A Day of Fiber Fun

Yesterday was one of those miserably hot and humid days that we often experience here in the southern US. Just too hot to handle a big quilt. My sewing room is on the third floor, actually a converted attic space. Even though it is air-conditioned, it never really gets cool on days when it is in the mid-nineties. So, I decided to play with small pieces. I found a small piece of Sulky Solvy water-soluble stabilizer, and made a small sample of Fantasy Fabric using fibers, ribbons, shiny thread, and Angelina. This piece is very small, maybe four by six inches. It looks like ocean to me! And each side looks a little different, because I used turquoise thread on top and a lime green on the bottom.

While I had the Angelina handy, I tried fusing some to Bounce dryer sheets, to get a sort of transparent shimmery stuff. I also fused some Angelina to bright hand-dyed fabric, along with some silk sari ribbon that has a silver center. I used Bo-Nash powder to fuse all this to the fabric. These might make good postcard backgrounds.

Then I fused some Angelina'ed fabric and laundry sheets to a leftover piece of Timtex, the stiff interfacing I use in fabric postcards. I made some funky-shaped bookmarks, then added some beads.

Then I remembered my vow to do all the sample projects in Vikki Pignatelli's book Quilting by Improvisation, and went to the section on improvising blocks. This time I used a light stabilizer by Sulky, and made improvisational log cabins. You just cut the strips for each round in a funky manner, iron under the edge that will cover the previous round, and stitch down with an invisible zigzag or blanket stitch. I got two of these done. I used darks on the center and outer layers, and light or bright greens on the second layer. This might look kind of woodsy if I ever finish enough to make a quilt.

Doing the Happy Star Dance

This afternoon I followed the directions in Quilting By Improvisation to make this curved star with flames, called "My Star Dances" in the book. Vikki Pignatelli's instructions are very clear, with lots of photos and step-by-steps. I was fairly satisfied with my results, although I had a bit of fullness in the red part of the star. I will quilt it, probably on the Gammill, then add a faced backing in a curvy shape. My biggest problem today was that I burned my left ring finger on the steam iron when I was turning one of the seams under. Nice blister! HMMN, maybe the messy glue stick is not such a bad alternative.

What to do with old quilt magazines?

Yesterday I went upstairs to sew the binding on Lily's quilt, but was stopped by the pile of old quilt magazines that I had pulled out last Thursday for the guild's silent auction. I decided not to haul any mags in for the auction, but did clear out about eight books that I never refer to. The mags were from 2000-2002. I went through all the Quilters' Newsletters and pulled out articles to keep, and actually filed them alphabetically in folders. I still have a pile a foot high to deal with.

Then, I decided to start a different project that I got excited about after watching her on The Quilt Show. I bought Vikki Pignatelli's book, Quilting by Improvisation, and have now created the freezer paper pattern for "My Star Dances." This project introduces her method of piecing with curves. I am excited to try it, because she does not use any glue stick or glue like other methods I have tried and don't like. I end up with glue all over my hands, table, tools, you name it! Vicki uses a lightweight stabilizer and freezer paper. Usually Vikki just irons down the fabric to the stabilizer, using the freezer paper pattern on top as a guide. She recommends using Stitch Witchery on the narrow roll when it is necessary to fix the seam allowance in place. We will see how successful I am with this method. The possiblilities for artistic quilting are endless if you can sew anything you can draw! In fact, I hope to take this book and go through it step by step to learn all her methods. One of my quilting groups has issued a challenge to make a leaf art quilt by our fall quarterly meeting. Maybe I will come up with something original by then!

I just bought ANOTHER quilt book!

Have you become a member of The Quilt Show yet? I joined as a Gold Star member, but really have not browsed the site much until the last few days. I have uploaded four of my quilts to the picture gallery. When you do that, your quilt images are shown at the very beginning of the gallery pages. Yesterday, I got a nice note from a quilter who had seen my pictures. After a few e-mails back and forth, she sent me a picture of a postcard she made with silhouettes of her grandchildren. It is stunning- and she kindly sent me the instructions for her process. She used black Ultrasuede for the silhouettes. Next time I am around Avery and Lily, I will be trying to get them to hold still long enough to take their portraits for silhouettes. Thanks, Margo!

I actually watched one of the shows with Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson this morning. It featured quilter Vikki Pignatelli, who is best known for quilting with curves. She demonstrated her techniques and showed some of her stunning quilts. They are very organic, with lots of trees, leaves, water lilies...she must be a fellow nature lover. So, I ordered her book Quilting By Improvisation, and now must visit a fabric store not only for Ultrasuede, but also interfacing for her techniques.

I actually am trying not to purchase so many books with quilt patterns, but I think that one that teaches the process to make original quilts is going to be valuable.

Do you like Ricky Tims? I have quilting friends who are wild about his quilts and techniques, and others who don't care for him. I took a daylong workshop with him several years ago, and I thought he could not have been any nicer. He explained things well and gave you time to work on them before going on to the next step. I have two of his DVD's, which are also very good instructional videos. His hand-dyed fabric is gloriously rich and colorful, although pricey at $25.00 per yard. Sometimes he has specials and you can get it for $20.00 and hoard it for a very special project. Ricky lectured and played piano at the guild meeting the night before the workshop on Harmonic Convergence. He also played for us during the workshop. Oh, did I mention I purchased one of his music CD's? I guess you could say I am a fan. In fact, before he became famous, I clipped a photo of one of his quilts from a magazine, and it has been on my inspiration wall (meaning, thumb tacked behind my sewing machine table) ever since. At the workshop, he used MY sewing machine to demonstrate, and he took a photo of one of MY quilts that I brought for show and tell! How cool is that?

Okay, I know you are looking for the latest nature photographs from my North Carolina home. The baby bluebird is now displaying blue feathers, and the other egg was a dud- never hatched. The north side of my house is looking splendid with the viburnum, rhododendron, and pyracantha in bloom against the backdrop of a lovely hemlock.