Unscientific Comparison

My friends Susan and Marilyn from the Fiber Divas use a 50% bamboo/50% cotton fabric for dyeing and other surface design. They get it at Joann's. I decided I wanted to try it out. Since the Joann's near (relatively near) us doesn't carry it, I ordered it online. They call it a drapery lining muslin and it is a 200 count weave. I decided to try ice dying with it and a piece of  PFD Pimatex cotton for comparison. The Pimatex is what I've been using for quite a while. 

Below on the left side is the Pimatex piece. The two longer ones in the middle and on the right ore the bamboo/cotton fabric. They dyed really well. They have a softer hand than the cotton after being rinsed. Almost a silky feel. Susan likes using this fabric for stamping and other surface design because of the tighter weave.

I bought the bamboo/cotton when it was on sale for 50% off. Regularly it is $12 something a yard. I paid $6 something. I also bought it over the 4th of July holiday when they had 4 cent shipping.

This bottom one is another piece I dyed. I think it is one of my favorites. I used a variety of reds and yellows.  Will have to think of something special to do with it. This one is Pimatex cotton.

                                     

Challenge Quilt and More Ice Dyeing

Recently on the Quilt Art list, there was a discussion on how you work. Do you work on one project at a time and finish it before you move on or do you work on multiple projects at once? I'm definately in the latter group. When I start a quilt I will almost always reach a point where I have to stand back and figure out what the next step will be. This could be a matter of minutes to days. While I'm waiting for inspiration to hit me, I will either start a new project or move on to an old one. I was at that point the other day and sandwiched 3 quilts to be quilted. This is the first one. It is now quilted and bound. I need to find something to go in the center circles to hide where the quilting lines meet. It looks a little sloppy there.

 This is what I made for the Divas challenge where we all received a 1/4 yard of fabric from everyone and had to create a quilt with it. I had trouble adding Susan's fabric to the quilt. Hers was the last one I received. I  kept trying things and didn't like them and my piece of fabric was getting smaller and smaller. I finally decided on the circles in the center of all the squares.

This piece of yellow was the yellow piece here. I overdyed it the other day and think it looks much better.

These are some new pieces that I ice dyed. The one on the left was on the bottom and the one on right was on the top. I mixed some intense blue and sun yellow dye powder together before I put the powder onto the ice. I wanted green not yellow and blue. I forget what red I used.

New Quilt

This is a new quilt I've been working on. I started it using Rayna Gillman's book, Create Your Own 

Free-form Quilts. Using Rayna's technique you just start cutting strips and sewing them together. With my schedule right now I just needed some mindless sewing. I really like the colors in this. I didn't like this first layout as much with the purple strips on the bottom. 

I replaced the purple strips and came up with this. Don't like this orientation as much. It's really nice to be able to play with Photo Shop Elements and see the different orientations with out having to keep rearranging the pieces.

This is the way I like it the best. Tonight that is. When I look at it again tomorrow that might change or I might decide to move things around some more. Think I need to add a little more of the black fabric to balance the quilt a little.

This is the orientation on my design wall. Which is the back of two bookcases right now. I really need to get up a real design wall. Since I have the nice new painted walls, I don't want to stick push pins into it. You can see the pieces of scotch tape I've used to stick the different pieces up. I don't really like this vertical orientation. Something about it just doesn't work for me.

 It's getting late so I'd better head to bed so I can get up for work in the morning. I hate having to stop when I just want to keep working.

Good Night All!!!

More Ice Dyeing

After doing the ice dyeing at Susan's house, I wanted to do some more. I managed to fit in 3 more batches before I had to go back to work a week ago. I finally found time to put the pictures up on my blog. 

These first ones were yellows and reds. The top picture shows all 4 fabrics in the order that they were dyed. The one on the left was on the bottom. All were fat quarters except the one on the right which was a 1/2 yard piece. 

 Here are some closer pictures of a couple of them. Love the colors!

I forgot, this wasn't a pfd fabric, it was a cloth napkin that I picked up at the 2nd hand store. I dyed a couple of these before and find that they take the dye very well. 

This is the 1/2 yard piece. This one I just used yellows, it picked up a little red color from the ice underneath. I think I want to cut it in 1/2 and over dye the right hand side. There is just a little too much plain sun yellow and white showing up. I am thinking of adding some golden yellow to it. It looks brighter, a lot brighter in person!

This was a batch of blue that I did. Once again, the left was dyed on the bottom and I added a little bit of raspberry dye to the blue. The piece on the right was another 1/2 yard piece and I used only blues on that layer.

Here is the whole 1/2 yard piece, unfolded. It came out really neat.

This was the third batch I did. I added a little yellow to the blues. In this picture the fabric on the right was  on the bottom and the one on the left was on the top. I'm not sure why the center piece came out so much lighter. I know the one on the left was on the top because I used a piece of bamboo/cotton fabric that Marilyn gave me. It has a slightly different feel than my pfd fabric. I purposely put it on top so I'd know which piece it was.

Some of the blues came out lighter than I thought they would. I don't know if it is a result of how much dye powder I used or because all my dye powders are around 10 years old. But I always have a hard making myself dye lighter colors so I can't complain.

Ice Dyeing with the Divas

 Yesterday Susan, Carmen, Marilyn and I got together to try the Ice Parfait Dyeing from the June/July issue of Quilting Arts. It was lots of fun and so easy! I meant to take my camera yesterday to get pictures of us doing the actual dyeing, but forgot it. This morning I rinsed the fabric out and here it is drying on the rack.

 These first two were the first two fabric layers in the container. I can't remember which one was on the bottom. I think the first one was on the bottom. One of them, I loosely twisted before putting in the container.  The next one I scrunched into loose fan folds going diagonally across the fabric.

This one was the third fabric in. I loosely scrunched it.

And finally this was the last one in. I did the loose fan fold on it. This one had the most effect from the ice melting. I'm not sure what you would call it.

It was a fun day but we missed Anita and Lynn. 

I soaked a few more pieces of fabric in Susan's soda ash solution so I could dye some more pieces at home. Those are now sitting in the container in the basement. 

I'm most of the way moved into my sewing room now. Still have a few things to rearrange and reorganize and sort through but I can now use it again!!! Just in time for the hot weather. It's so nice to be able to hide away in the nice cool basement. Which is where I think I will head to now! Just have to think of something simple to eat for dinner. 

Moving Back In!

The time has finally come. My sewing area is finished, it's painted a nice green and I am moving my stuff back in. Gary is helping to move the big stuff. My fabric cabinets, the ones with the doors, used to be on the other side of the sewing table. I decided to move the to the other side to make a partition between my area and the messy part where the laundry is and the utility sink. It also gives me more wall space to put up a design wall.

We moved this stuff yesterday before we went into work. Just waiting for Gary to wake up so we can finish moving stuff and arranging (He works a later shift than I do). Then I can get down to the actual organizing. I need to go down to the local second hand shop and see if they have a small table top ironing board. I've saw some there the last time I was in. I want to put on up to the right of my sewing machine so I don't have to keep getting up to iron seams each time I sew. That was one thing I found annoying the way the room was set up before. It is really nice to have actual outlets now!!

Better get moving. besides working on this, I also have to make a birthday dinner for Alex and Gary. There birthday is tomorrow but Gary and I are off work today and will be working tomorrow.

Pop Up Quilt Show

If anyone is near Plymouth, NH today, 5/25, or Saturday, May 26, stop by the Pease Public Library and see the quilt show. It's open 10am to 5pm both days. Susan, Anita and I from the Fiber Divas put this together for the library. Marilyn also has some quilts in it along with some other local quilters. My daughter, Kara, also has one of hers in the show.  There is a nice variety of traditional and art quilts. I took some pictures this morning. the ones here show the Fiber Divas quilts since I don't have permission to put up the others quilts on my blog.

I'm finally back to actually write something about the photos. I had meant to get the names of everyones quilts when I was at the show Saturday and of course forgot to. These first 3 just show general pictures of the room and how we set it up. It was an adventure figuring out how to hang the quilts since we couldn't put anything in the walls. Also figuring out how to group the quilts so it made sense. For the bigger quilts, we put 2 folding tables next to each other and used fishing line on the back to hang them. You can see Marilyn's quilt the top photo set up this way. We had 5 quilts displayed this way.

We pulled one of the room dividers out part way and hung some of the smaller quilts from it. The top photo shows my leaf quilt and the next photo shows the other side of the divider with 3 of my quilts and Anita's flower quilt.

Here's a closer look at the 4 quilts. I should have taken a close-up of Anita's since this doesn't show all the thread stitching Anita did the background. I had meant to take my camera Saturday when I was watching the show for 2 hours and get some close-ups. Her piece is a whole cloth quilt.

My leaf quilt 

Three of my quilts that hung in a window. I think all my quilts have been posted at various times on the blog so I won't go into detail about them.

The top left quilt is Anita's. in this one I think she wove fabric strips together and then added the sheer strips on top. Then she added embroidery. It looks really cool close-up. On the top right is Marilyn's quilt. It had some nice 3-D leaves on it. Anita made the quilt of her house. It is a gift for her exchange student to take home with her. 

Here is Kara's and my, mother daughter quilts. Kara's the the top quilt. She made this in the 6th grade after hearing her teachers daughter talk about her time in the Peace Corp in Africa. This was one of Kara's first quilts and she designed it herself. and did most of the sewing herself. We had fun looking for embellishments she could use on it. The bottom is my first non traditional quilt that I designed myself. 

This Quilts is Susan's.Once again the picture doesn't do it justice. Susan uses lots of layering techniques. Sun printing, dyeing, stamping, layering sheers and metallic, quilting and other techniques. I spent a long time looking at her quilts and I still don't think I saw all the details.

Here is the purple display. The top on is my Construction quilt. The bottom left is Marilyn's Lupine quilt. Once again, this picture does not do the quilt justice. Bottom right is my quilt. The idea for it came from a small painting my Grandmother did in her 90's. The assisted living home she was in had craft times. One day, they had painting. The hard part for Grandma was she could only see blobs of color by this time. But she went ahead and made an abstract flower that looked like a flower. So I took that idea of blobs of color and made this quilt. Grandma put her painting in the auction at our family reunion and I ended up with it. The bidding was quite fierce but I eventually won it. At that time, I didn't have a place to put it so it's been tucked away, but now that I have a place to hang stuff up, I need to frame it and get it up.

On the table we have Marilyn's crazy quilt which was a big hit, two of Anita's cards and Susan's tote.

These are two of Anita's pieces. Once again you can't see the quilting in them. The cross piece she made for her husband.

. We had a lot of people come through. They really enjoyed the mix of traditional and art quilts. 

Getting There

My sewing room is coming along. Gary and Alex have the walls up, the outlets in and hooked up, the light fixture up and Gary has started mudding the walls. Wish they would dry faster! Soon I will be able to paint. Can't wait.

I know it will all be worth it but I'm really missing my sewing room. I want to finish some projects and have some ideas for some new ones and I can't start them. I can't even find all the boxes with my fabrics in them. Oh, well. It will all be worth it!!!! Did I already say that? I have to keep reminding myself.

New Walls Started

Here is what my sewing room looks like right now. Needless to say, I'm not getting any work done. But the thought of having actual outlets to plug everything into is exciting. We even have leftover paint from when the house was built, so I will be able to paint the walls a nice light green color. It's the same green we have in the kitchen. Can't wait!!!

This is the view from the bottom of the stairs looking toward my sewing room. It was really interesting trying to pack everything up and move it all to another part of the basement and leave Gary space enough to build the walls. Guess when I move stuff back, I'll have to go through everything and get rid of some stuff.

Fiber Divas Challenge

Here is the start of my quilt for the Fiber Divas Challenge. I mentioned the challenge in an earlier post. We received a piece of fabric from everyone and had to make a quilt using those fabrics. Look here to see the fabrics.

I'm finding that I am having lots of fun exploring these circle quilts that I've been making. I don't think I posted an updated picture of the purple, orange and green circle quilt I started last November. I'll have to get a picture of it. I have the top completed. Just need to back it and quilt it. That one was all machine stitched. This challenge top is all fused. I'm trying to decide if I like the black yarn between the blue and the green squares or if I just want to leave it plain.

Oops gotta go! I have to leave for work soon and still need to get dresses and make my lunch!

After looking at this picture on my blog, I noticed that the lower left "green" square doesn't look so green. Didn't show up as much on my design wall. Since it is already fused together, I guess I will try painting the square with some dynaflow to see it it will add just a touch more green to make it blend in better. I proabably won't have time until next week when I'm on vacation. This weekend I will be straight out at work since it is Easter Weekend and people are rushing in to get all the goodies for Easter dinner!

Finished Landscape

I have finally finished the landscape I started in Sue Benner's class. I really like the way it turned out. I had fun making it. What makes this piece extra special is that the inspiration for it came from the landscape around Bennington College while I was there taking the workshop.




This circle piece is a piece I was just playing around with to practice free motion quilting. Still need a lot more Practice!!!! I also used a satin stitch around the edge to finish it. I'm still not happy with the way the edges came out when I use this method. This piece was all fused. I used a lot of silks and polyester clothing in it. That is one thing I like about Sue's work, how she combines recycled clothing with her own hand dyed fabrics. For the sashing, I used a small blue ribbon that I had.

Better get to bed now. I have to get up at 3:45 to get to work at 5 tomorrow morning! I hate these early mornings! Oh, well, someone has to get up to make the donuts and other breakfasty stuff.

Table is Done

Don't have any new quilts or progress to show. Gary did finish my sewing table so my sewing machine is now level with the table and has no gaps around it. YAAAA!!!!

I did get a lot of cleaning done down in my sewing area especially since I had to vacuum up saw dust.

Tuesday, the Fiber Divas met here at my house we had a great time. Unfortunately Susan and Anita were not able to make it. There is a nasty stomach bug making the rounds up here. Marilyn and I talked about the workshop in VT we went to and showed off the quilts we made.

For our challenge this year, we each brought a yard of fabric which we divided into sixths so everyone received a piece. Here is what we have so far. Susan still needs to bring hers.

The challenge is to make a quilt using a part of each of the fabrics. We can make it any size, use any technique, dye, paint, etc.

That's about it here for now.

Still Waiting

I'm still waiting to be able to use my sewing machine. I would really like to start quilting the quilts from Sue Benners class. Instead, I've been fooling around with this piece that I started before I went to VT. I've been wondering what would happen if I did some surface design and fusing to the background piece before I put the cheesecloth over it. Lots of possibilities. I can't really get my paints out right now so, I fused down the black circles and the lighter leaves. I still don't know what I'm going to do to the top. The leaves on top now were just thrown on. The 3 bigger leaves I fused out of different fabric scraps from the class.



This background, I fused from scraps from the class also. Just need to figure out what to do with it.
One of the things I really liked about Sue's work was her use of recycled clothes. Now when I see someone in a really great blouse, I keep thinking, that would look great in a quilt! Will have to keep my eyes open for some at the second hand store in town.

Mess of a Work Space

I was doing really well after getting back from my workshop with Sue Benner. Then it all came to a crashing halt! This is what my work space looks like right now.




For my birthday, Gary bought an insert to go around my sewing machine so I will have a nice level work top. Because the table was custom made for Gary's sister by her husband, we couldn't just order an insert to fit a ready made table. The insert goes nicely around my machine and Gary is now modifying the table and insert so they fit together. Hopefully it won't be too much longer.
I am using this time to try and clean up and reorganize the basement. The basement started out nice and organized but over the last year, it started spreading and getting messier and messier. I have to find space to put a recumbant exercise bike. I want it in my work area so I can watch the tv while I'm riding it. I know myself. I will be more likely to use it if I can watch tv.

Funny thing about my birthday... It was the Friday while I was at the workshop and I was so caught up in everything that was going on that I completely forgot it was my birthday. Then I couldn't keep track of the days and dates during the workshop and kept thinking my birthday was on Saturday instead of Friday. When I finally remembered and figured out the correct day everyone got a kick out the fact that I'd forgotten it. I did buy myself a nice birthday present. Sue had some of her hand dyed scarves. I bought a beautiful silk one. I'll have to get a picture of it and post it soon.

Views from Bennington College

Here are some views from around the college.

This one is from the dining hall looking towards the building that the bookstore is in.

This is one of the views from the arts building where we had classes.


Our last morning there we saw a beautiful sunrise.

Then just a couple of views from around the campus.

I'd really like to see the campus in the fall when all the leaves are in color.