My Alabama Home

This is something I've been thinking of doing for a long time. Thank you, Roberta, for the push.

This is my house - the one I've waited all my life to have.

For anyone who is geographically challenged (like I am) I used a map of Alabama as a pattern for the background.

Portals

I love the idea of portals. (Love Esterita's work) we often visit ruined castles, abbeys and churches. I have loads of photos, but I have had this one from a magazine up on my wall for ages, wanting to do something with it.

I used paper solvy to print my sketch and then thread painted over it. It is meant to dissolve easily. But I found it difficult to get rid of it under the dense stitching. When it dries, it dries white again. The work looked pretty good yesterday in time for the deadline! But the white bits bothered me. So, since I had stitched it onto tea-dyed linen, I thought I would use a teabag to put a bit more tea on, hoping to colour the white bits of paper.

Well, that was a mistake, as it turned everything VERY dark, and I lost any definition at all in the distance. So, this afternoon, I have reworked more threads into the background, and brought it back to where I can cope with it! The actual piece is a bit browner than this photo shows, and the whole thing blends better, but the photo does show the depth.

In order to create the depth, I tried using lighter threads in the background and darker in the foreground. Using principles suggested in the link to the essay. I also used stronger definition in the foreground...often using 3 or 4 threads in the needle to get the mixture of colours and strength of line.

thanks for any comments.

Pink House

This quilt might fall into a "cheater"...I started with a UFO. When we were on a cruise...while visiting Dominica.. I took a photo on a moving bus thru the window of the pink house. I found the pink leaves on another Island ..St Lucia..with the plan for a Architecture quilt. I enlarged the photo and printed 4 parts on 8 1/2x 11 fabric sheets and sewed the parts together. And added the pink borders...pressed and my steam iron dripped water spots on the printed house.....so into the UFO pile it went..... With the announcement of Architecure... a rescue plan came with crayons and shiva paint sticks and quilting with different colors of verigated threads. I'm late posting as I did not have my photo or my statement ready before we went out of town for a few days...

Orange House, 25 1/2" x 18 1/2"

• 

Architecture is not my thing! Nevertheless, here is my attempt. I pulled in what I learned years ago of perspective and vanishing points. I built the house with woven strips, sewing them down with satin stitching which got thinner with distance, and for the vertical stitching, going from black to dark gray to lighter grays.

My thought is that I have mixed up surrealistic elements with more natural ones, and it doesn't work as well as I would like.

Passageways by Linda Cline

12 x 12
fused cotton, paint

I had a couple of ideas for the challenge last week that I sketched out. They seemed like they would take more time than I had to do them in, so I sat on the floor against the front door yesterday and sketched the hallway. I made it simpler by just sketching the walls; eliminated the doors and all the stuff.

Scanned the sketch into the computer and then drew on top using straight lines. Added a vanishing point to check and fix the perspective.

I took some artistic license before I made the quilt and moved a wall slightly and rounded the tops of the doors. Took even more liberties with the colors. I thought I would make the whole quilt in warm neutrals. But lots of color snuck in before I was done. I used a piece of fabric that I had used as a paint rag for a lot of it, and I added more paint after the quilt was fused together. I didn’t think architecture was my thing, and didn’t think I was going to like it after I had made my sketch, but decided to go with it anyway. I kind of like how it turned out.

The House That Booke Built

This was the hardest challenge for me as yet! It litteraly took me the full week working all day every day to get it done.

The house is the home my mother in law was born in, and her father who was always just called "Booke" (last name) built the house in 1905. My husband and I went to see it in Utah a few years ago and took this picture. His Mom said it has hardly changed at all in all these years.

The house is fused raw edged applique. The large trees' trunk is painted with expanda paint, puffed with a hot gun then painted. The leaves are created with fabric "confetti" of cotton and organzas, then quilted down with very fine black tulle.

The bushes and orange tree are wool roving, stitched with perle cotton, or machine quilted. The cypress tree is rusched netting.

I hope I fulfilled the assignment of depth.

Comments and critiques are gratefully accepted as usual!

Cherie

Challenge 13 - done!

Whew! I can't believe I made it. There were several times when I just wanted to give up and throw it in the trash. If "fast" is the operative word here, then I will have to learn to simplify.

I have always loved going downtown and walking among the skyscrapers. When you look to the sky, the shapes are amazing! I discovered this view standing at my own front door. I have so many trees around my house that this is one of the few places I can stand and actually see the sky.

I learned a lot here. One is that you don't need to recreate each and every piece. The other is the quality of the thread you are using is very important when doing a lot of weird piecing.

Enjoy!

Karen Markley

Rhoda...challenge 1

Here is a close up of the house, fence etc.

Rhoda...challenge 1

Here is my attempt at the first challenge, and my first challenge.
The house is one similiar to what my husband was raised in.
The house is done on muslin, lot's of stitching and Shiva Oil Sticks.
This was fun.

Kathy Lichtendahl

Here is the image of my first quilt as part of the FFFC group. It is called "Inside Out" and it is a depiction of our back patio that stretches from the rear wall of our house to a natural sandstone cliff where we have planted a small flower garden. We use it as an extension of our living quarters for at least seven months of the year.
I had to squeeze the construction of this piece into the middle of a very busy week. There are certainly things I would do differently if I had more time!

Haunted House?

I love the architecture theme of this challenge, and what everyone has done with it. For some reason, I felt like piecing (not that there's anything wrong with that), so I decided to try to create some abstract "portal" blocks out of batiks, using value change to create the effect of depth.

I used a takeoff of a crazy log cabin block, and just started sewing blocks with no preconceived idea of what size they should be or anything. The first one came out giant sized (as you can see compared to the others). I then just kept making blocks until I got tired of them, and sliced them up until I could piece them together into this one piece. It is layered with peltex as batting so hopefully the weird shape will hold together, and machine quilted with King Tut.

I like the way it ended up looking sort of like a haunted house, but I don't think there is enough value contrast to create the depth effect. I would appreciate any feedback. Thanks for another great challenge.

Brenda Jennings

Child's Town

The inspiration for this quilt was finding a drawing of a house thatI had made at age 5 -plus the final instruction for the challenge to have fun! I tried to make the houses, trees, hills and car have a childlike and spontaneous look. All parts of the quilt are fused and then machine quilted. I'm not sure how it works design wise, but I do think it shows depth in several ways. Let me know if gives you as much fun as I had creating it.

I tried unsuccessfully to add the drawing I made at age 5-the quilt was not an exact replica but I used the curtains at the windows, the colorful roof and the sun in the quilt.
Nancy Schlegel

Grant House

This is the house.

In my dreams..... this is a house in Portland, Ore. In Oct. 1977 [ this exact time of the year] my aunt and I visited Portland for some shopping. We arrived late Sunday afternoon, and decided to drive around and get a feel for the community. We drove past this house, I LOVED it, so stopped and took a picture. I have carried that picture around for 30yrs. When I saw the Challenge, my mind went immediately to that picture, here it is, with some added embellishments. I was trying real hard on depth, so I do look forward to your comments.

Size is 11.5 x 11.5

Happy Childhood Summer Home

The first image that popped into my head was the tent that my family camped in when I was a small child. Such good memories and when we weren't travelling, our parents let us pitch the tent in the backyard and my brother and I spent a good deal of the summer there. Architecture? Well, it was our summer home anyway. :)

The quilt is about 9" x 10-1/2", hand appliqueed, hand embroidered, hand quilted - and some of the embroidery was added after layering so it works as quilting as well. Lately, I've been feeling confined by my usual tedious approach so I tried to be very loose and free with this and it was a lot of fun.

Also, I read the recommended essay on depth and realized I always work with a light foreground working back to a dark background. It just seems to happen. So, this time, I tried to do the opposite. Dark foreground fading into the background. Not sure if I succeeded but it was fun. I think that I may do some more small pieces in the same free spirit. It was very liberating.

Cheryl

Stairs down to My Nightmares

I forgot the photo, sorry.

Anna Koziol

Stairs down to my Nightmare

I printed one of my photos to fabric then used fabric paint and 5 different shades of grey thread to provide extra details and depth.
The black fabric surrounding the stairs is fabric which i had previously discharge dyed. Grey fabric paint was used to provide interest.
Holographic threads in silver, black and red were used to add some lines for interest.
The quilt measures 12" x 12" and was bound with red cotton net.
Whilst i enjoyed the process i am unsure about the final result.

Seattle Sunrise

Sometimes you don't really read the challenge - you go forth - then you re-read the challenge and realized depth - oh well.

Architectural? So not my thing - but I had just witnessed a beautiful red sunrise and thought this would be perfect for the challenge. So a very not realistic city scape but fun to do. More beading than I would usually do for this challenge - I have blisters on my finger from the pearl cotton ridges on Mount Rainer. Overall it captures the beauty of a red sunrise. I call this Seattle Sunrise - measuring 8 x 18.

Lisa
In Rainy Seattle

Treetop Fantasy

Here's my little quilt (about 14 x 14") for Challenge 13. It's made with hand dyed fabrics and a few touches of commercial prints (dots...I just love them) using fused raw edge applique and lots of quilting in a leaf pattern. I had a bit of trouble with the perspective, but I think this is passable.

It's a treehouse in case it's not obvious to anyone but me!

Comments/suggestions/greetings welcome.

Cynthia

City Scape - Debbie Krueger

City Scape
18" X 13"
Reverse Applique
Fused Applique

All right, folks! I need some input here. I was totally going to skip this challenge and make up some foolish excuse, but then I realize that that defeats my reason for joining the challenge in the first place.

So, this is far from finished, and we'll see how far I get by Saturday, but I'm wondering if others see what I'm going for....I'm a total city girl, so my "home" will always be in a city. I think I've got the general idea of a near building and far buildings, but am curious if others see it. And yes, the buildings are supposed to be off kilter--kind of like the quilter. :)

Thanks for any ideas you may have--though I might not be able to use them here, I'll certainly keep them in mind for future projects.

Debbie Krueger, Waukesha, WI

Roanoke Cottage

9" x 12"
Thread-Painting

Snippets

Watercolor crayons

Pigma pen

I based this quilt on a picture of one of my favorite homes. The bushes and flowers were thread-painted on water soluble paper and tulle. The grass was added after I put together the quilt sandwich in an attempt to add depth. The leaves on the trees are snippets of fused fabric. I used watercolor crayons to add some shadows where the chimney steps back from the entryway. And then used a black pigma pen to draw bricks around the door and add detail to the birch tree. As always, I welcome any comments. Thanks for looking.

If These Walls Could Talk.... Ann Morrell

Here is my first challenge. I had lots of fun doing it. I used a technique that I had been wanting to do for awhile. I took two photos, merged them together, turn them into a painting, printed it out on cloth and then thread painted it. I also used my Embellisher and watercolor crayons.




I live in a small little beach community called Grayton Beach. I use to come here as a child, and was lucky enough to return after retiring and make my home here. Our community is made up of million dollar beach homes, and smaller beach cabins that have been here for years. My beach "shack" actually exists and has been here for over 87 years. It just got a new tin roof. It is not on the beach so I "picked it up" and moved it over to a sand dune over looking our beautiful beach to make my piece. Can you imagine the stories this house could tell if the walls could talk.


Here are the two photos that were merged for my piece.

ren's window

ok, here it is. after detroit this morning, for which I left yesterday, I am now in kentucky and won't see my sewing machine for several weeks. this thing isn't yet quilted or embellished; I expect to have trees and fences going up the hills and a flower box below the window, maybe. I think my greens are too close in tone, but that could be remedied with stitching. anyway, it's now out there. I'm looking forward to critiques!

Challenge 13

Challenge #13 (2nd Year Challenge # 1) - Friday, 28 September 2007

Guest Hostess – Roberta Ranney

Theme or Technique - Architecture

Create a quilt representing your house or another house or building that
made an impression on you. The house may be the house of your dreams (or
nightmares). Your quilt may be realistic or abstract.

Design Concept - Depth
Some of the ways to create depth in your work are (1) use of shadows, (2)
lines converging in the distance, (3) elements decreasing in size in the
distance or (4) use of color to bring some elements closer and others to
recede.

Discussion - The following is included for informational purposes only:

An essay on depth:

http://www.blehert.com/essays/3dimension.html

Examples of quilts with houses/architecture:

http://www.quiltedartworks.com/

http://www.esteritaaustin.com/gallerymain.htm

http://www.auburn.edu/~garmego/arch_quilts.html

http://www.debanderson.net/Pages/Gallery3.html

http://www.debanderson.net/Pages/Gallery4.html


Due - Saturday, Noon EST, 6 October 2007 (but late postings are accepted)

One final requirement - HAVE FUN WITH THIS!

FYI: Your challenge piece could fit the call for entries for the 2009 Quilting Arts Magazine Calendar! The size must be 12” x 12" and the piece must have used some type of embellishment or surface design. Check out the details HERE!

Poppies

My newly up-dated, up-embellished, up-beaded piece.

Personally, I think it looks good. But I need your comments.

I would like to submit this to a juried show. Yes, I like it that much.

With your help, I think it hasa chance.

Carole

The Calm of Night

Only two weeks late...not too bad...LOL

This little piece (11x15 including borders) was done needle felting by hand, not machine.

I didn't draw any pattern or sketch, just went for it putting down whatever felt good.

After the felting, I backed the piece with stabilizer and thread painted/quilted it.

These are both techniques I have barely tried in the past so wanted to play with them. I know I definitely need alot of practice to get it right, especially the thread painting...but I had alot of fun doing it. I mounted it on a piece of mauve sueded pigskin.

As always, I welcome critiques and comments

Cherie

Fish Tank, ~17"x22"

This piece uses only satin plus some Angelina fiber as embellishment. I wanted to re-visit the technique I used in the single-fabric challenge where I used all gray satin with a fairly thick layer of batting, but this turned out much different, in part of course because I used multiple colors. I chose some of the fancier stitches from my new sewing machine to add seaweed, and free motion quilting to add more wave texture. The treasure chest and castle were added at my husband's suggestion, though I had originally intended it to be an underwater ocean scene. The wavy shape was in part because I did not have enough fabric to fill in the rectangle, but then again, I like getting away from a strict rectangle in my pieces.

I may add a bit of beading to the pirate chest, and some random beads for bubbles, but I'm not sure about that.

Beachfire

This small piece (12" square) started as an experiment with some watercolors. I painted them on the fabric and thought it was attractive. I was bored and needed something to quilt so proceeded to quilt the piece heavily. Then I took a beading class a few days ago and decided to use some beads to emphasize the different areas of the piece. My work is rarely abstract so this is a departure for me.

As much as I don't care for beading (kind of like watching paint dry) I'm going to add some more to this piece because it seems unfinished. Any beading advice would be appreciated. Thanks for looking.

Roberta

Poppies of France

My Poppies of France is up... a little late. But, I did get an early start! [smile]I had a lot of fun with this one. I used four different fabrics for the background, cut them into large rectangles, mixed them up and sewed them back together. Then I took my rotary cutter and cut into wavy stips free hand. Next, I laid them out, wove them together on batting,overlaid with tulle and had fun with some free motion quilting. I used some copper netting [coarse] cut on the diagonal for a grid, added the silk flower poppies. I used velvet and a brad on the silk flowers. At that point I sent it in. Cynthia suggested more poppies..clumping... stems.... I did that and added leaves. The additional poppies are free hand cut from felt, as are the centers. again, brads [yellow] and I used Tsukineko ink for the black 'blush' around the centers. Bound it in black.
BTW it is straight on all sides, but since my move and no sewing room, I am using a door with some flannel and have yet to work out the irregularities. I am a 'straight-freak' and make it a must 'learn how to' do when I teach. Pictures sure are another matter.I will look forward to comments.
Carole

Lily Pad Garden

14 ½ x 10

I did the surface design part of this challenge right away. I took hand dyed and commercial fabrics I was not overly thrilled with and discharged, stamped and painted them.

I had taken underwater pictures of the water lilys through the glass wall they have at one edge of a lily pond. My fabrics kept screaming at me to use these pictures for this quilt, but I wasn’t sure they were telling me the right thing. Or maybe I was afraid of doing it wrong. So I procrastinated for six days, and then decided I had better just do it and see what happens.

I spent Thursday afternoon creating the quilt top, and quilted it this morning. I mostly like how it turned out. I need to learn to trust my instincts more.

The quilt seems to lack depth. It isn’t apparent which leaves are closer. They all seem to be on the same plane. Perhaps I could have remedied this by lightening the color of the further away leaves. But I like it the way it is also.

Challenge #12 - "Excess Baggage"

"Excess Baggage" has an upholstery sample for the background. The irregular patches are hand woven fabrics from a student. I love creating texture, both visual and tactile. A few of the elements in my quilt are from the scrapbook section of Michael's - the Chinese knot, the bronze ovals, and the ribbon. Compostion was the toughest to achieve. I had problems placing the rectangles and still creating movement throughout the piece. I think what worked to unify the elements were the "danglies" in the center, and the springs, best seen in the close up on the Yahoo page.

Comments and suggestions are always welcome.

Ann in Walnut, CA

Pink Mountains

I hand dyed a piece of fabric using Ellen Anne Eddy's dyeing method http://www.ellenanneeddy.com/

Then I used Shiva paintsticks and torn paper as a template to add the mountains and highlight the moonlight and lake. Shiva is fun to use if you have the patience to wait 24 hours for it to dry!

Cynthia

Challenge #12

The first image is the quilt I made in response to this challenge. I stamped the dark blue fabric with copper circles and some sparkly stuff. The light blue fabric is quilted in circles, and the peach fabric is quilted with copper sliver. I'm not very happy with this particular surface design that I did.

The second image shows part of a quilt I made a few weeks ago, stamping and rubbing with Shiva Paintstiks on the lighter red batik. Then I quilted the checkerboard using copper sliver, metallic variegated thread, and sulky rayon. This piece is piped with a tiny piping I made using a cotton lame variegated fabric. Pretty, but it still shreds. I like this quilt a lot better, partly because there is not so much contrast between the two colors as in the other quilt.

Surface design is new to me, and I welcome the chance to experiment. Comments are welcome!

Just Playing

I made two. They are very small so I will be sending them to Ami Simms soon for her Alzheimer's auctions.
The background was painted using watered down acrylic paints.
Machine quilted around the painted leaves and then silk flowers were sewn on.
A very fast and easy project

Challenge 12

Challenge # 12 - Friday, August 24, 2007 – Due Saturday, September 1, 2007

Hostess - Gena Flatley

Theme - Maker’s Choice

Design Element- 1) A surface design technique either new or familiar to you.
2) Build on a technique, style, thought or design you’ve used in one of this years other pieces.

This month we will extend our comfort zones to include a surface design technique that you have either used before or one that is new to you. Alter a piece of fabric and use it in a small work. The extent to which you use this design element in your piece is up to you.

Share a paragraph about your technique(s) with the group. Include any problems or successes you have.

Surface design is a wide open area that includes dyes in many forms and applications, discharging, acrylic and textile paints, resists, devores, stamps, stencils, rubs, screen-printing, mono-printing, sun-printing, wax crayons and watercolor pencils and embellishments. I’m sure there are many more types of manipulations with which create new fabric designs than I can list here.

Design may be realistic, representational or abstract.

Discussion The following is included for informational purposes only:

I’m including a list of books that have been helpful to me, along with some websites with technique information. Please feel free to share any websites or information you have that may be of interest to the group on this topic.
The Surface Designer’s Handbook – Holly Brackman
Color by Accident – Ann Johnston
Color by Design – Ann Johnston
Art Quilt Workbook – Jane Davila and Elin Waterson
Complex Cloth – Jane Dunnewold
Dyes and Paints – Elin Noble
http://www.prochemical.com/ – website for dyes, books, etc, with many how-to articles
http://www.dharmatrading.com/ – website for dyes, fabrics, paints, etc with many how-to articles
www.pburch.net/dyeing.shtml - Paula Burch has an excellent extensive site with dyeing info

A final note: this challenge may be easy or hard, I don’t know…. Easy because it is wide open, hard because it is not specific, or vice versa. As we’ve worked through this year we’ve tried many different techniques, styles, interpretations, themes…. It’s been a wonderful year for me to see how everyone works in different ways with different styles and approaches. The photos in the files are absolutely inspiring. As a group, you all can be extremely proud. It’s been a wonderful, wonderful year.


Have fun! Gena

Le Talisman, After Sérusier

13½” x 11½”

I didn’t like my last attempt at a quilt in the style of Sérusier, so I had another try at it. This one is a loose copy of Sérusier’s “Le Talisman”. I like this quilt much more than I did my last one. This was fun. I learned more by trying to copy his painting than I did by doing my own things with his colors.

challenge #11

My inspiration was a painting by Paul Klee called "1919", though some references also call it "1914". You can see the painting with this link: www.chess-theory.com/encprd03014_chess_practice_reflections_debates_arts.php

Klee had a wide variety of styles and you will see many of them at this website. I particularly liked "1919" because of its simplicity, use of a bold black outline as well as its child-like quality. My quilt is entirely fused but has yet to get a border.

Ann In Walnut, CA

Klimt Tree of Life 19.5"x22.5"

Well, I'm a little late, but close this time!

I chose to create a Klimt-style tree of life. It is fused from a heavily metallic gold on orange commercial fabric over a leafy green print and a brown paisley print with lots of gold metallic accents. I think that is why I can't seem to get a decent picture of it. I will try to get a better shot when I can.

I quilted this with gold silk thread. I wanted the quilting to be subtle; unfortunately the quilting doesn't show up very well at all, so it was a bit too subtle. I may add some gold beads to the background area to add some more interest. A la Klimt, you can never have too much bling, right?

This was a lot of fun except for cutting out the spirals (aaghh).

Brenda Jennings

Sérusier’s View

16" x 9"

I spent several days procrastinating and looking at Post Impressionism and Fauvism books. Yesterday I decided to take a different approach and picked a photo of mine to interpret.

Then I looked through the books again to choose a painting to use as inspiration to interpret my photo (taken at the Plimoth Plantation in Massachusetts.)
I was drawn to Paul Sérusier’s, Le Talisman. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_S%C3%A9rusier. I like the unusual colors he chose, and I thought the large flat areas of color would be easy to translate into cloth.

I put the image of the painting away until I had finished my quilt, because I didn’t want to be tempted to copy what Sérusier had done.

I still love Sérusier’s painting, but I don’t care much at all for what have I done. I thought I would use the warm colors for the very hot day, and the cooler colors for bit of shade that the plants were providing. What I ended up with is a very otherworldy looking something. I will call this a fun “learning experience.”

From ERTE'S Hearts and Zephyrs series...my interpretation of "Heart-I Purple".

I have always loved all of Erte's work and really had fun recreating one of his pieces in fabric. It turned out to be the most involved and labor intensive of all my challenge pieces so far, due to all the beading and painting lace with metalic Tsukineko ink. The fabrics are suede cloth , dupioni silk, and a holographic gold. Background is a metalic look cotton.

Comments and critiques are welcome and appreciated......Cherie

Pieces 10 & 11 by Tina Marie Rey

I am finally posting quilt #10 = better late than never. I used washers on a hand dyed and discharged background. I hands sewed them on using red metallic embroidery thread.
It is unnamed.

I then did #11. I used Monet's flowers as inspiration. I had hand marbled the background fabric in an Elin Noble class back in November of 2005. I had held on to it knowing I didn't want to just cut it up. This background is perfect, I think, because it has such a Monet feel to it. Please feel free to critique or comment!