PERFECT UNION

 Our community Artisan Faire this November will now be held exclusively outdoors, so my previous wall space will not be available.  Larger pieces will be impossible to exhibit until the 'under construction' larger new clubhouse is completed. I've decided to reduce my inventory of larger art quilts to avoid lengthy storage.  Visit my online gallery....I'll be making changes asap in pricing but if there is a piece you are especially interested in....connect and I'm sure we can work out details.

In the meantime.... my newest piece - $150 

For some reason the center quilt within the quilt is fuzzy....but not so on my Facebook page....if interested visit there or holler and I'll email you a photo.  I'm getting very dissatisfied with the quality of this blog service and am looking into switching...however with so many years of content I'm finding that very challenging.  Stay tuned.

PERFECT UNION - INDIGO & ROADSIDE WEEDS

20” x 23”

This ‘QUILT WITHIN A QUILT’ was created using the reverse side of genuine rare vintage Shweshwe & Kashmel Indigo cotton, printed in England & South Africa under names such as 3 Cats.  Machine pieced and quilted.  Married with thread painted weed motifs and densely machine quilted.  Faced edges with fabric hanging sleeve attached.

MY HAPPY PLACES

 Those of us who have multiple happy places consider themselves very fortunate.

Of course my studio tops my list, but a very close 2nd is the kitchen.  I've always enjoyed cooking, especially if there is a special reason to do so.

I've been busy this week preparing for out of town company.

A lunch menu:   Greek pasta vegetable & feta salad, homemade pita bread with Tzatziki dip, followed by what may or may not be a 'cleansing finish"......... Homemade meringue shells filled with mint ice cream and topped with homemade Chocolate fudge sauce from my cookbook.

I happened to have egg whites left after making hollandaise sauce to coat fresh salmon cooked on the grill....so why waste them?  My trusty pastry bag was a kitchen item that didn't make the trip across the country...so a large spoon to form the shell had to do!

I've never made pita bread before.....the shapes got better as I baked each separately.  The baking stone was so heavy I was unable to pull the rack out of my 500 degree oven which would have made placement of the rolled out dough more precise.  Instead each one was deposited onto the stone with the aid of a rolling pin..... not always successfully.  However, the taste along with my homemade Tzatziki dip is super.  Hope this makes you all hungry!!

BACKGROUND QUILTING

 The indigo piece I've been working on moved one step closer to the finished concept I envisioned.  It was tense there for awhile.....after machine stitching weed motifs, the batik fabric was so distorted I feared it would be a total failure.

Hummm, it had been spray starched, stabilized, stitched using a walking foot, very carefully stitched I might add....but still it was a mess.  After setting it aside for a few days I wondered if it could be tamed with quilting.  To my astonishment, it worked.

Onward....stay tuned....

INDIGO BLUES

 Who doesn't love indigo?  A stack of 'made in England' vintage genuine and rare block printed Kashmeri indigo cotton prints has been staring me down for quite awhile.  Most are small pieces featuring charming prints which are also subtle and very appealing when viewed from the back.

The calmer reverse side of some from my collection has now been patchworked together to act as a background for an idea that will no longer stay silent.  Hopefully it will work. As the design issues are under consideration, enjoy viewing this unique fabric.  And YES I will be piecing more to show off the wonderful prints in a future project.  

MID-CENTURY MODERN

 Mid-Century Modern art seems to be popping up everywhere these days.  So.....I decided to tackle creating a new piece....

MID-CENTURY REVISITED -  13” x 13”

SOLD 

Hand-dyed cottons, machine appliqué with thread play.

Wrapped on canvas frame & secured in a black wood 

frame without glass.

SFMOMA

 WOW.......a visit to SFMOMA with a friend presented itself......after over a year living in CA, it was time to venture into SF.  Fortunately it was a trip carefree because her daughter drove us!  Well almost carefree.  What hicks..... we had early dinner plans at our son's house.  They drove back to Roseville and I overnighted at our son's home.

Our only glitch was some confusion regarding our Uber ride to his home.  It entailed much different pickup instructions than my previous experience. But eventually we were connected to a nice young understanding driver. A glass or two of bubble upon arrival settled us down.

The reason for the trip was to attend the Ruth Asawa Retrospective.  INCREDIBLE1!!  Not one, not two, but 12 galleries full of her art....the diversity of her talents was mind boggling.  It was surprising to learn she spent some of her formative years developing her skills at Black Mountain College (outside of Asheville, NC).

She created her famous interlocking wire sculptures over her long career.  Many were made in her Noe Valley (SF) home.  The same neighborhood where our son now lives.  Besides the jaw dropping wire work, there was examples of her drawings, printings, clay work, just about every medium one can think of. (No sign of quilting though!)  This SF exhibit will close Sept. 2, 2025 and travel to other venues.  I found this one already advertised:  Ruth Asawa, MOMA, New York -  19th October 2025 - 7th February 2026

Do deep dive on the life of Ruth Asawa.....artist and mother of 6, her life and art are fascinating!    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5P6aEbqNtc

...

HAPPY FAREWELL

It’s been so rewarding to go from full time quilt instructor to full time studio artist. My 8 year relationship with Woolworth Walk Gallery in Asheville, NC( among other venues in WNC) has kept me challenged and fulfilled.

It’s always a thrill to know a piece has caught someone’s eye. It’s especially flattering when it’s a skilled artist whose work I admire. Oh to have the FM skills of Jenny K. Lyon!! Be sure to seek out one of her workshops as she travels the quilting highway…...you won’t be disappointed!

Here we are today as Ginkgo Fan Dance goes to live with Jenny.

GINKGO FAN DANCE

 SOLD!!!   SUMMER SALE on this newly completed art quilt, act now...shipping available.

GINKGO FAN DANCE -  22" x 15"

sold

Japanese cottons, machine appliquéd with thread play.

Double fold binding, hanging sleeve attached.

GINKGO LEAF INSPIRATION

 After working with some ginkgo leaf gelli prints, this favorite design motif inspired another small art quilt.  It's in progress now....stay tuned.

NEAR FAIL #2

Admittedly this project wasn't a total fail. I'd been anxious to experience acrylic pour art ever since I started watching way too many YouTube videos on that subject.

I have to laugh, the box indicates for ages 6+.  Young kiddos surely would be less fearless than I was (probably because their parents would have cleaned up any mess.)

I read the instructions several times & set up my work station in the garage.

Then set about stirring and mixing the silicone into some of the paint.  The gray paint appeared to be almost clay like and no amount of shaking the bottle helped.  Instructions said if it wasn't pourable a little water could be added.  Which I did, more than once to no avail, undissolved particles remained.  You can see them in the little cup at the bottom of this photo which shows the applied paint before the canvas was turned side to side, up and down to distribute the paint.  

The smaller of the two canvases came out pretty well.  Here they are drying propped up on plastic cups on a plastic covered table. The larger one required so much paint, by the time it was mixed, a 'muddy' appearance developed.  It looks like a moon scape with all that little sand-like gray paint visible. 

I'm happy I had the opportunity to try 'pour acrylic art' and really relieved I don't have the adequate space to explore it further.  To do it properly the art should be spun on a lazy susan where the paint could fly off faster, maintaining more color separation.

Thank you Dianne for the challenge!

 

TWO FAILS

 Two nearly total fails back to back!  Maybe I should just keep the results to myself......still it's always fun to explore new avenues

The first one:  My thoughtful DIL gifted me an "Indigo Paint Kit" she purchased at SFMOMA after visiting one of their exhibits.  I've indigo dyed many times, but was curious about this little kit because it was for 'Indigo Paint'.  The instructions did not require the fabric to be soaked in soda ash, so I'm thinking okay powdered paint....because it had a small packet of indigo colored granules.

Foolish me, it was such a small amount that surely I wouldn't need a lot of room to work.  I'm a careful tidy person, right?    Gulp....no matter what I did, the powder would not dissolve. It was gritty, slimy, goopy mess that would not work as "paint" applied to fabric with a brush as the instructions implied.

In the process of dealing with fabric, paint, stirrer stick, brush, & plastic drop cloth, all having to be carried to the garbage & my laundry tub, somehow stains appeared in my carpeted studio.  NOTHING I tried worked to make them totally disappear.  

Talk about disappointment!  Bummer......  We had noticed that the paper bag it came in was stained at the top....not sure if that had anything to do with it...the powder appeared dry and should have dissolved.  

Onward I say........because I was looking forward to working with a "pour kit" a friend had given me.  Come back tomorrow and see that disappointing project...but at least I did this one in the garage!!!

GREEN AND GOLD LOVE IS IN THE AIR

 NFL training camp has begun......so we pause fiber posting today and move to the Green and Gold. I'm told Green Bay is hopping with visitors from all over the country enjoying the pre-season atmosphere.

One of most heartwarming events is seeing kids lined up with their bikes/scooters, hoping one of the players will walk over and choose their mode of transportation to take them along the road to the practice field.  The kids walk along side, holding the players helmet.  What a thrill for some young child.  LOVE IT!!!

And look at this adorable interview with some of the kids......how's this for total happiness.....

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DMgFZXsSdo9/

2ND CHANCES

The disappointing gelli printings that I over-printed have now been trimmed and ready to be married to blank folded cards.......Love when fabrics gets a 2nd chance!!

GELLI PRINTS CALLING ME

Printed just 3 days ago and I've already dug into the new batch of gelli printed fabric. Love the ginkgo leaves.

Here are some notecards and gift tags in the making. The last photo features mono printing using the tops of small plastic cups and the edge of a hotel room key.  After reassessing some of my fabric gelli prints, I decided they needed a redo.....

GELLI PRINTING WITH FRIENDS

 My passion for gelli printing has rubbed off....two pals recently purchased plates so we had a little instruction play date.  Both created successful prints (on fabric....we after all are quilters!!) 

I suggested working with foliage in addition to having fun with texture materials. Printable leaf options around our home with only 2 year old plantings was slim. Thankfully both friends brought great options. See some of our results below.

Love how the lace was used to print over Elvis fabric.

These two were created by printing twice....once with foliage and second as a ghost print.

Leaves on painted background in preparation to print on fabric.

Top two pieces were mono printed on felted wool, blue piece below them was ice-dyed felted wool that was overprinted using the gelli plate.  Remaining were gelli printed cottons. 

HAND APPLIQUE

 Though much of my work has featured machine appliqué, I still love getting back to tradition.  And that means hand appliqué.

PART 2 - LOOKING FORWARD

 The quilt world has brought incredible experiences, challenges, accomplishments,  places I visited, and people I've met that are the stuff of dreams.  My needle became a magic carpet that took me all over the world.

The very, very most treasured bonus is the lifetime of loving and talented friends that developed.  As I mentioned in Part 1 of this saga.......I received a box of fabric from my extremely talented SC friend Denny Webster (https://www.dennywebster.com/).   She was a member of the original Fiber Junkies..........6 of us who met once a month to explore different surface design techniques.  You can find years and years worth of posts documenting what we learned on this my personal blog.  Some of which  was shared in Post 1 came from 2018, however there's a ton more if you want to do a deep dive in the archives.

Denny's surprise got me traveling down memory lane as I unpacked the box full of mostly Japanese and Liberty of London fabrics.  When my dear friend Helen passed away, I was entrusted with disposing of her vast collection which was then passed along to many of my friends.  Time has moved along and Denny's style has developed into new challenges, so some of that fabric has come back to me now.

It's an opportunity to share it with some of my new West Coast friends........  Friends are so important.........cherish them no matter if they are close or far away.