Category Archives: Foundation XX II – Elsie’s Rock- Cape Cod Stone

Paying Attention

BS11Cemetary Hello,

When one needs ideas for solutions  or inspiration I believe  one has some  choices.         I was struggling with part of the  Stone Church project.     There is a old cemetery that is a part of that area and I wanted to include it in my piece.  But I was having trouble  so I took a walk in the near by cemetery to refresh my mind.  I was surprised by the presence of the deer.  There  were two actually and the cemetery  is surrounded by city on all four sides.   Looking at  how compact these stones and how much they overlapped has helpedVictoria's-project1 me formulate a solution to the  work I must do on the project.

Sometimes the ideas are as much about paying attention as anything else.     There was a FAB meeting at my house this week.  Folks showed their work and  Victoria is moving along nicely with this quilt.  She got inspired by Ginny’s silks that she had purchased a few weeks ago.  They  are shown here in the orange and  gray strip. ( I got inspired by that same orange silk)    I Vickie's-bed-fullthink the shadow of the leaf looks wonderful too.   She  also showed a top that she had assembled for a bed quilt that she is making for her new house.    I am so impressed by the large number of prints she uses and the colors.    I would not have put that strong orange with the turquoise myself- but I love the combination.   So by paying attention to this  little surprise I now have  a jumping off  color  combination  to try in the future.   The real trick here is to note the surprises and in my case write them down.  I do that in my idea journal and it helps me when I need to get going with a new piece.

Progress Report:

Foundations XXI  Elsies Stone - Cape Cod Rock 43" X 44" $595.00
Foundations XXI Elsies Stone – Cape Cod Rock
43″ X 44″
$595.00

Foundations XXI Elsie’s Stone- Cape Cod Rock   The Road Less Traveled

I am finally done with this project.  I love all the texture on the surface of this wonderful stone.  I am very grateful that Elsie gave me this parting gift.     The many fascists of its surface with the limited colors make it fascinating to me.   I think I could revisit this rock and work from a different side  too.

I used yarn ,  nylon nettingClose up -Elsie's-St and lots of torn fabric bits to produce the colors and textures.    There is also my favorite silk paper at work on this piece.

 

Elsies Stone-cl2

 

 

 

 

 

The Road Less Traveled  35" X 45"  $535.00
The Road Less Traveled
35″ X 45″
$535.00

 The Road Less Traveled

  I started this quilt in Rosalie Daces Color class at QBL.  I have finally completed the process.      I used many of the techniques she taught us.  I did insert slender curved lines into sections.  I let colors “bleed” or flow  across seam lines to make connections.  I used raw edges to add texture  and I hand embroidered across parts of the surface to draw sections together.      Even Close up -road-less-traveledusing all thoughts techniques  I did not use all the techniques that she taught us.  As a teacher she has a lot to share and she does so very willingly.

I enjoyed using these

BS11Road-LT-clearthtones and I will continue to  pursue the techniques she taught.  I am still not happy with size of my slender inerts- so there is work  to do there.

 

 

Stone-Church clStone Church

I already mentioned the bit with the cemetary so I will not cover that again.  I added lots of machine lines on the roads as they were gravel and I remember how there seemed to be lots of “tracks” of the tries on them.   I remember too that Grandmother Ester liked to drive down the middle and only pulled the turquoise ford  over when she could see a car coming toward her.

Harmony     I am done with the assembly of the form of this quilt.  I decided to use the character that

Harmony cl represents Harmony for the central focus and so far I have just quilted around that shape to create the quilting pattern.   I want to fill in the character with black hand stitches/ patterns so it stand out.   But I have not come up with the correct stitch to do that job yet.   So I keep looking in books and paying attention to the world around me and hope that I will find inspiration.  Until then  the project will just hang in the studio awaiting the correct solution.

BS11Sketch-for-CNew Work      In Valeri’s Goodwins class she had a do a fabric ” sketches” of 4″ X 6″ before we started work.   So in keeping with using the best the teachers have to offer I made the sketch first.  This is the one I selected as my jumping off place.    I wanted to use the big printed flower I created a few weeks ago as a big part of this work.  NowBS11Crumasnthum I am in the process of pinning up parts that I think will work to do the job.  I have split the two flowers apart and added parts of a third to the design.  Very few parts are  connected or solid in its position at this point .  This is  fun but scary part of the process-  but I need the challenge.

 

 Daily News    This project is finally complete.  I have now Daily6sewn all the blocks closed and will continue to play with placement  for as long as the process interests me.   This will be the last post where the  project will appear because at this point all the finished units have been appeared at  least twice and some more times then that.   Daily-5I have enjoyed doing a daily sewing pieces and it is very true that the whole is made of of lots of little parts.  If I had started out with the intention of making  180  hand embroidered  blocks I do not think I would have done it.  But by making small manageable  units- it as a doable Daily-4task.    I have been encouraged by Susan to submit this idea as an airticle for Quilting Arts so that is my next project.

Keep Creating

Carol1Daily3

 

 

 

 

Daily1

Daily2

Abundance August 28, 2014

Blackeyed-SusansHello,

Today on my walk I was struck by the effects of sunshine and light.    It was not sunny today by I noticed how bright the Black Eyed Susan’s were at the entrance toMushrooms the condo complex down the road where there is full  sun shine.  By contrast the  there is so much shade in my yard that there are mushrooms growing along the drive on the north side of my house.  Granted they are quite small- only a out the size of a young child’s finger tip- but growing there none the less.   Sunshine never falls on this area of my yard, but Nature still  finds a way to put life into the space.  I am so lucky to live in such an abundant part of the world.   To add to the abundance of my visual world there is an  abundance of activities going on too.

 

prints Last week I spent three days exploring with Cheri and Terney printing techniques.  We started out intending to do wood cuts and we all did one, but soon found out that although the look is wonderful, the process does not allow for much cross grain cutting.    I think now that our tools needed a bit of sharpening  because we all became quite tired of all the effort necessary to do the work.   Cherri Cherri was the most successful and her’s are  the two  round ones on the pin wall.  Treney had never done Gelli prints before and the other prints   on the pin wall are her works in that area.     I decided to make  foam prints and got going creating graffiti stamps of everyone’s name.   I wrote the names out with a paint brush so I would have a flowing design and  then did a second copy on the paper side of the sticky fun foam.   I then carefully cut out the Grafittigraffiti with an exacto knife so I would have a positive and a negative copy of the works.    This picture shows Cherri’s name.   The black is the foam and it appears backward so when it is printed it will be forward.  The red graffiti of her name is a back view and it still has the paper on it.     Tierney printed her name on the Gelli plate fabric she created the first day.     I have not cut out my name yet because I made it too big for any of the Tierney-Grffitticlear plastic  that I mount these on.  I will have to save my take home container from Wegman’s salad Terney to accommodate them. We had a good time   working talking and laughing.  It is always more fun to explore with other folks. Prints-wood and foam

I made one last stamp  on Friday and printed it when I got home.  Last week when FAB went to Genny’s she had a wonderful kimona on the wall and I could not get the flower  image out of my head.  So I designed and created my own curcumthum. BA28stamp  I made one fourth of the blossom and then rotated it as I printed.  I did a second color on top just off center a little.  I look forward now to using that fabric in the near furture. Print  I found out that I really like the flexibility and speed of foam stamping too.

 

 

 

Then on Tue this week I went to the Kuhlman Foundation opening at Cornell University.     Seven BA28Foundatin-dress-2scholarships are given to students with a theme that they need to interpert.  This year the theme was Layers of Leather.     The approaches were all different and the students were there to BKuhlmanFoundatins-dress1explain their work.  It was a fascinating  event.

Then there were also some interesting things going on in a hall display as well.  The second mini show was of wearable art that was all lazer cut polor fleece.BA28Lazewr-cut-polar-fleeceBA28Lazewr-cutting-laceBA28More-lazercut-fleece   Valerie Goodwin my teacher at QBL had talked about this process in my class and I was delighted to see a second example of the process.

Elsie's-rock-clProgress Report:  Elsie’s Stone     I  am still working away on this Foundations piece.  I am  having a good time working with the close values in this stone  as well as playing with the strong textures.   Once I heard that one should make art to be seen on two levels- from a distance and then drawing the viewer in to take a second look.  I think this series does a good job doing just that.

 Necklace# 7    I still seem to flower-necklace-7find the necklace process that Noel started in me a few month ago working for me.  I think I am nearing the end of the necklace  obsession though.  I think I may apply this idea to a quilt top in the furture.  I  do have two necklaces that are started so I will finish then an then go forward with that idea.

 

NEW-WORKNew Work    I pulled out fabrics that I though I might use in a new project starting with one of the silks( the orange, white and black print)  that I had purchased from Ginny last week.    I think I will add some more browns to the mix and then begin to build the work.

BA28Daily's-2 Daily News  This project was at a stand still until the velcro arrived.  It is moving forward now and although I only seem to get five blocks done a day I am making progress.BA25Daily's1daily5Daily's

I hope all enjoy the  Labor Day holiday week end in their own fashion.

Keep CreatingDaily-3

Carol

Sharing August 21, 2014

Good Habits  21" 32"
Good Habits
21″ 32″

Hello,

As fall approaches I feel the need to “tidy the nest”  a bit.  As a result of that feeling, I have been sorting out old works and finding new homes for them.      So I took along this quilt when I went to the Dentist and it is now hanging in his office.  It took a min. before he saw the tooth brushes.   He was delighted and so was I as the work was only setting in a dark closet before and I think art should be out in the world.     I feel so fortunate that I can share in this fashion.

This week the FAB group BA21Nancy-Komonawent on a field trip too.    We visited the home studio of Ginny Spina  to see her silk /Komona collection.   It was wonderful.    Her home is beautiful and so are her gardens.    She sells on etsy at  www.silkhouse.etsy.com.    We got to see and handle the silk.  Nancy even tried on one of the Kimono’s that had arrived in the mail that morning.    Victoria and I  both purchased some of her scarps and now I have a new pile of fabrics and the  ideas are flowing.  Nancy purchased on of Ginny’s scarves BA21-Nancy-+-scarfand her custom designed pins that day as well.     We all had lots of fun and made new connections.silks

 

 

 

 

 

Progress Report: Ju Ju June

Ju Ju June  !8" X 30"  $190.oo
Ju Ju June
!8″ X 30″
$190.00

  As I predicted this quilt is now complete.   There is lots of experimentation in this piece.  This is my first attempt at using only canvas as the fabric base.  I also had full control of the colors and patters on that base and although I really enjoyed that aspect I do not feel like I explored it fully.  So I need to keep putting myself in that position and dealing with that challenge.   I also feel I need to do a similar project  again because the process is still very much a mimic of Katie Pasquini’s process.    I did enjoy mixing the metal with the gathered ribbon “flower” shapes and the beads.     BA21JuJuJune-cl1

 

 

 

 Rafter Room This quilt is now hanging overRafter-Room  the door to the rafter room were it will remain for it’s life time.   Because it is summer I am not aware of how many drafts it is stopping, but I imagine it will do the job in the fall and winter.    I really enjoyed  doing the free motion work on this project.     It was not only fun to trace the Rafter-Room-cl2shapes printed on the mud cloth it was fun to extend them out into the blank areas.   Then I went forward  to drawing and filling in the blank areas as well. Rafter-Room-cl1  I think  that I will look at pattern with a little bit of a different eye- and notice more details as a result of this  project.

I got to use up the end of one of the fabrics that I had created in Judy Langele’s class at QBL 2  three years ago too.( It is the bottom of this work with the blue gears and dark violet in it)

 

 

 

the road less-traveledThe Road Less Traveled    I am still doing the free motion work on this piece.   I am  trying to sort of soften the hard seam lines with the machine work.   I will add hand work as well.

 

 

 

Foundations XXI- Elise’s Rock/rock A Cape Cod Stone   This is a rock that  Elsie Dents gave me.   She has moved to Pennsylvania and we will miss her strong graphic bird based  work in the DIVA group.  She was cleaning and found this stone that she had collected on the beach at Cape  Cod and BA21Elsies-rock-qthought of me.  So she brought to me at the last meeting that she attended.  I like the strong lines across the  stained quarts  so I am using it as  my jumping off point for the next Foundations work.  I am still working with the out side shape of this quilt part as well as the light and dark on the surface.

Daily News  daily8 BA7daily-10 BA7ddaily9 The news goes on and on.  I am enjoying the playing part of the process now.  I thank Barb every time I finish a block because her way of completing the process is so much faster than mine.

Keep Creating

Carol