Week 5 of #AtoZchallenge2021Quilt (Art)

Last week was the end of the #AtoZchallenge2021Quilt (Art). It was a great finish, even if I was less organised as the month went on. I want to thank Frédérique of Quilting Patchwork Appliqué for a wonderful challenge. I really learned a lot and am so happy to have participated. Here's a look at the last week's post.

V is for Village

This project, Amalfi Coast Happy Village was one of my first art quilts, although I didn't realise it at the time. It was made during a workshop with the owner of a local quilt shop and based on Karen Eckmeier's book, Happy Villages. The image is loosely based on a postcard that I bought in the Amalfi Coast in Italy. 

Amalfi Coast Happy Village - my first art quilt

Putting Amalfi Coast Happy Village together 

Happy Villages by
Karen Eckmeier

W is for Weaving

This piece is called Ciboulette Stitches. It was created based on a workshop with Sue Stone through TextileArtist.org. Weaving was my first passion and it was great to incorporate it into my art. BTW ciboulette is chives in French. 

Ciboulette Stitches on a woven background

Lovely ciboulette flowers

The real thing in the garden

X is Xerothermic

Xerothermic is an adjective used to describe dry and hot climates. Isn't Google amazing? I actually learned a new word 😊! 

This piece is called South-West art quilt. It was begun at a workshop at my local quilt shop, Quilty Pleasures, in 2010. I had done what I could, but had no idea how to finish all of the grasses in the foreground. Finally it came to me – couching! So the piece was finished in 2015 as part of a UFO challenge. 

The quilt hangs in my daughter's room as a reminder of our wonderful vacations in the American South-West.

South-West Art Quilt

Couching was the solution that I
was looking for!

Lighting up the sky

Y is for Yellow

This piece is called “Keep Calm and Stitch”. I stitched and beaded the word “Calm” since it’s my word of the year - I didn't realise until then that my unconscious word of the year for 2020 was Frenzy. That's why I consciously chose Calm. 

This piece was made in January for the first challenge of the year of Project Quilting 2021. The theme was to use the Pantone colours of the year – Illuminating and Ultimate Gray. To avoid last year's Frenzy and to remain calm, this is the only one of the Project Quilting challenges that I did this year. I did enjoy it and hopefully it's something that I will continue to participate in, at least occasionally. 

“Keep Calm and Stitch” - for the Project Quilting 2021

Details: buttons, couching
and stitching

More slow stitching to remain calm 

Beading and various
embroidery stitches

Z is for Zigzag

This practice piece is zigzag crosses. It is a Sashiko stitch that I learned from Shannon & Jason Mullett-Bowlsby of Shibaguyz Designz in a virtual workshop. I also bought their book, Boro & Sashiko to keep on learning. Now that I know how to create the grids to stitch Sashiko, I really love it and hope to keep adding it to my art quilts. 

It's too bad that this last post wasn't an example of something in a real art quilt but the only other word that I might have used was zillion, as in a zillion beads in an art quilt. I am working on a project that feels like it has a zillion beads in it but when I looked at it, it didn't look like it even had tons of beads, let alone a zillion 😁.

Sashiko stitching zigzag crosses

What I learned

• 

  Although it required a lot of preparation, this was a great challenge.
• I think what I underestimated the most was the time to prepare the posts since I didn't want to just put in what I had said on Instagram.
• It was a great experience to see most of the art quilts that I have done over the years. Many of them have been created since belonging to the TextileArtist.org's Stitch Club, for which I am very thankful.
• I know that I've learned so much as an artist about colour, composition and techniques, but I'm pretty impressed with some of my earlier works. Most are pretty good!
• Now that this rush is over, I'm looking forward to reading some of the other participants' posts 😊
  

Related links

• Amalfi Coast Happy Village, May 26, 2014
• Ciboulette Stitches finished,  July 20, 2020
• Slow stitching with new projects, July 12, 2020
• South-West art quilt
• April Challenge Completed, April 25, 2015
• Project Quilting 2021 -  Grey and Yellow, January 10, 2021
• Sashiko samples
• Catching up on posting projects, February 8, 2021
• Sashiko stitching and visible mending, December 06, 2020

Linking parties

I will be linking up to many fun linking parties this week. You can still link up to Free Motion Mavericks until Tuesday evening. After that, make sure to visit Muv and link up there! Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, Oh Scrap!, Patchwork & Quilts, 

Hand-quilted pillow on Throwback Thursday

Welcome to Throwback Thursday (TBT) link-up for October. I'm co-hosting for Sandra of mmm! quilts this month. I hope that you can join me in showcasing your pre-blogging era quilts.

Hand-quilted pillow

This pillow was one of my first hand-quilted projects, possibly around 2006. The front has a thin layer of batting and is hand-stitched in the ditch and outlines three butterflies. I made it during a class at our local quilt shop, Quilty Pleasures.

Hand-quilted pillow

 It has been well loved by my daughter and it matched the quilt that my mother made for her.

Hand-quilted butterfly motif

The fabric is quite faded but it washed up well. I just noticed that some of the quilting on the butterflies has come off. I'd better fix that!

October's One Monthly Goal (OMG)
Since this is a short post, I'm including my October OMG, which will be a pillow by the end of the month😊. I don't generally make pillows (these would be my only two) but I'm eager to start free motion quilting my Kingfisher Quilt. I had extra diamonds cut from the background batik, so a pillow will let me try out the motif I have in mind for the project. Hopefully the FMQ will work out - but either way, it should be a pretty pillow.

The front panel of the pillow-to-be

Pillow to match the
Kingfisher quilt

Hopefully the FMQ will work out - but either way, it should be a pretty pillow.

Related links

• Kingfisher Stitch-Along quilt top finished, August 31, 2019

Linking parties
I'll be linking up this post to several great linky parties, including, of course, the One Monthly Goal hosted by Patty of Elm Street Quilts. Let's go check them out! Moving It Forward, Tuesday Colour Linky Party, Needle & Thread Thursday, Put your foot down, Midweek Makers, Slow Sunday Stitching, Peacock Party, Beauties Pageant, Can I Get A Whoop Whoop?, Finished or Not Finished Friday, What I Made Monday, Design Wall Monday, Monday Making, and Free Motion Mavericks with Muv.

Throwback Thursday (TBT) Link-up for October

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

My First Swap

I've been avoiding them for years but I finally succumbed to a swap through my guild, the Common Thread Quilt Guild. In the excitement of the moment I just forgot that I don't do swaps. Don't get me wrong, it's a great idea, but I know myself - it'll mean another deadline, agonizing over what to make, is it good enough, will she like it, etc. At least this swap is in person, so I don't have to mail it. That would have added another layer of anxiety.

I really tried to plan ahead and minimize the agony of the decision and the deadline. Two months ago I went to Quilty Pleasures, our local quilt shop where the recipient of my project works, and asked her colleagues what she might like. They gave me a great idea and I got fabric that is typically "her" as well as a pattern.

A runner for the guild swap

I knew that the pattern would be challenging for me since I have less and less patience with instructions. That's why I planned to make two Sew Together Bags - one for me to practice on and the other for the swap. I brought everything to the retreat, thinking I would at least get mine done, since she was also attending the retreat.

You may recall from my post that it didn't go so well. Every piece of fabric I cut was wrong. It's a good thing that the fabric was for my own bag, or it would have been a complete disaster! On the way home from the retreat, my girlfriend offered to bring me a couple of patterns for a runner. I gratefully accepted.

Details of the hexagon 

Here it is! I'm not sure which magazine the runner is from. I did have difficulty with one of the pattern templates - it was too small, but I took out my graph paper and drafted a new one.

The block was interesting since the middle hexagon is actually appliquéd to the outer edges of the hexagon. The pattern suggested using stabilizer and glue but since I liked appliquéing orange peels so much, I just used freezer paper and basted them. It's ironic to think that I used to skip most of the basting required when I used to sew clothes!

I stitched-in-the-ditch using Bottom Line thread and then FMQ a six-petal flower in the middle of each hexagon. Nothing fancy since it's quite busy.

After making the runner and placing it on my living room table, I'm very happy with it. Hopefully the person who receives it will also like it!

Update

Fabric Play

Our swap exchange was last night - and it turns out that my secret sister, Sherrill, also had my name!!!! Apparently the colours I used go with her decor - so the table runner will look good on her living room table.

Two Christmases ago, Sherrill was my secret sister and I gave her a copy of the book, Fabric Play by Deanne Moore. When Sherrill got my name for this swap, she decided that she wanted to make one of the quilts from the book.

My very own lap quilt :-)

The book is all about using different fabrics to get different looks for the same quilt. If you click on the link for the book at Martingale, look at the fourth quilt image in the preview- you wouldn't even recognize the "Your Own Way" quilt.

Although I've gotten lovely quilty gifts from friends, I've never gotten a quilt. I'm so thrilled. It will be used and cherished.

I've linked to the following parties. Come see what's happening! Linky Tuesday with Freemotion by the River, Main Crush Monday with Cooking Up Quilts, Free Motion Mavericks with Muv, Off the Wall Friday with Nina-Marie, Monday Making with Love Laugh Quilt and MOP Monday.

First Free Motion Quilted Runner

Table Runner - free motion quilted

The adventure continues. My childhood friends, Lyne and Luc, were coming to Ottawa to see their daughter during the long weekend. Since I knew they would be dropping in, I asked Lyne what her kitchen colours were: light yellow, lime green and rose. Those are so not my colours, so off to Quilty Pleasures for some fabric. I got really lucky and found two beautiful prints, obviously from the same line with flowers and cattails. They both had yellow, green and pink. The green is more minty than lime – hopefully it won’t clash.

Of course after all of that practicing, I had to use my new free-motion quilting skills. I started the paisleys in the right-hand corner. It’s a good thing that it’s a table runner ‘cause it’s awfully stiff! Those first paisleys were just a little too small and close together. For the left-hand corner and the bottom left, I used a pattern of 2 rows of half-circles with stippling in the middle. This was perfect for the 2 inch strips. For the middle green fabric I used a template to make a type of spiral. I marked all of them and of course practiced before quilting them. By the end, they were looking pretty good!

Finally I had to do something in the bottom right. I watched Leah Day’s Free Motion Quilting on Craftsy again, and sure enough, her paisleys were much larger than mine. So off I went to practice. I like the final result. It’s much less stiff than my first attempt.

The runner won’t win any quilting prizes, but that wasn't the point. It was a gift to a dear friend and a practice piece at the same time. Lyne is an artist – she knows all about practicing!

What did I learn?
1. Free motion quilting is fun, but if it’s done too closely, it can make a quilt very stiff!
2. I really like fabric that drapes and isn't stiff!
3. Practice, practice and when you think you have it, practice again!