Button it! November Journal Quilt

Button it! November Journal Quilt.

Apples October Journal Quilt

This is my little journal quilt for October - apples. The challenge is to use buttons for the next 4 pieces. I've been picking the apples from my Sunset apple tree and thought the apple pips and core looked a bit like a button. The background is a rustic open weave linen and I embellished apple shapes with little pieces of wool, adding them like watercolour. The leaf shapes were appliqued and layered with muslin which was also blattered with the embellisher to distress it a bit and then machine stitched to the background. I added handstitching and then white laundry buttons. They looked a bit stark so I painted them with some dilute Inktense colour.
I really enjoyed getting the embellisher out and needle felting the background, the effect can be quite subtle.

Traditional quilt

I haven't made a quilt like this for a very long time. My aunt was 90 this week so I decided at the last minute to make her a lap quilt. It is a little larger than the usual size, 45cm x 45cm and  I was determined to use up some of my commercial fabrics which I tend not to use these days. Inevitably I had to buy some more - you never have enough of the right colour. It has turned out rather bright but I hope she likes it. My mother will be 90 in January so I shall make her one too. Its very strange to think that they are the last of that generation in the family - more memories!

memories and connections

Several months ago my brother and I were forced to make the decision that our mother could no longer live at home and needed more help with her needs. She is suffering from dementia. Neither of us was prepared for the emotional implications of this decision let alone the practical ones. We were faced with a home crammed with things that represented our lives and those of our parents and grandparents. The home is now just an empty house and we have tried to deal with the contents. I collected up pieces of linen - table mats, hankies, embroidered napkins and tablecloths, gloves and aprons. These had been embroidered, crocheted, stitched, darned and and owned by my grandmothers Maud and Gladys and my Mum, Eileen. What on earth should I do with them.  I do not want to leave my boys with the decision of what to do with my things let alone my grandmother's. I wanted to do something that would connect me to them and also be relevant and even something of use for my children. I bit the bullet and started cutting up the pieces. I am stitching a crazy patchwork quilt in squares made up of pieces belonging to Maud, Gladys and Eileen. I am using old transfers to add my marks to the pieces now. So far I have made 17 squares so a long way to go but all the time I am stitching them ( glass of wine at hand in front of the telly) I think of these women, their lives and how they have made me what I am.

Flying the nest September Journal Quilt

Yesterday I came across the paper collage above which I did 18months ago. My eldest had just left home and was starting a new job and living in Brighton. I was doing a workshop with Sian Martin and had collaged bits of photos, receipts, computer printouts about Brighton and bits of  discarded artwork, then machine stitched pathways over the surface. We were using potassium permanganate and on that cold February day and I found the colour so dreary echoing my state of mind probably. I had a lightbulb moment looking at it again. I scanned and replaced the background colour with a lighter tone which immediately lifted it. I used a portion in large scale as a background then layered up the image again in two sizes. I printed the image on to old cotton sheeting that I had treated with bubble jet set and then machine stitched the background. I particularly like the scanned areas of the original stitching marks which picked up portions of the p.perm. and seeped into the needle holes.

Man Woman August Journal Quilt

This is my August Journal Quilt entitled "Man Woman". It is the third of the quilts which specified text. I have been suffering from empty nest syndrome. It always happens at this time of the year. The youngest (now 21 ) drew this little picture many years ago and I have had it pinned on my wall. The funny expressions always make me smile. I used this as an opportunity to get to grips with a new printer after my old Epson started dumping ink on the surface of my fabric. I defined the pencil marks and then added some more colour to the original drawing then I added a half triangle border to the design together with some repeating figures which I think must have been Ralph. There was a tiny little figure on a distant planet and I'm wondering if that was his brother! The little wholecloth was printed on bubble jet set treated recycled cotton sheeting and then machine stitched and I also put some little french knots where there were pencil dots on the original. It still makes me laugh.
The exhibition in The Guild in Bristol, Cloth, Paper, Stitch, has now finished. Thank you to my friends who supported me and the people who visited and bought my work and cards. There was a lot of interest in the lichen pieces again and I think I shall make another large piece soon.

July Journal Quilt

"Love a wall" This is my July Journal quilt for the contemporary quilt group challenge. I have used the applique stone shapes, but this time have added some hand stitching. The text is from Robert Frost's "Mending Wall" again.

Fabric Paper Stitch, Guild Gallery, Bristol.

Views showing my piece "Listen" and "Moon-made friends" and "Gaps", the little Gaudi inspired pieces, Di Goodison's jackets and bags and Sally Gregg's felt pieces.

Fabric Paper Stitch Exhibition, Bristol.

Spectrum had its preview yesterday in the Guild Gallery at the Bristol Guild in Park Street. We had a lot of visitors and the day was very enjoyable. It ends on October 1st.
You can see some of my lichen pieces on the wall and Joan Bowie's mermaids.

Gaps and Tumbling Stones

The horizontal design above was the original cut out piece which I have added a border to and mounted on linen - called Gaps.
The vertical piece on the left is made from some of the original applique pieces on top of a printed text background using verses from Robert Frost's Mending Wall. I have added borders to this, some builders scrim which I particularly like using at the moment and the whole thing is mounted on a linen background.

Moon-made friends

At last the blog is up to date thanks to my son. Somehow I had two addresses and now I have transferred the images from the old one.

Moon-made friends was made for the recent exhibition in the Weavers Gallery, Ledbury, entitled The Dymock poets. The poem that inspired this piece was Iris by Night by Robert Frost, one of my favourite poets. It tells about an encounter that Frost and his friend Edward Thomas had, while walking late one summer afternoon in the Malverns. It was wet and the light formed a rainbow which magically encircled them. I started the design for this piece from lichen circles which I re- drew and distorted. When I finished the design and cut and appliqued the pieces I really didn't like the result. I am in the habit of bonding down the random cut out shapes from a piece of work and had done this on a long piece of calico using the negative shapes. This was a far more interesting design and I used it as the basis for the piece above. The text from the poem was printed onto some transparent non woven fabric I had acquired and looked suitably watery. Both the rainbow and the moon were appliqued and the whole piece was also hand stitched in vertical lines.

Having agreed to produce a quilt a month for the Journal Quilt project this was an eleventh hour piece. I made it even worse for myself by using the contents of a " challenge" bag of fabrics and threads - pink is not usually me at all but I managed to complete this with a nice grey background - more me. This is the last of the circles theme. The next four pieces will have text in them.

Another journal quilt for the month of April inspired again by the tree of life image.

Chocolate wrappers were bonded on the background, hand made khadi paper from Ahmedabad was mono printed with acrylic paint and the circles were completed with silk bonded with scrim rubbed with gold markal stick on the surface. The trees were machine stitched and the surface machined with a gold thread grid. The threads were left unstitched across the circles.

Visited this extremely skilful kalamkari artist in Ahmedabad recently. His work was beautifully delicate and lyrical.

This is the second little journal quilt I've done. For some reason the first February journal quilt has posted to a different blog. It can be seen if my website is accessed and you click on the link on the contact page. This is a mystery to me!

I spent a wonderful 8 days in India in February,mainly Gujarat, looking at a lot of textiles and art. This little tree of life piece is appliqued on silk which is first hand quilted, then machine stitched over the top of the applique. It was inspired by a wonderful Tree of Life window in Ahmedabad. I bought a lovely scarf made of two pieces of sari silk. One side is a single ikat type weave and the other is block printed. The whole scarf has then been stitched completely with rows of running stitch in stripes of two colours. I tried this technique on the background of my little tree.

I decided to take part in The Contemporary Quilt Group's journal challenge. This year the pieces are 10 inches square. I found an old paper bag while clearing up the detritus from the kitchen table and used it to make transfer prints on poly satin and organza. The bag had a faded tree design with a flower head on it. Using the enlarged flower head image, I made a template to mask out transfer paint on poly satin and organza. The paper bag was also bonded on to muslin. Machine stitched, mainly. It reminds me of my favourite dusk, end of the day landscapes.

Gaudi inspired tile

Have been having trouble with the blog posting but all seems well now. This is a little piece based on Gaudi mosaics. Reverse applique with embroidery.

Yesterday I visited Prema, a lovely little chapel gallery tucked away in Uley, a village near Stroud. I first met my husband when he was staying here with Andrew Wood when the building was being converted and we slept under blue plastic. Where have the years gone?
Bethan Ash has an exhibition here at the moment and it was a very good place to show off her vibrant work. Interestingly some pieces were displayed downstairs on red painted walls and they looked great, really enhanced it.
From Uley my friend and I went on to Bath to the Victoria Art gallery to see David Tress's work Landmarks. What a treat! We came away inspired.

Magritte the Quilter

A friend sent me a postcard of a Magritte painting called L'Incendie, The Blaze. It reminded me of a tree I could see across the valley in the last days of autumn 2010. I made this little panel using the embellisher, wool and some hand dyed cotton and machine stitched over the top.