Finishing Up OLD Class Projects

Part of the "decluttering" of my sewing room has been the discovery of many projects that were almost done but not quite.  These were all projects that were started in a class or pre-work before I took a class.  I will admit to being a compulsive finisher though so I decided to tackle several of these that have been floating around for years in some cases.  This water lily is straight out of one of Ruth McDowell's technique books and was done in preparation for taking a class from her in Massachusetts several years ago.  I chose to vary the colors from her original.  It was a good way to get myself used to her piecing techniques.

This was done in a class many, many years ago taught by Annette Ornelas (whose is most known for her dimensional flower technique -- still haven't finished that project!).  Doing this was a great deal of fun and a very different technique.  Again, this was my own design rather than using the one she had provided -- I took the class shortly after my trip to Alaska and this was my interpretation of one of my photos.  Hard to believe, but this was done totally using a "flip and sew" technique -- yes, with curves.  Needless to say, you had all sorts of puckers and fullness when adding pieces after piece.  Her strategy was then to quilt the heck out of it so that the puckers and fullness just become texture.  As you are using a base fabric on which you are applying the "flip and sew" pieces, it stays totally flat.  However, all the quilting makes a piece that has the feeling of a piece of cardboard!!  It was easy to quilt though as you just followed the curves and stitched every 1/8 inch!

This is a closeup showing the quilting.  You don't see any puckers in it though!

I called this one Tree of Life and my intention was to convey a circle with the tree motifs.  This was started in a class with Cynthia Corbin who remains one of my favorite teachers and people I am inspired by.  We created background and then cut and resewed.  My abstracts ALWAYS eventually become representational -- she suggested I just go with it if that's what I like.  I took a very limited pallette with me as I had flown to NC to take the class and stay with my daughter.  These are of course all my hand dyed fabrics which appear again in the Colin quilt.  I made a very bad design decision when selecting the thread to machine quilt this, choosing a variegated grey thread.  I really disliked how it came out, especially the light threads in the dark areas.  Amazing what a black Sharpie will do to cure the problem!  I had colored threads before after projects were done (when you use to light a thread and it shows between two pieces), but had never colored quilting threads.  It worked and I am much happier with the piece now.