Embellishment – Page 2 – Artquiltmaker Blog

Tarts Embellishing

Last week (or so), I posted about some embellishing that I wanted to do. La, one of my FB readers and a friend, said that she needed to see the whole piece not just the details. Here is my initial attempts at embellishing. Check out the previous post if you want to see details.

After looking at this audition for a few days, I decided that there was too much going on in the Chocolate pot area (upper left), so no embellishing. At the same time I noticed that the tea kettle (lower left) was looking a little lonely.

I have some star buttons that I bought to make The Child some fun garment when he was tiny. It never got made and I have been looking for something to do with the buttons. Perhaps embellishing the Tarts will be their ultimate home?

I kind of like the 5 stars. I am liking having some of the embellishments cross the block boundaries.

I have tried a couple of different things with the grey tea pot. One is red circles. They are okay, but I think I like the hearts better. Still, as Lorraine Torrence says “make visual decisions visually.”

Since I had the stars out anyway, I thought I would try them. I thought they might work since the yellow could spark up the purple. Yellow is also opposite purple on the color wheel. No dice. There is something about that purple that the yellow could not help. I like that purple, but I am finding it hard to work with…today.

I took a picture of the whole thing with the red circles. The circles don’t work for me.

I like the hearts best. TFQ pointed out that they would be very difficult to applique’. I think I am up for the challenge. It would be better if I found some heart buttons, but I need some that aren’t too cutesy. I’ll look around.

Here is a full view with the 5 stars and the hearts back on the grey curvy tea pot (upper right).

Beach Town Update

We bought Tivo recently and it has revolutionized my world. Last night, while I was alone, I went downstairs to catch up on some shows, and brought Beach Town with me. With the show quilts off and the Flowering Snowball still in waiting mode, I thought it would be a good opportunity to make some progress on this piece. I noticed that it had been a long time since I posted a photo of it. You guys have never seen the quilting.

I really felt good working on this project. As I worked, I found that this project may not need as much embroidery/embellishing as House & Garden. I tried to figure out why. I don’t know for sure, but think that there is a lot more going on in this piece in terms of fabric – lots more commercial fabric with patterns on it. I also think that there are a lot more details, such as the flowers, the variety of beach houses, the tree, etc. I am going to do some embellishing on the pink striped cabana and add some windows and doors to the other houses. I am not sure what other type of Perl cotton embellishment this calls for.

I do feel like the piece needs some beads or sequins. I’ll have to think about that some more before I rush into anything. I dug out my Therese De Dillmont Complete Guide to Needlework (Amazon doesn’t have my exact edition and no photo, sorry), a reprint of ancient book that I got somewhere. I wanted to see what stitches they suggested so that I could, perhaps, learn some new stitches for this piece as well as Kissy Fish. I haven’t done much else on that front thus far.

The first task last night was to rip out some of the stitching I did when I was in SoCal at the beginning of September. I really shouldn’t stitch when I am upset, because I end up ripping it out anyway.

I ripped out the blue zigzag stitching around the windows of the green house. It looked too subtle for me. I also didn’t like the unevenness of it. I wanted it to stand out and be more of an element.

The zigzag stitching is still around the window, as you can see, but I took it outside of the window frame so it is much more wonky and ‘alive’. I think it looks better. I do want to make sure I stay away from the spooky house look.

I had embellished the sun with some of Laura Wasilowski’s hand dyed Perl cotton early on. I didn’t like the look, because the sun was just too puffy. I like my quilts densely quilted. I machine quilted the sun in a spiral, mimicking the handwork and carefully avoiding the existing Perl cotton. Quilting in a spiral isn’t for the faint of heart, but I took it slowly and am pleased with the results.

So, that is your Beach Town update for the duration. As usual, I would love to hear your thoughts.

Beach Town Progress

I spent 10 hours in my workroom on Sunday. I spent most of it machine quilting Beach Town. The piece is relatively small, so I was surprised that it took so much work. The really surprising thing is that I have more machine quilting to go!

It was surprising, because I thought I did most of the machine quilting during my last session. It turns out that I really wanted the quilting much closer together. I filled in some areas I already done. The new areas were quilted much closer together – only about 1-2 stitches apart.

The skinny tree needs some more stitching. It is raveling away and I’d like to save it before it goes completely.

I really hope you can see the machine quilting in this picture, because that is how it is almost all over the piece. There are a few sections left to do, but the bulk is done.

I was thinking, for future Pamela pieces, that I really needed to get the machine quilting done before I start in on the hand stitching. Not that the hand stitching hampered my machine quilting at all. It just makes better sense to do the machine work first and finish with the hand work.

New Stuff

I saw the cupcake fabric on the Camilla Knits blog (See also blogroll). It is right under the A in Happy. I immediately was inspired to make a bag. Who woldn’t laugh seeing someone carrying a cupcake bag around? Then, I thought it would be unprofessional. TFQ reminded me: WHO CARES??!! I bought it. I sent email, but eventually had to call Clementine’s Dry Goods to actually get the fabric in the mail. Lovely that I did, because I spoke with the most helpful/ customer service oriented person. She didn’t bat an eye when I said that I was calling about a fabric that I had seen in a picture on the Camilla Knits blog. The fabric arrived two days later (no, I didn’t pay for fast shipping) in the lovely little package the you see above with a free Kaffe dots FQ. I’ll have to go and buy stuff there more often.

I would actually like to go to the store and look around. The photos look like it is a wonderfully inviting place. I like the look of the high gloss shelves and I adore those Ladies. I hope to convince DH that I need them for the living room. You can stop laughing now.

I bought these ribbon at the EBHQ show from the Quilted Gypsy, down from the Seattle area. I love these ribbon and want to put them on a bag. I haven’t done it yet, obviously, so another thing to add to your Stay Tuned! pile.

Joyce at Quilting Adventures had a bag contest. I heard about it and sent off the French bag and the Alexander Henry bag. As TFQ predicted, the Alexander Henry bag won a judges choice prize. The prize was the above pack of three FQs (above). So nice! The QA staff got a great photo of it here. You can also see the other bags that won in QA’s Bag Contest Winners post. I am thrilled. What a shot in the arm for me doing a project series that is just kind of playing around.

My sister loves Paris. She went in April despite upcoming end of the semester papers and finals. Since she was there, I sent her to Le Rouvray and she picked out the above fabrics for me. I think they look very French apartment curtains-style.

Make CHEERFUL Quilts

EBHQ Show April 12-13, 2008

The East Bay Heritage Quilters held their bi-annual show last weekend at the Oakland Convention Center. The best part of the weekend was that TFQ came down to visit and go to the show with me. As usual, I took a lot of pictures. TFQ has a new camera, so her photos are included in the group, which I have added to Flickr.

The show was well hung with plenty of room to look and photograph. The lighting was excellent and while well attended, it wasn’t so crowded that we had to fight with people to see the quilts. The disappointing part of the show was the brown. The overall impression of the show was that there was a preponderance of quilts made from brown or beige or some equally depressing color. These were not the rich chocolate browns of dark chocolate, but the sad, world weary browns of a country/area that is sad.

The above quilt, by Carol Lee Blangsted, a former president of EBHQ, was probably my favorite in the show. The fabric didn’t make my heart sing, but the design was wonderful and the quilt was well executed. Ithought it was a good design for the lovely large print fabrics available now.

The shopping was ok, but there weren’t nearly enough vendors selling fabrics and there were barely any fabrics from any of the new groups that have come out recently. Their loss was Black Cat’s gain.

We spent a lot of time at Black Cat chatting and looking at the fabric. We didn’t get as much bang for our buck, but the fabric choices were fantastic.

I did buy a few fabrics at the show, and one booth, a friend of TFQ’s, had luscious ribbon (see right side of picture above). As you can see dots are still the rage in my life!

I was also on a button kick. The totes require a button and I have been at a loss to find the right ones for various projects. I stocked up at Britex on Friday and partook of one booth’s antique buttons at the show.

The above fabrics were a gift from TFQ. YAY!

Making Lemonade

When you have lemons, make lemonade.
As you know, the machine is gone and I can’t work on the Pineapples (Well, I suppose I could, but I want to be sure all of the problems are consistent by using the same machine). I have a Janome Jem, which I have only used a handful of times, so I have formulated a list of other things I can work on while giving the Jem a little workout. Here it is:

6 baby blankets: three friends/colleagues are having babies-2 each
Binding for Sharon’s quilt.
Binding for Serendipity Puzzle.
Gift bags: I have lots of fabric for bags, and Christmas is coming.
Cut out fabric for test blocks. I am going to start looking at new machines soon and I want to have some piecing in my own fabrics, which I can use to test the machines.
Wash and press new fabric.
Replenish Pineapple strips.

I also have a lot of hand work, which I can now work on since the thimble came back from vacation:

Pamela’s self portrait from June 2006
Pamela’s garden from June 2006
Pamela’s house and garden from May 2007
Kissy Fish

So now I am going to get off my duff (computer) and start some of these projects.

One good thing about the machine being gone is that I could get a good picture of the Pineapple blocks.

What to Do When you Win the Lottery

The lottery is up to $25 million, so I guess I didn’t win on last week’s ticket and will have to buy another one. If I had won, I would do the exact same thing that I did this weekend: sewing, visiting with quiltmaking friends, writing about quiltmaking and more sewing. I could have done without the proposal writing and the cold I have been fighting off, but you can’t have everything.

You may notice that these blocks look very like the blocks that JulieZS showed me on Wed. I looked the block up in Around the Block, a very useful book by Judy Hopkins from several years ago. I was sort of inspired to try the block, so I made the big one for Julie and the 2 6″ blocks for two different friendship quilts that someone requested. The small ones are smaller than I anticipated, but perhaps I will make a couple of more in order to fill in more space in those friendship quilts.

It was Mav-Week as well. In addition to seeing Julie, Mrs. K was in town, so we met over in Oakland and went to lunch at a nice little vegetarian place (excellent lemonade) down Washington and around the corner from the 10th Street convention center entrance. Mrs. K was visiting the Bead Expo. I thought about going, too, but decided to sew and try to shake the cold instead. Of course, she and Vicki had to show me their purchases and, among other things, Mrs. K had bought a strand of gorgeous millefiori (according to St. JCN) beads.

I had to have them. Mrs. K was kind enough to sell them to me and go back and get another set for herself. I am thrilled. Mrs. K puts them on the ends of the ties to her prayer boxes and I will have to find something equally fantastic to do with them. I hope you can get a sense of what they look like from the photos above.

As I mentioned, I also pressed the fabric that St. JCN sent me. I am quite proud of myself for not letting it languish for months unwashed and then pressing it right away. To add icing to the cake, I cut pieces out of the new fabrics as well: strips for the pineapple and corners for the Cross Block. Below are the corners for the Cross Blocks (perhaps called Royal Cross! More on THAT later) that I cut out of those fabrics.

Kissy Fish Brings Me Back

I am shocked that it has been a month since I have posted anything. No sewing has taken place except some beading that I did on Kissy Fish. I worked on it in the car as we drove, but the beading doesn’t show up very well in this photo. Here is a detail, but it is also difficult to see the beading and embroidery. I am off to a quilt show in Seattle this weekend and will hopefully have a cleaner (more sewing machine friendly!) house and lots of inspiration when I return.

Fabric Painting

After the CQFA Steering Committee meeting at KAM’s house, we did fabric painting. KAM organized the whole thing and it was a nice ending to the meeting.

This is my first attempt:
After my first attempt, we watched a five (or so) minute segment of Simply Quilts. It was good to watch after, because I wasn’t too influenced by the demonstrator.

Here is the piece that I finished after we watched the segment.

One thing I got out of the segment is that simple shapes seem to be better, so I worked on this one:

My final piece is the best one IMO.

It was GREAT not to have to do any organization for the project but to just start painting on fabric. KAM was so generous with her paint, fabric, etc. It was wonderful. As you may know, I am not a big fan of messy work. I did enjoy doing this project as I could just play and not worry about making a masterpiece.

I plan to try the presentor’s idea of doing some curved strip piecing through the middle of my piece. I don’t want to make these the center of a piece. I just don’t think they could stand up to the scrutiny.

DCM and I discussed not having enough time to just play and wreck fabric pieces. We are both having a hard time getting over the feeling that each piece we make must be perfect.

A topic for another day….

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