Been Doing Lots and Lots of Cutting!!

Well, I finished this one block wonder and then decided it was time to "unstash" some of my fabrics that were in various and sundry places and not big enough to really do anything with.  I decided on 5 in squares and 10 in squares.  If the pattern was really pretty and largish, I would make 10 in squares and then cut 5 inch squares from the remainder.  Occasionally I had enough for some 2 1/2 or 2 inch strips.  I rarely threw out anything more than 3/4 in wide but filled a waste paper basket!

This is a 12 inch by about 18 inch plastic box which contains all the 5 in squares which are standing up so  you can easily see everything.  I noticed there really weren't any greens, blues or yellows to speak of.  I use a lot of these colors and must have most of them down south or in larger yardage.  This was mostly cut from fat quarters or quarter yard pieces.  Lots of hand dyes and a few marbled pieces that were not good enough to keep whole.

While going through the miscelaneous boxes, pulling out the small pieces, I came across several (what I thought) were really nice pieces of hand dyed fabrics from a long time ago.  I didn't want to cut into them as they were fat half quarters so decided to put them up on my design wall for inspiration.  Immediately I thought of jackets or large totes.  I really don't need another jacket, but one may find its way into one when I get back to the south where my favorite pattern is!

This was my favorite and most likely to be a jacket back in the future.

 

This will find its way into a tote I think.  So will the next one.  They are fat quarters.  

 

This is also one of my favorites and is tied with that other one for a jacket favorite!

Greenfield Lake Ducks, Sky, Beach and Jacket Progress

Greenfield Lake is beginning to look like fall and I loved the picture of the Cypress trees knee deep in the alligator filled water!

This Great Blue Heron took off while I was watching from his hiding place in among the Cypress.

It was just beautiful there at Greenfield Lake Park with many trees taking on their bright colors.

My second favorite duck -- Northern Shoveler - was there in abundance.  Both males and females but they wouldn't let me get anywhere near them!  There were places where the trees were filled with Great Egrets.   Cormorants and Anhingas were  also there in great numbers.  I spotted a couple of Pied Billed Grebes as well.  I have been seeing them lately at Carolina Beach Lake as well.  I had to use my little camera with the 35x zoom to even see these birds, they were so far away!

A couple of the females -- I love their big bills!!

Couldn't resist taking a bunch of pictures of this almost full moon last week.

This is a "sun dog" caused by ice crystals.  It is a rainbow completely surrounding the sun.  The colors are more muted than a regular rainbow but the red is closest to the sun.  They occur on our chilly days.  I have only seen these down here.

There was a preponderance of Moon Jellyfish on the beach.  They have these four bright pink circular things in the middle which are gonads!  Shows what a jellyfish thinks is important!!  No circulatory system or digestive system is present!!

I am slowly but surely making progress on the jacket pictured previously.  Each of these strip sets is just 3 inches wide and  this picture shows the four strip sets contained in the jacket with the darker two being the more prominent ones.  I was shocked to learn that the jacket pattern was done by a woman who just taught a class at my home GVQC guild in Rochester!  I had seen the jacket just because someone had "liked" the site in FB.  Sorry, I missed the class now!

I cut two squares (3 inches by 3 inches) from each of the strips and placed them together to see how they look.  I think this will be okay!

One thing that wasn't suggested in the pattern but which is downright critical with this is the checking of your 1/4 mark on your foot or sewing machine!!!  I did a test and found that my 1/4 mark on my machine resulted in 2 3/4 inch wide strips.  I quickly placed down some tape at what I measured as 1/4 inch and tested again.  Perfect!!!  Both Sharon Craig and Jan Krentz emphasize this checking in their classes.  Even a slight variation when multiplied by four or five can mean disaster!

A Pieceful Day at Marcia's

The day was wonderful and the company grand! It has been awhile since the three of us have gotten together to sew, eat and gab. Two projects wended their way into my bag and called out to be worked. One was a bog coat I made with some of my hand dyed fabric but which didn't have a front band on it. So that is almost done now and I will finish the stitching on it tonight.

The second is some homework to do before attending a Ruth McDowell workshop in Massachusetts in September. A couple of the other art quilters in our RAFA group are attending in July and they had received their instructional letter already. One thing that is recommended BEFORE attending the workshop is that you work one of the pieces in one of Ruth's books using the techniques she describes. So I decided to do the water lillies from her latest technique book. It is lots of curves and I love curves and will probably do a piece with lots of curves.

Today was spent tracing her drawings onto freezer paper and putting appropriate marking on them. I am almost positive I will like working with a fabric pattern better but I am willing to give this a try. I know the better part of the work shop will be taking our photos, blowing them up and creating the drawings that Ruth has already done in her books. This will not be an easy task I am sure.

I have admired Ruth's work for 25 years so this class will be a real treat, whether or not I use the techniques on an ongoing basis. She was one of my original inspirations for creating something other than traditional quilts.


This is the back of Priscilla's new jacket. We three decided that we liked the look of the two molas. The bottom one is all beaded so now Priscilla feels she has to add beads to the top one.

This is the front of the new bog coat. The band is Hmong embroidery from Laos. The fabric is the rayon/linen mix that I get at Joanns dyed with Procion MX dyes.
This is a closeup of the fabric in the back of this jacket. I really like the colors which were a combination of intense blue, some turquoise and navy blue with some sun yellow dribbled on first.