July 25th, 2015
Woo-hoo! Our local quilt show, Kaleidoscope of Quilts, was held this weekend and I am one lucky quilter! The quilt I call “My Thistle Garden” won many awards…Best of Show, Best Wall Quilt, and Best Machine Quilting on a Non-Computerized Long Arm! I feel so proud and so grateful!!
What a great way to begin the weekend! Well, it only got better from there! I taught a class on trapunto in the afternoon and for the first time ever, everyone decided to frame their wreath with a circle of featherettes. Check out this shot of Gary Harvey’s block where he’s stitched his first round of featherettes surrounding the wreath:
Can you believe that this was the first time he’d tried using a chalk triangle to create boundaries to make a freehand featherette? His work is so symmetric it almost looks like it was created from a digital file! He’s working on another row of featherettes that will fall between these now and I can’t wait to see what his finished block looks like! When I asked if anyone else would let me take a picture of their block for my blog, everyone was SILENT! Sorry I don’t have more pictures but you’ll have to trust me, they did some really beautiful work and it made my day. Hope everyone else is having a great weekend!
Filed under
Free Motion Quilting, Trapunto.
July 21st, 2015
This week is pretty packed full of stuff, so I just don’t have time to sew. I was able to do the test stitch out of a machine embroidery applique design because I could get some other work done as the embroidery machine stitched away. This one uses the Appli-K-Kutz 8 1/2 inch feathered wreath die shape:
This next photo is a shot of it with only the outer plumes decorated with swirls. I like that look as well:
And here’s a tangential view of the whole thing stitched:
Filed under
Appli-K-Kutz Fabric Cutting Dies, Machine Embroidered Applique.
July 5th, 2015
I finally got a little time to quilt this weekend and I had a wonderful time working on this wall hanging:
Only the center panel has been quilted but what is exciting me about this is that I used unconventional textiles for the applique shapes and it creates an incredible 3-D texture once it’s been quilted. I’m really struggling to get a photo that shows this:
All of the appliques are either woven wool fabrics, wool felts, rayon felts, bamboo felts, cotton velvets, or cotton suedes. Once you quilt around the applique shapes w/invisible thread, they really pop out:
I couldn’t resist messing around with a little ruler work as well…I’m blown away by how much punch just a little bit of ruler work can add to the design! I’ll get some other pictures up later, but it’s pretty cool to see this in real life! Also, in case you didn’t know, Craftsy is having a big sale this weekend with classes at $19.99! Click here to get the discount!
Filed under
Craftsy!, Free Motion Quilting, ruler work on a HDSM.