New Quilts

Here are some of the new quilts I've made. This is the sketch that the first quilt was made from. Doesn't really look like much. I drew this after looking at pictures of our house construction. All the framing for the walls both inside and out gave me the idea for this.

This is the final quilt from the sketch. I went with totally different colors than I usually use. I always fall back on the colors I'm comfortable with and find easy to use and wanted to challenge myself to use something different. That was one of the first comments the Fiber Divas made that it wan't my normal colors. This one I called Construction.

This is actually 2 separate quilts. I took the idea from Jean Wells book, Intuitive Color & Design, Adventures in Art Quilting. She calls it Portrait Finish, where you make a simple quilted piece to mount the actual quilt on. It acts like a mat for a painting. I think it gives smaller pieces a much more finished look. Some people mount their pieces on painted canvas or mount the actual piece onto stretchers. I've always thought some of the smaller pieces that I've done look unfinished and needed to be presented differently. They needed something more so people would think of them more than just fancy potholders!!

This is a closeup of the quilting in Construction. The quilt itself was made with hand-dyed and painted fabric. The background piece was made from batik and hand-dyed fabrics.



I have always wanted to try my hand at more abstract work like Jean Wells. I've also admired Robin Ferrier's work and Liz Berg. Theirs is more abstract also.

After I finished Construction, I again hit a blank. I'd go down and pull fabric out, move it around and nothing! Didn't help that I had an awful head cold and was all stuffed up! I finally decided to just start pulling stuff out of my scrap bag and just start sewing. Well, as I was pulling stuff out, I found the piece with the vases on it. I had started it years ago and never did anything with it so finally just tossed it in the scrap bag. I also found the pieces to this border in the scrap bag. Something I had started in a class I took with Carol Taylor 3 or 4 years or so ago. I started by sewing all the pieces to the border together. Had no idea what I would do with the finished piece but just started sewing. I then decided that the border would look interesting around the vase piece that I had pulled out. The border might be a little too big for the center but oh, well, at least I was sewing again!! I do love how the colors of these went together. I doubt I ever would have thought of doing this if I hadn't come across them in the scrap bag. It did need something between the center and the border so I picked out the tan and black batik. Now to just finish it. I think I need to add something on the upper right to fill in a little of the space. I'm thinking some sticks (not real, maybe embroidered) or pussy willows. Something simple.

Last Saturday the Fiber Divas went to the Belknap Mill Quilter's Guild Show in Laconia, NH. Lynn Elkinton, one of the Divas, was their featured artist. She does such lovely work, it was great to see it all in one place and see some pieces we hadn't seen before. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera!

I just took a look at Carol Taylor's site so I could put the link in my post. I love the new work in her linear series!!!