Flight of Dragons

Finally finished the challenge for this month. With the 6" x 12" size I have been limiting myself to, I could only do a sort of half radial. I started with the dragons, thinking of a similar thing to the British Red Arrows flight team.

I decided to use the elements for the colours of nature. But I also included a black and white dragon which I am calling the element of Word. So, from right to left I have water, fire, word, earth, sky. They are all made from hand dyed silks, except the black and white one, which is from a black and white silk tie. They all have a ball of fire in front of them. This is similar to the oriental dragons chasing a pearl. But you can decide if they are chasing it or if it comes from them. Because I fused the dragons on, the thin silk they are made of actually darkened a bit. If I made something similar larger, I would use brighter colours for the dragons. At the end, I tried to draw out the brighter colours a bit with a yellow border that has a bit of green paintstick highlights.

The dragons on their own were not enough, so it sat a while. Finally, after much consideration, I decided to do clouds. I realised the best way would be to stitch synthetic organza and then cut it back with the soldering iron.

This piece is really something I think has been a good trial for attempting to do in a larger size at sometime. It would definitely work better if I didn't have to cram it into a small area.

Golden Ferns and Bouncing Limes by Ann

I've been having more fun printmaking. I used a fern and a dried lime . For medium I used Lumiere fabric paints on cotton fabrics. The ferns are stitched with Sulky Metallic Gold. All other stitching is black cotton. The colors are those that would be found in a gem show.I'm much happier with the results than when I used the doily. I also like making these small things because they are fast. Of course the part that seems to take me forever is the finishing. I'm leaning toward doing some kind of 'rough' finish in the future. Not sure what it will be. Ideas always welcome.

For printing with the lime half, I first tried dabbing the paint on the lime, wrapping fabric around and rubbing with my finger to make the print. The better method for me was to wrap the fabric around the lime, dip my finger in the paint and then rub over the lime to make the print. I waited between each print for the paint to dry. I used a different color for each individual lime print. The limes have symmetry in themselves, but not of course in this print.

For the fern prints, my method was to put some paint on the fern with a brush, move the 'painted fern' onto a clean sheet of paper, place fabric over and then transfer the color using a brayer. I let each one dry before putting on the next fern point in the radial pattern. After I was finished, someone told me it is better to use the back side of the fern or leaf. I'll try that the next time. Using the Lumiere yielded many different shades although I only used one color for this print.

Wishing you JOY on your Journey,

Ann

www.designerann.blogspot.com/

Rhoda Seeds of Change

Well...in my busyness I deleted the whole post rather than the just the picture.
So here is a new picture, you can enlarge it and see the faces.
Cynthia and Wendy thanks for your comments.
"Thanks for the wonderful challenge Wendy.
Mine is definitely a work in progress,
Continuing with my 'woman' theme, this time I have a woman and child, something
I've been meaning to do for awhile.
I did the radial symmetry background using paperpieceing. I used colors of the
sky and water.Unfortunately it looks quite grey in the photo.
The mother and child are done in bright nature colors, colors of hope. The hand
is dropping some seeds, in hope of change. I painted the faces using Tsukineko
ink. No thread painting yet, so it is very much a work in progress. I will post
again when it is completed."
Here is a photo of the finished piece. I added a water pump and plants. I have to say the whole piece evolved with me thinking about the hungry children in the world.
So the seeds are; the child, the seeds and water. A helping hand to help those in need.
Great challenge, even though it took me a long time to finish it :)
Rhoda

Ch 35 - Peacock

I had a hard time deciding what to do for radial symmetry until I saw a neighbor's peacock disappearing in the bushes alongside the road. This piece is 9 x 11 1/2 inches. The background is hand dyed fabric, and other fabrics are both hand painted and commercial. This peacock is bejewelled with sequins and beads,

as well as thread painting. The black outlines and feather stems are heavy black "Levi" thread. Thank you Wendy for this challenge. Linda Mac in WY

Too Many Tomatoes

In keeping with my theme, "Can I Eat It?', and in keeping with the "I can never seem to finish on time" problem, here is my addition to the current challenge. Radial symmetry presented a problem for me in that I coud not for the life of me figure out how to do a representation of something to eat. That is, until I started cutting vegetables for my husband's salad. And there it was - radial symmetery inside the tomato! I used hand dyed fabric, a bit of a Fossil Fern fabric, and the wrong side of an old calico. Now the only thing left to do with this little quilt is a bit of beading for the seeds.

Spinning Out of Control

I started this challenge right away, doing a couple of small sketches that I liked. I picked one and fussed with choosing fabric for it, couldn't come up with anything that worked, so dropped and switched to another sketch. Then I spent last Friday morning procrastinating by vacuuming, dusting and rearranging bookshelves! Finally that afternoon, I picked my fabric and got started. I was really liking the way it developed, so I took my time finishing the design and getting the quilting done. So no apologies for being late-this one just had its own schedule.

My series is what happened in my life in the month-and at first I thought of this as the fireworks for July 4th. Then it hit me that it was a perfect visualization of the health problem that hit in July (which seems to be on the mend fortunately). I set the main element off center-going off the side and top and called it "Spinning Out of Control".

Nancy Schlegel

Galapagos Stars

I combined two photos from our Galapagos diving trip. The red/orange starfish are Panamic Cushions and the yellow is a Chocolate Chip Star. I sponge painted over a blue fabric for the background. The dimensional corals are thread tangles from washing frayed, dyed fabrics. The quilt is bound in yarn and embellished with a variety of beads. Size: 10 X 14

Hulk Haiku

Here is the 3rd in my Haiku series. "Hulk" which is the common name of this aster. It is still unfinished, needs quilting, binding, and the Haiku put on. Not sure how I am going to do that yet, may put them on a banner, or embroider them, haven't decided. Right now I just added them using the text feature :-)
I found a silk plant somebody was tossing so I brought it home and pulled all the leaves off from the plastic veins. I knew I would use them for something and this was perfect. Didn't have enough for a whole flower, only a half, but didn't like it so went with 1/4. They are attached with invisible thread and I purposely left wrinkles and bumps for texture.
The white part of the flower is 2 layers of batting, which I attached with white embroidery floss. I went over the edges to give it more of a flower appearance instead of a circle. On top of that is a small arc of 2 layers of batting which I painted yellow, again attaching with yellow embroidery floss and doing the same extended stitching. Throughout the top white and yellow areas I scattered some yellow french knots and the bottom white has echo quilting.
I put a detail photo of the center too. I wanted it too look 3D like the leaves and to have a puffy center, which I got :-)
I did this all by hand in one day, just got too hectic around here for me to finish it in time.
My nature colors are pretty obvious :-)
Oh, because I wanted to use the leaves as flower petal, I did a search for green petaled flowers which is how I found this flower. It was the only one that fit my vision. I think I have met the challenge, although after seeing what every one else did I am not sure..LOL
This is 18"wide x 20" long

Wildwood (extracts from Artists Book)

I know this is a slight cheat - I have been making these pages for several months now, completing an exhibit for the UK's Festival of Quilts. Had decided to shift my theme to woodland, and it occurred to me that the one I was finishing off (the dormouse below) met the challenge requirements, as did the berries and ramsons (wild garlic) pages.

As these pages are tiny (6" squares) I've included the three of them. They are translucent (like woodland) so back-to-back pages have to have mirror outlines but different images (the two above are back to back) which has been a little tricky to say the least.

Each side of the page begins with silk-dyed pelmet vilene (pellon), the design cut out with a scalpel, then the whole page covered in hand-dyed silk organza and stitched. The two sides are sandwiched together with silk tulle net in the centre, then quilted and partially cut back to the net and finally satin-stitched round the edge. There are sixteen double-sided pages in all, each containing different woodland plants and creatures.

Look Up!

The canyons of the Southwest have long served as inspiration for my quilts. One morning, I woke up wondering what it would look like if I was at the bottom of the slot canyons watching the sun rise or set. I quick grabbed a post it on the bedside table and sketched this .... The sun rises at the bottom and is sending light over the canyon walls and the diffused light brings out the colors in the rocks.

Easy to find the rock colors in my stash of batiks, but what to do about the blue? So last Sunday, before the monsoons rolled in, I was out on the deck sun painting the blue so I could get the right variegation for the sky. I'm very happy with how that came out. There are some sparkles in there too!

My intention was to have all 16 points come together in the center (which is why I asked Rhoda about hers!), so I foundation pieced this, but no matter what I did (4 attempts and lots of frayed PFD later), I gave up and cut out the center, machine appliqueing the circle to a narrow margin (and oh I forgot to take out the freezer paper circle, so its a little crunchy there) and shifting the focal point even more. Happy accident? I'm not sure yet.

Very simple straight line quilting with monofilament to accentuate the lines It will be bound (but not til Sunday cuz I teach tomorrow).... a piped binding with a light inner piping and darker outer binding.

Comments of course are welcome. And thanks to you all for some great quilts! Y'all really pulled out the stops for this one!

Hawaiian Kaleidoscope by Cynthia Ann Morgan

Here's my piece for the Radial Symmetry challenge. I started with 2 Hawaiian applique blocks that I did ages ago before I lost interest in hand applique. I "deconstructed" them by inserting strips, slicing up, and adding fused applique parts. Then quilted it to death. Usually I plan out my design, but this one...not at all. So that spontaneity was very much fun! The result reminds me of looking into a Kaleidoscope. Comments and greetings welcome!

Cynthia

PS...this is what one of the blocks looked like before deconstruction ----->

Fan on the Grass

This is not finished due to several complications (none of them quilty). I believe it follows the radial symmetry rule, the color range suggested, and also stays with my theme of vegetation. The fan has been appliqued to the background. It needs to be sandwiched and quilted. It will be done sometime!!

Pink Coreopsis

I seem to have a new series - flowers - going now. This is taken from a photo that I took of a pink coreopsis growing in our garden. I used a machine reverse applique technique from Carol Miller's class at QuiltNebraska last weekend. I layered the green, the pink, batting, and a back, and drew the flower on the green fabric. Then I sewed on the drawn lines and cut out the flower shapes, leaving a raw-edge applique. Both the pink and the blue-green are hand-dyed fabrics. I added thread-painting and quilting, and beads for the center. Then I couched a double strand of fuzzy yard around the edges. The size is 11" x 11".

I like the technique - I'm not sure this was the best subject for it. As always, all critiques are appreciated.

One day later - I "uncentered" the flower, and I didn't have a bee, but I added a ladybug. Hope that makes it better.

Rose - 16" x 16"

This is as far as I can get before this weeks challenge is due tomorrow. I have really enjoyed working on this. This work is based on a photo I took about a month ago. I converted the picture to black and white, enlarged it to 16", printed on to paper, traced the outline of the rose and surrounding leaves with pencil on to white PFD fabric, stitched the outline in black thread, painted the color on using Fabrico pens. (I seem to have a fascination with trying different methods of applying color over the past month.) The composition is radial, but not too symmetric. The quilting that remains to be done will be more lines of black outline.

I like the imperfection of the color application in this piece. Actually, I always like the imperfection in the hand application of color to fabric. However, am wondering if others perceive it as careless or somehow insufficient. Would appreciate honest feedback so that I can either stand tall around my few perfectionist friends or decide to put more effort into getting closer to perfect.

Thanks so much for any feedback.

Betty Warner

La Mer/ Beyond the Sea

“La Mer/Beyond the Sea”

This quilt was inspired by Judy Dale’s Book Curves in Motion. Rather than make a round piece, I extended the wedges to form a square, so each wedge is a little different. Freezer paper templates were made for each element in the wedge, and then pieces were cut and fused to a background fabric. After all the wedges were joined, I top stitched the design, and then quilted the piece. Then the piece was trimmed to square up the edges. It reminds me of the ocean and the restless waves and Frank Sinatra’s song “La Mer” keeps flowing through my head. I might try this again where I mirror the design on every other wedge to make a kaleidoscope. Thank you Wendy for a terrific challenge. Comments are appreciated.

Hi-I'm a new member and I don't know if I'm doing this posting properly. I was Definitely challenged by this first try since I decided to try a lot of techniques I have not used much. The underlying photo is from a nature photography course--messing with the lens with slow setting (it's a flower). Then I printed on cotton and on organza and stamped a gold spiral in between the layers. I think this got lost. I used bobbin work for some of the free motion and also played with my new free motion couching foot. I look forward to any feedback. I'm not crazy about it, but I did learn some things. Thanks for the challenge!
Denny Webster

Snow in Del Mar

My challenge #35, Snow in Del Mar, is in the yahoo album and on the blog.

I cut the snowflakes out of sheer crystaline, metalic netting, holographic , and sparkle cotton. The small flakes are beaded. The background is a metalic knit.

My colors of nature are deep midnight blue and white.

19"x23"

This was a really fun one...thanks Wendy!

Comments as always are appreciated :-)

Cherie

Tidepools and Kelp Beds/ and ...........

This is another piece I had started for this challenge. Me and 'radials' don't get along very well, so this is as close as I can get without having to hang on to my chair.
My 'grapes' are ripening quickly in this hot 'sun', and the roses are showing new 'green' growth... the colors of my summer. To me it looks like hummingbird wings, or spinning wine glasses...
Anyway, Wendy, thank you for pushing the envelope with me!







This is a beach scene, lowest tide and a hot summer day....the kind of day when
the atmosphere delineates the earth from the sky.... These are the most incredible days on the ocean's coast , but few and
far between, because... literally, after a day like this the fog starts to roll
in.
I think I went in this direction, thinking more 'summer'... and the 'radial' being the intensely hot burning sun.

Several techniques and media are used here.... I started with a white silk, spray painted, torn into lengths, woven together,then layered with a white scrim,silk throwsters waste, silk tops [cultivated mulberry silk], hand-dyed scrim for the logs ,hand-dyed yarn for the kelp, the sun is angelina fibre, crystal organza islands in the distance and there is a tulle overlay. Hand stitches, machine stitches and quilting add details. Done on batting only then positioned onto a quilt sandwich and stitched down using a blanket stitch all round.

It is probably not quite what Wendy had in mind.. but nonetheless I look forward to your comments.

Succulent VII & VIII

I got two 5 x 7 pieces out of this project instead of the one I was planning. I am looking for a good source for pre-cut double mats for framing.

Radial symmetry wasn't a stretch for me since my current series is succulents, and most of my current subject matter seems to have radial symmetry already.

I have shied away from succulents with lots of tiny leaves until now. But his round succulent seemed perfect for this month's challenge. I approached this one a bit differently. I started with an underpainting which I new would contrast well with the final image. And then I didn't do my usual heavy quilting inside each leaf, but just outline stitched each.

I have in progress photos of this piece on my blog http://lindasartjournal.blogspot.com/

Snail Steps

I have been so busy this summer that I just knew I wouldn't have time to participate in the challenges for a few months. Then this challenge was posted and the very first night I dreamt about the quilt I wanted to make. I love traditional quilt blocks and "Snail's Trail" has always been one of my favorites. I decided to take the old classic and give it some modern curves with the result above which I am calling "Snail Steps". I enjoyed making this piece so much and love the way the colors flow. I really think I will have to spend some time in the studio working on my hand dyes so I can do a bed sized quilt using this pattern. The finished piece is 16" x 16".