Quilting & Learning - What a Combo!: Amy Ellis

Showing posts with label Amy Ellis. Show all posts

Sunday, September 08, 2019

Introducing my Exit Strategy

In the spirit of anticipation, celebration and learning, I am starting a new project.

EXIT STRATEGY →

In less than 3 years and 2 months, I will be 60! People are generally not eager to grow older, but I believe that the perks of age and wisdom more than make up for the laugh lines and grey hair (which I've had for over 15 years anyway!)

60 will begin the next phase of my life - Fibre Artist!

So, how am I going to get ready for the fibre artist phase of my life without living in the future? Well, pretty much the same way that I've approached most things.

Learn
Have a flexible plan
Keep expectations low and gratitude high

I hope that you'll join me on my journey. Let me tell you about my very flexible plan.

Amy's Creative Side

It started with the blocks that I made while participating in the One Week Improv Challenge with Amy Ellis of Amy's Creative Side. The challenge was by subscribed email and through Instagram at #improvwithamy.

As with most challenges, I followed at my own speed. I did manage to make the first five days of seven days (see the post in Related links). At some point after the challenge, I made a few more blocks.

Block 1 - joining strips

Block 3 - playing with triangles

Of course, the next decision is....what to do with those blocks?

The first time I thought about Exit Strategy

A few months later, in late spring, I felt especially tired and needed something besides rest to help me stay positive. What's better than a new plan, a new project to help my spirit soar with anticipation, celebration and learning?

The name, Exit Strategy, came very quickly but the rest took me a while to figure out. It's so easy to get caught up with grandiose plans but more than anything, I want this to be realistic and doable.

These are the notebooks that I keep with me to jot down ideas. The idea for Exit Strategy was slowly percolating.

3 notebooks that I keep around

The next step of this plan came about when I bought a gently used version of the book, Exploring Textile Arts in June at Quilt Canada. The book was published in 2002 by the Editors of Creative Publishing. There is a more recent version, but this one is fine for my purposes.

I've been very inspired by some of the techniques in the book. That's when the rest of the flexible plan started falling into place.

The flexible plan

Try out new techniques
Use the improv blocks as background
Blog and reflect on what I've learned
Repeat
Time frame: very flexible....3 years and 2 months 😊

Using 8 inch blocks as background makes these projects less intimidating. It's about learning, playing, taking chances and trying new things. I'm hoping that I'll be able to put some of the blocks together as they are completed....or not. That's also part of the very flexible plan.

You may have seen the first block that I posted about, without specifically saying what Exit Strategy was. If you didn't see it, the post is below in Related links.

A Felting Miss-Adventure,
part of the Exit Strategy project

I've been hard at work practicing my embroidery stitches and learning new techniques. Here is a sneak preview of my design wall. I will be posting about these techniques in the next few weeks.

A sneak peek at my design wall - things are progressing

I created a page for Exit Strategy, and as I progress, I'll add links to the related posts. I hope that you'll follow me in my journey.

What I learned

I've been thinking about this for a very long time, ever since I discovered what I wanted to be when I grow up 😊
I used to say that I wanted to be a full time artist when I retired, but then I thought about it....I'm going to be retired. This should be fun, not just another job! So now I'm keeping the full time out of the description. I'm hoping to play full time but as far as art making goes, I'll do what I want, when I want, and then, if I feel like it, I'll find opportunities to show my work and accept the deadlines that go with them.

Sunday, August 25, 2019

A felting miss-adventure

Welcome - yes, I did have a felting miss-adventure last week but wasn't going to post about it until I had done something positive with part of my felted piece. I'm quick to admit to ~~mistakes~~ learning moments but I love happy endings 😉

Festival de la fibre TWIST

Festival de la fibre TWIST
They always have the best postcards!

It all started when I attended the TWIST fibre festival last Friday with a fellow fibre artist. The yearly festival occurs in Saint-André-Havellin in Quebec, about an hour away from Ottawa. I had wanted to attend for years now and was thrilled to go with someone who could take me along.

It was a beautiful day and there were both artists and vendors - of pretty much anything fibre. I bought some beautiful roving, a little bit of yarn and a few fat quarters. It was very busy but manageable. I even met a couple of fellow Quilt Guild members. It was a great day.

In the afternoon, we attended a demonstration of a Felted ruffle collar by Anna Mathis of Ploome Fibre Arts. In 45 minutes, Anna completed a beautiful felted collar with ruffles. She was really interesting, full of energy and made it sound so simple!

Angora fibres all in place

Anna working hard to felt it

Pulling the felted collar to make the ruffles

Trying out the felted ruffled collar

Felting miss-adventure

Can you tell where this story is going?

The angora ready to be felted

On Monday I decided that I wanted to try out some wet felting. Anna had made it sound so easy!

I should have started with a smaller project but I couldn't help myself. I wanted a felted ruffled collar, even if I couldn't wear it (I'm allergic to wool).

It started off well. I had bought some angora roving so I used a light pink for the base and a darker pink on top.

Starting to felt. Slowly massaging and then
getting more vigorous.

This picture was taken before I got discouraged. After two hours of felting, I had to put things away to go to a meeting. The next morning I was at it again.

The results looks like something pink that the cat coughed up. I'm not being modest - it was scary!

I put it aside and worked on some of my other quilting projects. But I really wanted to create a piece with this mess, so that I had something to show for all of my trouble.

Here it is!

The finished block - the first square of my Exit Strategy piece.

I cut a strip from the felted piece and cut that down to one side (the purple strip was in the middle), and then I:

Needle felted on top of the scraggly felting. I used both the darker pink and the lighter pink.
Added some curly sheep bits to the edges.
Lined the purple strips with some yarn.
Beaded some amethyst and pink rose quartz along the purple strips.
Added more beads and then the Lotus Flower button.

I've attached the felted piece to the improvisational batik block that I made while doing the One Week Improv Challenge with Amy Ellis #improvwithamy. I continued making improv squares without knowing what would come of it. I'm now working on a project with these blocks, and this is my first one. I'll explain in another post.

What I learned

Someone said that experience is what you get, when you didn't get what you wanted (I had the posted in my room - always the cynical one). I got plenty of experience on this project....but I did end up making something, and learning, from my experience 😊
I believe that my mistake was not using enough angora roving. It just wasn't dense enough to felt, except in the middle.
In hindsight, I can't believe that I embarked on this miss-adventure. It's one thing for an expert to make something in a demo, but entirely something else to expect the same results the first time around.
I paid dearly for my experience. Today, six days later, I can almost walk normally. She wasn't kidding when she said to bend your knees! Since I'm on holidays, I used the time to rest and stretch, a lot!
I am really happy with my finished piece. It's a miss-adventure that ends well (and I have another two feet of the mess to play with!)

Sunday, February 10, 2019

Improv Challenge

A couple of weeks ago, I participated in the One Week Improv Challenge Amy Ellis #improvwithamy. I meant to post this as a Squirrel DrEAMi! with MMM! quilts but managed to miss the deadline. No worries, here's the post😊

I've made a few improv quilts and when I saw Amy's challenge, I knew that it would be a great opportunity to continue on my improv way (see Amy's new e-book in Related links below).

Amy's Creative Side

One Week Improv Challenge with Amy

I took out my batik scraps and started cutting (without a ruler) and sewing strips together.

Day 1 was all about cutting and sewing strips together.

Putting strips together

Day 2 was sewing bits together.

Sewing bits together

On day 3, Amy suggested that we add triangles to the other bits.

Adding triangles to the mix

Day 4 was a restful day using a log cabin format.

Using the log cabin format

On day 5, I tried making gentle curves

Adding very gentle curves

Putting it all together - Days 1 to 5

5 improv blocks

What I learned

The Challenge was actually 7 days but I ran out of steam!
I do plan on doing Day 6 since it was essentially improv foundation paper piecing. That does sound intriguing but if I had waited to do that block, I might never have posted this!
I started the challenge on day 3 and made the first three blocks and then two days later, made the next two blocks.
I really need to work on my curves. If you look closely at the curved block, you can see some lines that are crooked. Those are my curves...and the block is puffy 😊
I'm not sure what I'll do with these blocks, but I'm considering cutting them up from their 10" to perhaps 6", using the left-overs to make more blocks and then adding some light batik fabric as a sashing. Without too much extra effort, it could make a cute baby or lap quilt.
If you get a chance to check out the Intagram link below, there are some very cool improv blocks and quilts. I love the look of solids on improv but got carried away with the batiks. I think that smaller blocks with some white batik sashing would tone it down a little!
Thanks so much Amy for this challenge. It was a lot of fun.

Sunday, April 29, 2018

First Week of Comfort Quilt QAL

Earlier this week I started cutting fabric and sewing together some large blocks for the Comfort Quilt QAL.

I'm making a few cuddle quilts for our guild to donate. It's been a few years since I made a charity quilt, so I'm going to make a few :-)

The first four blocks of Comfort Quilt

I really like the way that it's coming along.

Comfort Quilt cuddle quilt in the making

I just need to add a border to make the quilt 22"x 22" and then it's off to FMQ. I can't wait!

Dreami!

This project definitely qualifies as a Dreami! post (which stands for Drop Everything And Make It!), as in a totally unplanned project that just needs to be made, no matter how much else is going on.

I have a hard time resisting quilt-alongs. I must say that my self-restraint isn't that bad because there are sooooo many more quilt-alongs that I would love to join. The Comfort Quilt QAL just came at the right time - I had to buy something at Ron's in Cornwall :-) so flannel for a worthy cause wasn't too difficult to rationalize!

Art with Fabric Spring 2018

It's my favourite time of the year - spring and the Art with Fabric blog hop!

This year the theme is 1+1=3 That can mean many things, but I am interpreting it as being whimsical and different.

I started looking at surrealist paintings in my daughter's art books. I was intrigued by Rene Magritte - especially his "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" image but as much as I tried, I just wasn't inspired. I thought about Salvador Dali. Although I'm not really a fan - that doesn't mean I don't appreciate it - I was intrigued by some of his imagery. Since I only need to be inspired by it to make my own art, I finally found a painting on the internet that excited my imagination. It's called Aurora by Dali, 1948 - or is it?

When I went looking for more information this morning and couldn't find anything, my daughter did a search. It turns out that there is no painting called Aurora by Salvador Dali. The painting is actually called Sunrise by the Ocean by Vladimir Kush, 2000 (see Related Links below).

I'm scheduled to post my art piece on May 21st. Be sure to check it out 😊 Don't worry, I'll remind you!

What I learned

I suspected that I wouldn't be impressed with the little blocks from the Comfort quilt. There's absolutely nothing wrong with them except that they have tiny 1" blocks. I have really big hands and it's just a little too fiddly for me. I made a few to get my first quilt done but I'll probably be avoiding them, unless of course I happen to be in an extra zen mood (right!)
I really love Amy Ellis's new book. My favourite thing (other than the gorgeous quilts) is that each quilt had a "One at a time" section. This gives the fabric requirements for those, like me, who make their blocks one at a time. It makes my life so much easier, not having to figure out what the fabric requirements are for only one block. Thanks Amy - that was brilliant!
I was really surprised that Dali got so much credit for Vladimir Kush's painting. My daughter wasn't surprised - apparently miss-attribution happens a lot. It's a good thing that I have an art-historian daughter - it seems that you can't always trust the internet!