Throwback Thursday, October 1

LITTLE MEN  # 2

The isolated men you saw last week are making progress in their life adventure.  In fact, they have gotten together and decided to journey to Africa, where they are anxious to see the wildlife.

A small group are braver and move on ahead to get closer to some giraffes.  The rest are waiting at a distance.  There are stitched sight lines to indicate who is looking where.  Can you follow the lines to see who is watching whom?  

Perhaps you need to look more closely.  Who is hiding in the bushes?

Can you see the zebras on the left?  They are looking everywhere. The men in front are looking only at the giraffes and the others are watching the men in front.  So none of the men look to the right to see the leopard hiding and watching those men in the distance.  What will happen next?

I have named this quilt OBSERVATION.  Check back next week to see who is continuing on.  

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com. 

 

RSC15 week 39

This is the last week of orange and I'm looking forward to next month.  But I have another orange option for my row quilt.

I really like the orange bordered by the little pinwheels.  I only have about six pinwheel strips so I will have to be careful where I use them.  That is one of the reasons I have been going slowly with these rows, so I won't end up having to do any ripping and replacing.  The floor is only temporary, but I do make good use of the iPad by taking photos of all my ideas to look back at.

The other reason I have put this aside was to finish this Project Linus quilt, a WIP since last winter.  I machine tacked each block, which is lo-o-ts easier than pushing a needle through fleece.

Hooray, today i finished the binding, so here it is!  There are little bits of orange in it also.

The flimsy came very close to the 50 x 60 inch size of the fleece blanket backing, but with a little fudging I managed to get the binding on, not the neatest job, but the happy little girl who gets it will not care.

You can see how well the front goes with the fleece, which is how I design them, from a given back to a coordinating front.  I think this limitation makes them more challenging, which I love.

    This quilt will be collected in mid-October at our Monona Quilt group.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  Come and join us, it's good fun.

Throwback Thursday September 24

LITTLE MEN SERIES

Do any of you remember this fabric from the eighties, row after row of these stuffy-looking gentlemen?

This fabric was the starting point for a series of three wall hanging quilts.  I bought about 1/4 yard at the time and then wished I had more.  

 

I found a book, don't remember the title, about designing your own quilts by using various sizes of blocks arranged in a balanced way.  I found some dark blue, maroon and other muted colors for the blocks.  I used one man for the center of the feature blocks, then strips or nine patch for the rest.  

As I studied it I realized there was a word which explained the state of these men, of so many people in general.  So I named it ISOLATION.

The back side is pieced out of leftovers, and I put in a small row of men as well, no longer isolated completely. 

There are two more quilts in the series.  Come back next week to find out what happens to the little men.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  Come over and check them out.

RSC15 week 38

HOORAY FOR ORANGE

This week I finally got a chance to do my balloon blocks in orange.  Some fun pieces showed up in my stash, including a batik with random cicles which showed up out of the blue.  So I have balloons inside of balloons.

Actually I did very little quilting this week,  just could not get motivated.  Maybe i should blame that on the humid weather.  We had about three solid hours of lightening last night and a ton of rain.  

    However, I did finally get back on track with my Project Linus girl quilt.  I am not quilting it to the fleece backing, just machine tacking in each block.  It is due to be turned in next month when our quilt group has our semiannual charity collection.  I love making these quilts for needy kids.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   Come along and enjoy some great projects.

Throwback Thursday, September 17

Here is the third of my Lights series of wall hangings made about 25 years ago.  This quilt required more additions such as ribbons.  I even went to my favorite thrift shop and found a silk sheath dress from the sixties to cut up for the leaf motif.  The dress was only one dollar.

These quilts were designed completely on my design wall, adding one piece at a time, then stepping way back to see the effect.  I learned a lot about how colors behave when combined, and this has been most useful for me ever since.

SUNLIGHT THROUGH THE TREES

Next week I will be sharing a totally different kind of series.  I appreciate Krista for giving us this chance to share these good older projects.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com. 

RSC15, week 37

A COLOR SHOW

This week I have had orange on the brain.  My pinwheel quilt has been taking all my sewing time.  I constructed two more new rows.  The first was simple, just a row of charm blocks from my stash to complement the pinwheel rows.  The second was a bear to construct.  I wanted to challenge myself by doing a chevron design.  I chose a MSQC technique, using a binding tool to make a Friendship Braid.  I cut down on the length of the pieces so the row would be about six inches wide.  There was a lot of ripping after attaching some pieces in the wrong direction.  Here are the two new rows with some white spacer strips.

This is just a trial placement.  When I laid more of it out on my kitchen floor I realized it will be bigger than I thought, because I laid out only two of the four pinwheel strips.  I took these photos of some of the rows and I was thrilled.  It's too bad these pics cannot convey the brilliant colors.

 Rather than picking it all up off the floor to make dinner, I called a couple of friends in my building to come quickly and see it.  Both of them said, "Wow" and as we all crowded in the hallway they were happy they came.  One had just gotten home from a day at Quilt Expo, fighting the crowds, and she bragged about the buys she had made, which made it worthwhile going.  I was just as happy that I had stayed home and had my own little show.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com. Please stop by and enjoy what others have done.

Throwback Thursday, September 10

MOONLIGHT

Last week you saw my Firelight quilt made with an asymmetrical block.  I was so pleased with it that I decided to do a series on the theme of light, using the same block arrangement.  This was in my art quilting days.  My method was to use whatever means was necessary to achieve the result I had in mind.

So I gathered shiny and velvety and glittery scraps and just worked it out on my design wall.  Here is my impression of moonlight on the snow.

Next week I wil post the final in the light series.  I think these are among my favorite quilts.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  Come join us.

RSC15, week 36

ORANGE IS HERE!

Its a good thing orange is this month's color, because I am working with it every day.  I'm busy with my pinwheel quilt made with HSTs from Summer at Easy Quilter.  Last week I showed you the strips of pinwheel blocks separated with white.  There are four of them, each about 42 inches wide.

   My plans for making a row by row quilt are taking shape, mostly trying different layouts.  My wonderful mail gal arrived with a bundle of ten fabrics which I got on a terrific sale at Connecting Threads.

Isn't it amazing that I found all ten of these prints, half a yard each, and a yard of dark blue in one place?  And look at all the orange!   I got to work by cutting some WOF strips from each and have been trying different layouts.

.

In addition. I have been finding fun charms to add other variations to the rows, like these I Spy squares from MSQ.

Haven't had such a fun week in ages!  Now I will begin the piecing and let you see how far I get next week.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com. 

Throwback Thursday, September 4

FIRELIGHT

This is the first in a series of three quilts that I made in the 1980's.  I wanted something with movement, not a static symmetrical block.  I found the unnamed block in a photo in a Michael James book.  I liked the diagonals mixed into it.

  Starting with some hand dyed fabric I had done in the sixties, I added every type of fabric that worked, including satins, velvets and plaids.  My vision was of a campfire in the woods, so each hand cut piece was added to enhance that effect.  

  I quilted it in the ditch, the only way to deal with all the different textures.

I was a member of Block Party Quilters in the Seattle area. This quilt was the beginning of my path into art quilts, which has been my most rewarding work.  With health changes I am more limited now, so I am doing simple things.  However, I always work out the patterns and colors for myself and am getting back into the creative side of quilting again.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   Come along and join the fun.