Reveal!

Last year I finished an art quilt for the Inspired by the National Parks challenge. Donna  De Soto is again heading up a wonderful book project.  I was thrilled to be able to make a landscape of one of our Utah parks. I was lucky to get the park nearest to where I live, Capitol Reef.

Ready to quilt

I did not take very many in progress photographs. I was too excited to get started! I had chosen to depict the Fruita Cliffs near the barn. I wanted to do a mosiac, so cut tiles of hand dyed and prints that had fusible web. I had drawn lines to designate the placement of the horizon and grassy areas. I used a solid background with the color name of Espresso. It was a very dark brownish black. I thought it gave the other colors a better contrast than solid black. I fused the tiles down to the background and then pin basted for quilting.

quilting on the back

I quilted the areas with what I thought would mimac what each section of tiles represented. I did take photographs of the back showing the quilting. I had previously written a blog post about my finish, but without showing the front.

backing

I miss calculated and miscut my backing fabric. I really wanted to use this John Flynn Artifacts print from my stash. I thought the piece was large enough, but I cut it in the wrong direction. So I added a bit of the background fabric to fill in.

Adding the sleeve

I sleeved and labeled it and it went on its way to Donna. 

Fruita Views (or Cliffs)

The finished piece!  I didn't know what to the actual name of the cliffs was, so I titled it Fruita Views. Labor day weekend, Sweetie and I took a camping trip to Capitol Reef. It was fabulous! At the ranger station I found out that the cliffs were actually named Fruita Cliffs! I let Donna know, it was late in the game and I am not sure which title the quilt received in the book.  But the book is due out soon! Donna has received her author's advance copy, I have my copy on order! The exhibit has already started to travel. Check the schedule here.

This is my off the wall and Finish up Friday post.

Also linking to Emily's Moving it forward.

Bowl city

I love making fabric wrapped clothesline bowls!  I get carried away and make way more than I can use. I have the excess for sale in my Etsy shop.  A couple of weeks ago someone bought a yellow bowl. She said she was thrilled to find one in yellow! I realized that it was the only yellow bowl in my shop. So I cut strips and made a couple more. Of course I got carried away and made a couple others as well.

Four bowls!

They are all different sizes and shapes.  I just let the bowl turn out however it feels like growing.

Daisy print

This is a cute little guy. I had this daisy print on a pale yellow background. It did not photograph well, but is a bit darker than pictured. It is the perfect size to put on your nightstand for jewelry, chapstick, etc. Or I use bowls this size next to my sewing machine as a thread catcher.

Bright Yellow

This was a bright yellow background with tiny red, green, blue and white spots!  It is a larger size, big enough to use as a knitting bowl, to throw the mail in, or display fruit.

Flannel scraps!

I had some leftover strips of flannel that I took out of someone's trash at the retreat last month. Along with a few yellow and green flannel strips that I had in my scrapbag I decided to try making a bowl with them. I hadn't used flannel in making bowls. It turned out really charming!

Total scrapbag

I am a scrapaholic. I can't throw out usable strips and squares. I cut my scraps down to the largest size possible and then sort them into boxes of like sizes. Yeah, I save 1 inch strips. I have this idea of making a crocheted rug out of them.  One day.  So anything that is about 1/2"-1" wide gets thrown into another bag and I use those for making clothesline bowls. Sometimes I sort them into piles of colors and other times I just grab strips out of the bag and let it happen. This big guy is a fun shape. A very wide bottom and not very tall.  I can't decide if I want to keep him or not.

I will worry about it next week when I get the yellow bowls listed.

This is my Finish up Friday and Off the Wall post for this week.

April Fool's Day!

Finished Swap Blocks!

I finished the swap blocks that I was working on last week! Yay!  A real finish! I need to check with Diane, make sure she is not out of town before mailing them off to her. Nice to be able to cross something off my to do (sew) list.

Newest Sweet Sixteen

For my March Sweet Sixteen personal challenge piece I am making a fern. I was able to get my swirl cut out, and now I need to do a bit of research on fern leaves unfurling.  I ended up with an alternate swirl, so I decided to make a second piece, not for the sweet 16 project, just for fun.

Leftovers

So of course, instead of working the official next on the to sew list, I start quilting on the leftover piece! I am going to FMQ some swirls in the background. I got out my practice piece to try that out today. We will see how that goes, swirls are within my FMQ skill level (which isn't very high, but I keep trying) Hopefully this will be next's weeks finish.

Treasures from Trash

Sweetie's favorite Beer

At Sweetie's workplace they buy bags of rags. Sometimes he finds treasures in the rag bags and brings them home to me. I turned one of them into a Sock Monkey challenge for my friends. Read about it here. The reason I did the challenge 2 years ago was that I dislike Sock Monkeys, they are a bit creepy. So since Sweetie was so thrilled about finding treasure in the rag bag, I felt I had to do something with it and so conned my buddies into a challenge. There was quite a variety of projects.

This time he brought home this Guinness Stout piece, looks like it was cut from a pair of flannel pajama bottoms. I am keeping this piece for my own use. Not sure what it will become, but I am sure it will be fun to work with.

This is my off the wall and finish up Friday post for this week.

I never can say goodbye!

I have this problem, when I move, I can't quite leave behind the friendships I made! When we moved from Salt Lake to Sacramento in 2001, I still kept (well, really still keep) in contact with the wonderful women in Quilter's Holladay (sic, it is the name of an area, now city in Salt Lake County). It is is a wonderful local guild! I have made lifelong friends because I joined that group in 1995. When I knew I was going to be moving to the Sacramento area, I contacted the guild there. Didn't quite get the response I was looking for. They are a larger guild and I guess I was looking for a smaller, friendly guild. Anyway, one of the visits I made to see Sweetie (he had already moved, I was tying up loose ends in Utah) we drove around the countryside exploring. We stopped in Winters and got out to walk around.  Sweetie points to a building on Main Street, " quilt shop, gotta stop". We went in and I met Diane.  Everything good that happened to me in California is because I met Diane that day. I started teaching there after I joined Sweetie in California. And eventually worked at the shop as well. It was a wonderful time! I also met Carol via the guild that Diane pointed me towards and she invited me to join Cotton Club. It was a fun, small group. Diane eventually joined as well. About the time we moved back to Utah, they started doing a monthly block swap. Well, I had to keep in touch, so this was a good way to do it. They choose a simple pattern and you make a set of blocks each month to swap. And one for the "pot". I make all of my blocks for the year, mail them to Diane and she swaps them out for me. I have won the "pot" several times!

In progress

I had to pass on last year's swap, but when I saw the pattern for this year's blocks, I HAD to do it. Freeform cutting is always up my alley.  I am a bit behind, but as long as I get them done and to Diane by the end of the year, she can catch me up with the rest of the gang. And hopefully I can take trip to California in January to pick them up in person.

Last 4 batches

Finished block

You take a square, cut it in two, straight with a ruler, at angle or not (your choice). Add a strip of solid, then do the same crosswise. Leave the ends hanging, we all get to square up our blocks that we received in the swap.

Completed sets

We are to use black on white and white on black for every other month. I love the way these blocks come out! I can't wait to see what everyone else is doing! I have 7 sets done, done. Working on #8 and still have 4 more batches cut and ready to sew. I had hoped to finish these at the retreat last week, but spent to much time wandering around and chatting.

Joy's breakfast

Karen's breakfast

My breakfast!

Tuesday I went to breakfast with my knitting buddies at Das Cafe in Spring City. I wasn't in the mood for potatoes and eggs, so I had Nutella chocolate cake for breakfast instead!  It was good!

This is my off the wall post for this week. Also my Finish up Friday post.  I hope to finish up those swap blocks today!

Pie Plating!

Last week I attended the Pie Plate Patterns Super Spring Retreat! It was a great time! My friends, Lisa and Helen, came down from Salt Lake for the event.

Lisa, me and Helen

We parked ourselves up in the mezzanine for open sew time. You can look down and check out what everyone else is up to!

Helen and Misty

We tucked Misty into a corner for "time out". We had set up a cutting station. Helen cut strips for everyone for Strip Poker on Friday night.

Lisa

Lisa worked on a quilt for her new grandson who is due in the summer. In the background you can see Helen's heart blocks. She was auditioning a layout.

My quilts

I hung some of my class samples over the railings. My classes went well! I love teaching EZ Crazy! There are so many possibilities with color schemes and layouts. Behind the blue quilt is where Misty was in time out.

Gift Bag

Wine!

A few years ago I had taught my Dice and Splice Flag Quilt class at the Quilt Walk festival. It is a quilt as you go project that uses zigzag stitching to join the blocks. I walked into the class and saw that all but one of the students had featherweight machines in front of them. I was shocked! Did no one read the supply list? The ringleader, Michelle, explained that they did not want to bring their heavy machines to the festival. We were able to work out a method for them to make the quilt. The next morning Michelle ran into my roommate, Sandy.  Michelle asked her if I was ok. Sandy replied that I had a very trying class the day before and it took me two glasses of wine to get over it! Michelle and her posse were coming to the Super Spring retreat this year. And when she saw that I was scheduled to teach the Flag quilt class, she decided to bring me a bottle of wine in case I had another batch of hooligans in my class this time!

Hurry! We are in a race!

The Dream Team!

Bonnie and Brenda offered a special surprise Friday afternoon activity. It was a Treasure Hunt using a smart phone app!  Lisa was our ringleader and we went all over Fountain Green and Moroni finding clues and answering questions! We had troubles checking in at the locations, so I think we could have won, but we came in third. It was FUN!  I hope that they will do it again next year.


This is my Off the wall and Finish up Friday post for this week.

Sweet Sixteen

I was able to get my February Sweet Sixteen done last week! Well, except for the binding. I want to use a solid black and that is in my new sewing studio. I will get it this weekend.

February

Closeup

Still having fun with the mosaic idea.  I have a plan for my March piece. Since I will be at the Pie Plate Pattern's Super Spring Retreat next week, I hope to have some time to work in it.

This is my off the wall and Finished Friday post for this week.

Two months into the year? Already?

It is hard to believe that it is already the end of February!  Where did the year go?  We did score a beautiful granddaughter on my Dad's 84th birthday a month ago! Best present you could give to a great grandfather! He was tickled pink! :)

I have challenged a group of my fiber art friends to do a Sweet Sixteen project. Since it is Sweet Sixteen this year (2016) I thought it would be fun!  Feel free to join in if you are interested.  Leave me a comment (make sure that you are not set to no-reply) The rules are simple.  Make something (fiber arty) that has 16 in it. It could be one piece that has sixteen fabrics, a shawl with sixteen sections, sixteen art quilts, 16"x16", etc. Whatever says Sweet Sixteen to you! Due December 31, 2016.  My theme is that I am doing a monthly piece that is 16"x 16". Each month will be focused on a color. I combined it with my Quilt Keepers challenge, using the orange batik as my pebbles.

Original idea

Final version

I am into peace signs. Always have been. Right now I think that the more you put peace out there, the more it will become so. At least I would hope so. Peace, pass it on. I wanted to do some more with the idea of mosaics, so I fused the batik and then hand cut out pebbles.  I was going to arrange the pebbles in a double row, but felt it looked too clumpy. I fused the pebbles to the black background. I free motion quilted to outline the pebbles and then filled in the background with peace signs.

Just before the binding

back

The quilting shows up better on the back. I have a design in mind for my February piece, but have not had a chance to get it started. I hope to show it off next week.

I have been preparing for Pie Plate Patterns Super Spring Retreat. They are a mother/daughter design team who live in a small town 15 miles Northwest of my small town. It is a fun retreat! A nice thing for them to do for the local quilting community. And bonus! This year it is opening on my birthday!  

I have relisted my patterns for sale on Craftsy. I am not set up to handle VAT, so if you are in the EU and wish to purchase a pattern, please do so at my Etsy shop, they handle VAT on instant download patterns. Thank you.

We were down in Kanab last weekend and there was a Hot Air Balloon Fest.  What fun!  I have never seen balloons up close while they are filling and launching.  I would never go up in one, I have a fear of heights, but it was exciting to see all the bright colors floating near the red rock cliffs.

Looks like fun!

Heading out over the valley

My favorite, Smokey the Bear!

Lifting off

This is my off the wall, and Finished Friday post for this week.