Medallion Quilt-Along Center

Stash reduction is a worthy goal and when I saw the opportunity to reduce my stash while at the same time create a beautiful quilt I jumped on it! Doesn’t my center medallion look great? It’s paper pieced from Carol Doak pattern 276. Funny thing happened while making this block — apparently I don’t know that 3 + 3 = 6 and that 6 + 6 = 12 because I made this and then was surprised that it didn’t measure 12 inches finished. Oh well it can become my label and it was good practice for paper piecing and color placement. I did use some of my “what was I thinking?” fabrics and they should look good for the next round which Anita of Bloomin Workshop has ready.

Father’s Day Gifts

I always have trouble finding just the right gift for my hubby, but this time I think I’ve found the ideal present. As a lifelong lover of the outdoors and avid fisherman how could he not like this salmon? It’s so easy to make and I fussy cut the batik fabric to mimic the shapes within the pattern. You can click on the photo to see what I mean. This is a www.quiltswithatwist.com pattern. I just traced the salmon onto fusible web, cut out all the designated pieces and then fused it to the black background fabric. My next step will be to do echo quilting and then make it into a pillow for him. This salmon is the second pattern I’ve made that Lisa Moore designed.

The first Quilts With a Twist pattern I attempted is her Orcas. Here is a picture of the Orcas that I need to quilt up and they will be ready to display. The Orcas have one extra step — the white fabric is cut and fused first, then the black is fused over that. This picture should clarify the process:

More Mermaids

The mermaids fishtails looked to shiny to me so I experimented by  painting on scraps of fishtail fabric ( its a metallic knit stablized on freezer paper for these trials — on steam-a-seam 2 for the quilt)  here’s a before of this shiny stuff;

For these trials I assembled Shiva Paint Sticks, Jelly Roll pens, Fabric Mate Markers and Sharpie fine points.

I tried  a purple and green Fabric mate  and  purple, green and blue jelly roll inks.  This next picture shows the Sharpie Fine Point colors of green, purple dark blue and turqoise.

And lastly the Shiva paintsticks:  The top color is from directly applying the stick to the fabric, the next was applied with a sponge brush the third was from blending directly onto the fabric and the  bottom is from blending purple,green and blue on a scrap of parchment paper and then blending it with the sponge brush and applying it with the brush.

I think that last blend is great colorwise. 

Conclusion:  I wanted coverage that still allowed some shine through and also highlighted the scaley look of this fabric. 

Fabricmate:  some shine,  good texture, colors are too neon for this application

Jelly Roll Pens: dull colorations, not much texture shows through, a bit of shine

Sharpie Fine Point: Deep colors but almost no shine or texture

Shiva Paint Sticks: Direct application yielded almost the same results as Sharpie, but when the sticks were blended on the parchment and then sponge brushed onto the fabric — great result: good color, texture and shine.  We have a winner!

So now I tried it on a mockup of a mermaid tail:

 

Looks pretty good, but I want it to vary from light at the belly region to darker at the fins, so I added som green FabricMate to the fin section and a bit more blended blue/green shiva stick to the mid section. Can you tell a difference? I don’t think the photo does it justice.

 

More Funky Women

Carol Ann generously sent me more pics of Funky Women.  She’s been busy designing more of these fun gals.  They are so sassy.  I plan on doing an OZ themed batch of them when I get finished with some of my WIPs.

Blue Girl African Girl

Miss Purplewitchie woman

wow, Carol Ann you’re going to have fun embellishing these!

Gig Harbor Quilt Festival Quilt (WIP)

I’m working on a wallhanging quilt to donate for auction at the Gig Harbor Quilt Festival later this summer.  The theme is “Fishing For a Cure” and the money raised goes to fighting breast cancer.  One of my favorite aunts died from breast cancer, this was back in the mid 60s and I still vividly remember Lily showing my mother and me her scars and Lily saying the radiation made her sicker than the cancer.  As they say (who the all knowing “they” are — go figure) she fought the good fight.  In any case, the money raised goes to a good cause and I want to make something that will fetch a good amount of change and that my Mom and Lily would like.  They were incredibly talented women — Lily was a woodworker who specialized in miniatures and western themed items like covered wagons.  My mother did oils and mozaics.  As soon as I heard the theme  for the auction an  image of a mermaid flashed through my mind.   Seated on a rock amidst waves she summoned  the other sea creatures bearing curative items.  My designs gone through many permutations of that theme to this one that I’ve finally settled upon:  2 mermaids swimming from the ocean depths toward the surface.  They are hauling a net full of curative items.  I think I’ll weave the net from their hair.   Here are some preliminary pics.  I just can’t say enough nice things about Steam -a – seam 2 Lite.  I’ve got it fused to the back of the mermaids and  it is pressure sensitive which means I can just gently place them anywhere on the quilt and they stick (like colorforms from childhood).  They don’t become permanent until ironed in place. (FYI — Steam a Seam 2 Lite is only semi permanent, it needs to be sewn).  I’ve already quilted the ocean water with 3 different metallic threads.  I think I’m in love with Superior threads “glitter” thread, it went through my Ellageo like butter. 

This is my drawing of a mermaid — it comes from a Dover publication (copyright free images — great source)

Here are some of my mermaidish fabrics

And here is a fused mermaid And here are the 2 of them swimming in the ocean. 

They are like colorforms, so I’m going to fiddle around with their positioning, but this gives you an idea of what I’m doing so far.