiber arts group, Fibervision, had an exhibition at Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara, California over this past weekend.  This is a picture of my piece, Filtered Light.  I took a picture in the redwood forest at the Purisima Creek Redwoods Open Space Preserve in the Santa Cruz mountains last October when Jim and I were hiking in that area.  The quilt is meant to celebrate when the sun broke through the overcast and, as the light filtered through the trees and warmed them, allowed the release of the magnificent balsam odor which is a signature of redwood forests.  I am very pleased with this piece and overheard lots of positive feedback from viewers at the show.

New Views II

Today was the ingathering of the pieces that will be in Fibervision's latest exhibit, New Views II, at the Cabrillo Pavillion Arts Center beginning tomorrow. We've got 60 pieces, almost all of it new work waiting to make its debut. Hope you can join us this Thursday, September 29th, from 5:30 to 7:30pm for the artist's reception.

Progress on Baby Trips Around the World

Last month I posted a photo of the fabrics I am using to make this quilt for my grand-nephew. Today I spent a lazy Labor Day reading magazines, watching an old movie (Above Suspicion with Joan Crawford and Fred McMurray) and sewing a bit on this quilt. All the "blocks" are finished, it is just a matter of sewing them all to each other now and this is the first complete round. It is one busy quilt!

If I had to do it over again I think I would have paid more attention to the value changes and less attention to the prints on the fabric.

September Paper

Lately I have been drawn to playing with paper and paint, perhaps doing some collage. I have also been thinking about my next quilt and using some kind of repeating circles and/or scallop shapes. So, I pulled out some paper, paints, bubble wrap, stamps and a purple marking pen and made this background. I may do some writing and collage on this paper version at some point, but will definitely do some sketching, planning, and fabric auditions based on this background tomorrow.

On The Fence

Photo of the Day

Lavender & Tree

Photo of the Day

Something about this tree with the lavender growing around the bottom of it really appeals to me, but haven't been able to figure out why. I'm sure it has something to do with the juxtaposition of lines. Thanks, Pammy Jane!

Free Motion Practice

Several women in my Fibervision group are doing a free-motion quilting practice round robin. I had a pile of three pieces I needed to do and send along. Yesterday I finally had a chance to do it. Interestingly enough, I seemed to get worse as the day went along! I'm almost positive that is not the way practice, practice, practice is supposed to work.

The blue pattern, Pebble Ripples, is one I saw on Leah Day's Free Motion Quilting Project blog. If you are a machine quilter and you haven't heard about Leah's project, you ought to check it out.

A different Arrellaga Tree

Photo of the Day

This very tall tree has the most amazing blooms at the very top.

Guess The Decade

Photo of the Day

There are several panels of this architectural detail on a building I pass on my daily walk. I'm thinking it was built in the 60's and it is amazing that it is still there.

Mystery In the Park

Everyday when I walk to work I pass Alice Keck Park Memorial Gardens (Alice Keck Park Park). This morning as I walked past the Arrellaga Street gate, I saw these three paintings set in various locations. Who painted them? Why were they there? Is somebody releasing their masterpieces to live freely in the world or discarding failures? I don't know the answers to those questions, but it was fun to see art in the "wild." It was all still there when I walked home for lunch. Wonder if it will still be there tomorrow morning.

A Lovely Gift

Photo of the Day

From a huge bunch of organically grown roses given to me as a gift. Not only were they incredibly beautiful, but the fragrance was heavenly.

Progress on Filtered Light

Today my friends, Mary and Linda, and I got together to work on our pieces for the upcoming Fibervision exhibit, On Our Way, at Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara, California. They are a lot further along than I am. They spent the day finishing bindings and hanging sleeves and I spent the day finishing the actual quilting of the piece. The other day I showed some of the free-motion work I did on the piece and today I worked on the straight lines.

This piece had some new challenges for me. I usually do all-over quilting in order to avoid the piece being distorted by different densities of stitching in different places. I wanted to quilt this piece to emphasize the idea of light filtering amongst trees and had very specific quilting patterns in mind. I am very pleased with the results and finally believe I will have this piece ready in time for the due date.

More to follow.

Out of Practice

Was lucky enough to have an extra day off this week and spent most of the day machine quilting my newest piece, Filtered Light. Well, not most of the day because I did some serious procrastinating first. Early in the day I washed and reorganized the plastic containers I use during fabric painting and dyeing, changed a light bulb and thoroughly washed the fixture, scrubbed a kitchen step ladder that has needed it for weeks, etc. You get the picture. When I am cleaning everything in sight, you can be pretty darned sure there's something else I am not dealing with!

Finally, I sat down with my machine and my quilt and began with the quilting I planned out last week. Not only am I out of practice, but apparently sewing machines can get out of practice, too. It took us a bit of concentration and patience to get a good rhythm going and still, I am unhappy with the results. The only cure for it is to quilt something more often.

The top photo is closer to the correct colors for this piece. More photos to come as things progress.

A Quilt Begins

Today my friend, Mary, and I went to the Creation Station in Buellton, California to pull fabrics so I can make a baby Trip Around the World quilt for my new grandnephew, Brom. I felt like I had really lost my TAW juju and needed the support of my color-gifted pal. We had fun grabbing fabrics and tossing them around until we found this fun combination and I'm looking forward to putting it all together. There's some great flannel for the back with big green frogs, will post some photos soon.

Arrellaga Sidewalk

Photo of the Day

It was a very cold and grey morning in Santa Barbara today, this piece of stone off to the side of the sidewalk seems to be reflecting the sky in its coloration.

Lantana

Not posting anything I've made today, but sharing some of the beautiful lantana I see daily on my walks to and from work. I have loved lantana ever since I was a little kid, loved the little bundles of even tinier flowers, loved the smell and look of the little berries the plant forms as it goes to seed. It has been delightful to observe five different colors of them in the course of five or six blocks. I should plant a mess of them in my front yard.

More Postcards

Here are a couple of fabric postcards I've sent out in the past few weeks.

The top one is an experiment in photo transfer on fabric and the attempt to try to create a faux antique look by making it look worn. I like it and learned lots, so next time I'll like the results even better. It went off to one of my friends as a thank you for a fabulous dinner at her house.

The bottom card is one of the turtles I screen printed some time back. I painted the little guy, drew on some seaweed and quilted it in time to send it as a birthday greeting to my middle grandboy for his ninth birthday on Monday. He loves turtles so I hope he loves the card.