Category Archives: Sea Stars

3X3, Collections, Curvie Cuts, Mom VI, Scrap Happy Quilts, Sea Stars, The Grandmothers

Itching for Spring

Hello
I am itching for warmth and more flowers and green leaves. We continue to get little tastes as these photos show.  Even the trees are blooming -But I am greedy and I want more Spring.

This week was a very quiet one when it came to seeing other folks and meetings. So I got a lot done in the studio.

Progress Report: Sea Stars This work is 36.5″w X 21″ l.  The base of this work came from leftovers from Wave. I just put the remainders together in a curvy cut fashion and had a great pallet to begin on top of. The starfish are created from wired ribbon that was leftover from Christmas.  The coral came from a purchase of paper that I made last spring in Rochester at the Art store.  Beads and yarn were in my collection. It was a fun project.   No money was spent on the creation of this project.   I already had/ have a deep supply of stuff to use in my work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Puck This stretched work is 12″ w X 16″l. I stared this work years ago and came across it in one of my searches. I decided to completes this work because with time I  could see what it needed. I added some shading and then did the machine drawing on top to complete the work.

I have a friend who is in Mid Summer’s Nights Dream next month and I will give this work to her as a memento.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Collections This work is slowly moving forward. I added the old leather book mark that was my mothers. The post card was from her trip to India. The pictures of Candy Grandmother, ( upper left) and Grandma Butterworth(  the flapper)  I had, so I decided to use them as well.

 

 

Icarus  The feathers are all made now and most are stitched down to the wings. I will finish this step and then move onto the body in the up coming week.

 

 

Circular Thinking- 3 X 3 I continue to work on the assembly step of this project. Columns A and B are stitched together in long columns. I have also stitched the first two blocks in column C.

Each connection also includes adding circles that cross over the boundary between squares.  I will begin to connect the columns this week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scrap Happy This is the newest scrap happy and it is made  from leftovers. I even made the back yesterday from remainders of other backs that I created for other projects.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jacket

I keep working to integrate the patches into the body of the work.   each stitch moves me forward.

 

 

 

Childhood Memories – The Grandmothers On the left is grandmother Ester, my fathers mother. I will show her in pale purple from now on, because the dress that she made and I loved the most was a calico print with purple pussy willows printed on it. Grandmother  Ester taught me to sew in the summer before  seventh grade.   My first project was pajamas in cotton  duck fabric. The top was white with big quarter sized multi colored circles. The bottoms were turquoise. I made them to wear to church camp that summer.
The    tall figure on the right is grandmother Ruth, my mothers’s mother. I will show her in royal blue as I remember a blue dress with a big white line pattern on it.  She always wore an apron made from a retired dress- just the skirt over the top of her clothing. I decide to show a summer day when she and I were clearing out the out buildings of Great Grama Gast’s home. ( that was Grandma Ruth’s mother)
In one of the buildings we opened the door to find a big ball of string so large it could not come out of the space. Strings from the butcher, mailed packages and groceries were tied one to the next and wrapped into this ball. Because  Grandmother Ruth and her mother Great Grandmother  Gast had lived through the depression, they   did not toss out any thing that could be reused! We had to cut away the string with a knife until it was small enough roll it our the door. But the real amazing thing was on one of the shelves in the back of the room. In a brown paper bag- and it was full- written in Grandmother Gast’s hand were the words “ string too short to save”. It was full of the knots and bits! I still have that bit of brown paper under glass on the back porch.
Keep Creating
Carol

3X3, Childhood Memories, Core family, FAD (Fiber Art Dames), Mom VI, Scrap Happy Quilts, Sea Stars

Spring Flowers

 

Hello,
It is so nice to walk out the door without boots, gloves and hats.   The early spring flowers are making their appearance in central NY as well . That is always a good sign.


The FAD group meant this week and the talk was lively.  Judy shared her newly completed sweater. She was working away on the next one all during the meeting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sharon has been busy at her machine and she had three quilts to share. This one is a commission where she tried adding pines in the background for the first time.   That layering adds a lot of depth.


Progress Report: 3 X 3 Circular Thinking I finished the last square this week and I am now in the process of connecting all the squares together. The first row of three is stitched.  I now need to go back into the work and add a bit more stitching to complete some of the circles.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sea Stars I have stitched down the stars now and I am on to the coral. I did the coral by machine. The coral is cut from hand made paper that I purchaed at The Art  Store in Rochester last spring.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jacket This work goes forward now that I have a new direction. I have added Turkey Work to three of the patches to integrate them into the jacket. I think it really pushes them back and anchors them too.

 

Icarus Here I am working on creating feathers for the wings. It takes a little over 12 min to do each one, but I think it is worth the effort.    I have created  16 feathers so far.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Collections I keep pining items on the surface as I come across them. I am just about ready to begin stitching on this project.

 

 

Scrap Happy I looked  again at the box of fabric that Angela gave  to me and found more of the fruit  bathers in a much bigger format. So I cut the 4.5 in strips from  it and added the sides. These new blocks  plus the leftovers from the first fruit swimmers  quilt will go together to make a second.

 

 

 

 

Childhood Memories This is a new venture that will be my  weekly project. This square is to introduce the core family characters. The memory connected with this work is one that happened every in our house  every Christmas as I grew up. My parents were married on Christmas eve and my Mom put on her wedding dress on that night every year.  Dad took a photo of my brother Gene and myself in the folds of the gown. I loved the dress as it was a beautiful silk double weave of a star pattern.   When one grows up one dies not realize that every family has its own traditions.   I  was Jr high before I realized no one else’s Mom dressed in her wedding gown on Christmas eve for a yearly photo.    The idea of celebrating an anniversary by dressing in the wedding  gown was just something my family did and it  had nothing to do with Christmas.   What childhood “traditions” where particular to your family?

Next week I will be trying to represent my grandparents in a new machine drawn  collage image.

Keep Creating
Carol