New Book

I don't have any new work to show but I ran across this book, "Stitching to Dye", by C June Barnes. I don't know if it has been reviewed anywhere and I just missed it but this book is great!!! She creates quilts with different white fabrics, stitches it, manipulates it and creates texture in the fabric then dyes it. The pieces she shows in the book are wonderful. So much color and texture. So many possibilities to play with!! I love her use of zippers in her work.
If you haven't seen her work go here to her website.

Felting Experiments

I felted these 2 pieces back in May but never decided how to finish them. Here's where I posted about them. I made them after watching a couple segments on Quilting Arts TV about needle felting. On the show, they used an embellisher machine but I did these with a hand felter. I was playing with felting different fabrics and yarns to painted cotton batting.
These were really fun to make. Just playing no thinking. They've been sitting around since then because I just couldn't decide how to finish them. I finally decided to sew them onto a piece of black felt. I started out with a rectangular piece of felt but it just didn't look right. So, I cut the black felt about 1/2" beyond the felted piece. Looks much better. This gives it a much more finished look.

Foliage Pictures

Between work and rain, I didn't have a chance to go out and take some pictures of the fall colors until yesterday. There won't be too many more days to take any. The colors around here are just about past their peak. I thought Kara might like to see what it looks like back home now.

These were all taken on one of my favorite roads near our house, Old Hebron Road.


Kara, this picture on top is from Old Hebron Road looking towards Texas Hill Road, somewhere near the christmas tree farm.

Fiber Diva's Exhibit

Here are some pictures of the Fiber Divas Exhibit at the Gilford Public Library. Thanks you Lynn for letting me use them!!! The library has a great area for displays and exhibits. These are the first two cases you see as you walk into the exhibit area (not really sure what else you would call this space. Having the glass cases made it really great for displaying small items. Besides the quilts, we also have sewing items like colorful spools of thread, pincushions, chatelains (not sure of the spelling), felted wool balls and fabric beads. These small things are spread out among the 3 cases. The case in the corner has Susan's challenge quilt which had moon as the theme. She also has 2 three dimensional pieces in there. Lynn has 2 pieces on top of the case.

This case is the biggest and has my circle themed challenge piece at the top. You can see the 5 pieces the other Fiber Divas made that are hanging off of my piece. At the bottom is Lynn's challenge piece. I can't remember the words from the song she used for her theme but it had to do with a river. Sorry Lynn!! She also gave each of us a piece of blue fabric that we all thought was really pretty and then found out it was one of the hardest shades of blue to work with!!! We all managed to get a piece of that blue fabric in there somehow. On top of the case is a purse I made and a mixed media piece I made also. Lynn has a couple of her quilts in the bottom of the case.


Closeup of Susan's quilt above the fireplace at the library. I will have to get the name of the quilt from her since I can't remember it and add it later. Ok, somehow I've lost the picture showing the quilt and all of the fireplace.



Here is the 3rd case in the display area. This has Anita's challenge quilt in the top. Her theme was Ecclesiastes 3:1. Marilyn's challenge piece is in the bottom half of the case. Her theme was Sashiko. I wish I had remembered to take pictures of everyones quilts before we put them in the cases. I'll have to remember to take some when we take the exhibit down. I have a couple of quilts laying on the bottom of the case and Lynn has the 2 pieces on top of the case.



Here is Carmen's challenge piece. Her theme was Ecclesiastes 3:1 also. There are only 5 pieces here. Carmen didn't get a chance to make one for her challenge.



Here's a closeup of 4 of the pieces. Left to right are: Marilyn Mason, Susan Wei, Anita Furbush and mine. Lynn Elkinton's is the one missing from this picture.

If anyone is near Gilford, NH, stop by the Gilford Public Library and see the exhibit. It will be up for the month of October and it looks like the exhibit for November fell through and we will be up for November too.

Gilford Public Library
31 Potter Hill Road
Gilford, NH 03249

M, W, Fri 9am-6pm
T and Th 10am-8pm
Sat 10am-2pm

Two More Circle Quilts and Geocaching

Here is the quilt I did for my "Going in Circles" theme. It makes me think of pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. This is 7"x39". I had to make it really long because all the other circle quilts hang off of it. It looks really great with all 6 quilts put together. I found copper colored metal circles to attach the quilts together.




This is Carmen's quilt for my circle theme. I love all the machine quilting in the background.



A closeup of Carmen's piece.


Melanie, you asked what geocaching was. We use a GPS to find hidden caches all over the place. These caches are lock n lock boxes, ammo boxes or some other type of box that will keep the inside dry. Inside is a log book that you sign when you find it and some little trinkets that you can trade for. We go to the geocaching site (click on the above link) to find coordinates for caches that are hidden all over the world. I found a couple on my way back from taking Kara to college. It is fun and something that the family can do together and we get to explore places we never would have gone to before or never knew they existed. We've been doing this for 4 1/2 years now.
Sharon, I found 2 out of 3 caches that day. Of course, the one I couldn't find, my husband said was easy to find.