What a wonderful assortment of ideas for our challenge fabric. There were bags, an apron, hat, purse, wallhanging and pillow. The pillow was reversible so there are two pictures of that. It was a very fun morning of show and tell.
Category: Quilting
These 2 pictures are from the 5th Saturday Challenge. The Bear won 2nd place and the flowers 3rd! The bear has the challenging fabric tucked in his ears and the flowers are just ingenious and oh so pretty.
5th Saturday Challenge
One of our neighborhood quilt stores, The Quilting Nook, started a 5th Saturday Challenge every quarter. I was lucky enough to purchase the last bag. It contained 4 fat quarters with a variegated brown ribbon. We could make ANYTHING we wanted. I couldn’t decide what to make so I hung my fabric on my design wall and kept walking by it. The only thing I could think of was a checkerboard. I resisted all the way up until the Friday before the challenge and finally gave in and made the checkerboard. Apparently I need to listen better, because I won first place for the board! I couldn’t believe all the creativity that showed up that day. My checkerboard has the pieces that fit in the pouch and rolls up to travel or store. The prize for the day was the fabric for the next challenge. I will be posting pictures from this challenge over the next couple of days and then the new fabric.
Acrylic Painting
I spent a lovely evening at the Mint Hill Arts listening to a lecture given by Nancy Cook. What she does with fabric, ink and quilting is truly art. She was so open and forthcoming about how she makes her art. She reminded me how much I really do like to paint. I’m still a fill-in-the-numbers kind of girl. I came across a fun little piece that I made. I used a design from Anita Goodesign and then painted with acrylic paints. There was a lot of trial and error, but I was pleased with the way it came out. After seeing Nancy’s work, I see where I could have used quilting to suggest flow and motion and maybe made it look a little more artistic. If you get a chanced to visit her website, I think you will find it worth your time to see her pieces. I can honestly say that the photography doesn’t do it justice. There is so much detail that it’s phenomenal. http://www.nancygcook.com
Free Motion Quilting
After posting the embroidery club, I realized that I had another project that I did free motion quilting on! I use this 3 ring binder all the time for classes. All my notes and handouts are in it for the sessions I teach and I’m always surprised when someone remarks on it. Because I use it all the time, sometimes I forget how striking it is. I used leftover fabric from a quilt that I made with purples, blues and lime green. I found the lime green at Quilt Patch Fabrics,www.quiltpatchfabrics.com and went thru my stash for the rest. I’ve enjoyed working with the silk flowers also. They’ve stood up really well to being carried around with all of my other supplies.