Better Photographs

Recently I posted about a commissioned quit that I made for my friend Karen. She sent me some photographs of the quilt. She has a much better camera than I do, so these turned out much better than my photographs. Her husband does wonderful woodworking and made a wonderful hanging rod for this piece!

Maple Leaves

Back

Close up

another close up

I finished this quilt in the summer, but since it hadn't been received yet, I couldn't post photographs. For my nephew, a going away to college quilt.  All plaids using my sourdough starter fabrics.


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

Quilt Fest in Layton

The Purple Twin quilt

I was able to get the second twin quilt finished before leaving for Quilt Fest in Layton (about a 3 hour drive from my house) For some reason the purples photograph as more of a blue than purple. Check out the Pink Twin Quilt in last week's post.

From last year's class

Good girl Brenda!

It is so rewarding to see quilts in the show from a class that you taught in previous years. First up on the agenda, Brenda Sommers entered a quilt that she started in a class I taught last year. It is so wonderful when a student names you as the teacher of the class, not just saying that it was from a class. Well done Brenda! It is a wonderful quilt!

This evening I helped hold quilts for a friend's lecture on scrap quilts. What a wonderful surprise to hold up another of Brenda's quilts that she made in another class of mine that she took a few years ago! Always a thrill!

Florence and her Sheltering on the Forest Floor

One of my best friends, Florence, entered her Mushroom quilt into the show. She won a Judge's Choice ribbon!

Shirley Olson's quilt

Another thrill (this has been a thrilling fest for me) I taught a "Choose your own adventure Mystery quilt class to a group in Utah County about 5 years ago.  Since then several of the quilts that came out of that class have won ribbons at Quilt Fest and at the Springville shows. And this year Shirley Olsen also won a ribbon!  And as another bonus, one of the quilts that I helped hold in the scrappy lecture was from this class!

Classic quilter's camp gear

This year's Quilt Fest theme is "Quilt Camp". I love it!  They had a Jamboree last night and a good turn out of outfits. This gal really packed well for the camp theme!

Bark

I love quilt "jewelry"!

And then another thrill, I won a ribbon! I have only won once before at this show, 12 years ago. So I was amazed when my friend let me know that my name was announced at the luncheon!  "Bark" is a piece that I made for a Quiltart challenge earlier this year. It won second place in the Art/Innovative category.

This is my Off the Wall post for this week. And since I also finished a quilt, I am linking to Finished Friday.

Not what I expected of today

Today hasn't quite worked out as I expected. I offered to come in and work the shop, the owners have had a family emergency. The store is in the process of closing.  Sad for the quilting community in this rural area. But that is how things work out sometimes. I was going to do a post earlier today, but with the sale going on, it was busy today. They let me use the wifi here, I have a useless data plan at home and I am almost out for the month, so cannot upload files or photos.

Pink Twin Quilt

I have been working on two similar quilts for my cousin's twin daughters. They graduated High School in June and I wanted to make them some cuddle quilts. Yeah, I am a bit behind.  I finished the first one yesterday, aka the Pink Twin Quilt. The second, aka the Purple Twin Quilt is ready to pin baste. They are similar, but I used a different color scheme and value placement in each. So hopefully they will feel different enough to make each girl feel special. The quilts are 60"x 72".

First Campsite

Second Campsite

Last weekend we went down to Capitol Reef National Park. Even though it is only about a hundred miles from where we live now, we haven't been there since our kids were in elementary school. I made an art quilt for a National Park challenge. I cannot show it until after the book is released. I love the red rock parks in Southern Utah! I hope to do more pieces using the parks for inspiration. 

About Time

I did get my garden in late, so it is no surprise that it took forever to finally get a couple of ripe tomatoes. I am sure that in a week or two we won't be able to keep up with the crop.

This is my Off the wall post for this week. Next week I will be at a quilt festival and hope to have a lot of inspiration.

I am also linking to Finish it up Friday.

Now I can show!

I have delivered one of my finished quilts to its new owner, so I can now show it off to you! My friend Karen commissioned me to make her an art quilt for her living room. She wanted it to feel like the color of cranberry. First off I had to go shopping. While in California earlier this year I was able to find some wonderful batiks in cranberry. I then had the idea to have my friend Lisa cut Maple leaves for me using her silhouette machine. You can read about how that worked on this post . Since I had moved on to another project, this hibernated for a while. I wasn't exactly sure where I was going with my Maple leaf idea.

Auditioning fabrics

So for the background I was going to sew some half and half blocks, with curves. Note the 4 blocks in the upper right hand corner.  Yeah, that wasn't doing it for me.  So I decided if I had leaves, I would need a tree trunk. I put up chunks of fabric for the tree trunk and the background.

Background is all pieced!

Several of the fabrics did not make it into the quilt. I also thought I would need some branches. Some are sewn in, others are on top.

Quilted

I machine quilted the background. Mostly with the walking foot, some with free motion quilting.

The quilting on the back.

Close up of the quilting

 Trimmed

I then placed the leaves all over the quilt. I left it on the wall for a couple of days to cure. I did move some of the leaves a little bit. Then fused them down and free motion quilted veins in all of the leaves. With so many of the leaves floating off by themselves, it took an hour to tuck in all the threads. I am a tucker. I feel that it looks better that way.

Finished!

I am pleased with the finished quilt. Karen loved it! That was the most important part!

This is my off the wall post for this week.

I am also linking to design wall Monday.

I am working on sorting out some stuff from my studio. I am going to be moving my studio to a smaller space and need to destash.  I have listed a bunch of stuff in my Etsy shop. More stuff will be going up in the next couple of days. Use the coupon code of BBLOG10 for 10% off a $10 or more purchase.

Craft books/magazines and patterns 
Vintage craft books/magazines and patterns
Craft supplies

Thanks for looking!

What can I show?

I have completed two quilts the last couple of weeks. But the recipients haven't seen them yet, so I cannot show them here. I am working on another piece, but because it is for a show I don't want to jinx it by showing it off here.  So what can I show? How about my good friend  Lisa's trunk show that she presented at the Springville Art Museum on Wednesday?

Lisa with her entry in the quilt show.

Doing her thing!

Some of her early work

A challenge quilt

Ice Dyed and then quilted

One of her latest pieces

I also had a couple of quilts in this show. They were hung next to each other in a hallway gallery.

Bark is on the left and Odin II is on the right.

This is my off the wall post for this week.

Sticks and Stones

I am trying to get some things caught up in my studio. Last week I wrote about my Ocean Blue piece for the A4 challenge group.  I was late with that piece, but am on time (I think!) with this theme. Sticks and Stones.

Threads everywhere!

I decided to do a piece using the phrase "Smile stone". The full story of the Smile stone is on the A4 blog post, I won't repeat it here. I decided to use trapunto to poof out the letters. After layering with a batting and backing I went around each letter with black thread to highlight the letters.

All tucked in

I am a thread tucker. I feel that it makes a more polished finish to quilting threads.

Stones

I am not very skilled at free motion quilting, but I can do pebbles!  I was pleased to see the letters pop after quilting the background.

Finished!

I did a line of stitching then rough trimmed the piece. I soaked it to remove the wash away thread I had used in the trapunto letters. I laid it out flat to dry and went off on errands. I was pleased to see how the soaking had improved the texture of the piece. At that point I came up with a wonderful idea to "bind" the piece using sticks!

Check out the A4 Challenge blog to read the full story of my smile stone. Also take a look at the wonderful challenge pieces the group has posted.

This is my off the wall post for this week.

Summertime blues

Up the Mountain

Sunrise

Sunrise two

Ocean Blue

I just completed this little quilt for the A4 challenge group.  The theme is Monochromatic.  For some reason blogger has turned this photo on its side.  The light portion is the top.

This is my off the wall post for this week.