More quilting on an oldie

I seemed to have dropped off the blogosphere there for a while. Sorry. But don't get the idea I've been sitting around twiddling my thumbs. (well maybe just a bit) No, I've been continuing to finish off some ancient UFO's and adding more quilting to some others. Here's one that got more quilting added to it. I was never particularly happy with the quilting I originally did on it. So following the adage that there's no such thing as too much quilting, that's exactly what it got.





and a close up

.....and I bought myself a new toy (HINT: this makes 21) .....but more about that next time

Another ancient UFO bites the dust

Many moons ago there was a quilt competition. About 1994 I think. Quilts had to be a specific size 90cm x 125cm (35 1/2" x 49"). Many hundreds of entries were received and a large number of these were juried in to a huge exhibition held in the Sydney Opera House. Of these 40 were selected to go in the book and also to be a part of a travelling exhibition touring around Australia for about 4 years. The exhibition was shown in regional areas and country towns that wouldn't normally have the opportunity to see a quilt exhibition. I was fortunate to have a quilt selected. Because it was an acquisitive exhibition the quilt was no longer mine so at the time I made a duplicate. The quilt titled 'Keep the Aspidistra Flying' was air brushed using fabric paint and hand quilted with heavy black crochet cotton around the main shapes. The duplicate never progressed further than a top so when I came across it recently languishing at the bottom of a pile of UFO's I decided to drag it out and quilt it. Only 15 years late. Got done eventually.

I got a little sliver of it showing on the cover.
At the time I made it, it was very unusual for me to do anything so 'arty'. I had been playing around with a recently acquired air brush and compressor and was doing a lot of fabric dyeing and printing with leaves and found objects around this time.

Another Journal Quilt and a UFO finally finished

I've been so busy quilting the last couple of weeks I've neglected the blog. This is one of the pieces I finished recently. It's another journal quilt for the Aus/Nz Artquilters Group. We don't necessarily have to do the monthly themes in order so this is actually the June theme - The Centre. These journal quilts are A4 size and quite fun to work on.

As I was doing this I remembered a quilt top that I did many years ago along similar lines and never really finished off so I dragged it out and was inspired to finish it. The background green is piece I hand dyed. The black border was sewn around it and then I printed with grevillea leaves using gold fabric paint. The 'woven' bits are actually cut from the one piece of fabric that I dyed and appliqued after the printing. I felt it didn't stand out from the background very well in places so I ended up couching a heavy metallic thread along the edges. The title is 'Unravelled'. I'd love to hear your comments.

Show and Tell

This is a bit of show and tell from many years ago. I thought I might drag out some of the old photos of quilts I have made over the years and scan them. This quilt used and lot of my hand-dyeds, some that I had overprinted with leaves from the garden, and some drapery fabrics. The dark areas don't show up very well in this photo. I really should re photograph many of my quilts with the digital camera.I've been shifting around sewing machines this week. So....you think. What's the big deal. You pick it up you put it somewhere else. No. I'm talking about industrial machines. They weigh a ton. They have a large solid table with a large heavy motor that is attached under the table. The head of the machine (the bit that actually sews) can be lifted out of the table. I can barely lift them, they're so heavy. I have five of them that I use for my business, well four really, cause one I had set up for machine quilting in my studio. They have sooo much more room under the arm of the machine than a domestic machine. These have about 12". I needed to swap this one for a different one that had been geared down and was a bit more controllable at slower speeds. So I had to wait until someone came to visit that could help me lift them. Where's a man with muscles when you need one?