Back To Work

Just about done with my article that's due next week.... It will out in Spring about threads used in complementary colors to fabric...about neutralizing fabric using complements, etc etc. I'll post a few excerpts from time to time.... I had soooo many sample photos..a picture is worth a thousand words, right? The most important message in this article (for my penny anyway) is about using complementary colors to create excitement in quilting. I always have a color wheel in my thread drawer. It's so helpful when pulling threads for audition. The complementary color to a rusty orange is cool blue. This little sample looks kind of energized, right?

Kid Fun for Christmas

What a blessed Christmas.... granddaughter Kaley here from Colorado (thanks Mom Allyson for letting her come visit Grammie). A fun kid game night on Christmas Eve... the creative idea of red-bowed Auntie Jenn. Looks like the kids had a blast. 9 year old Kaley-(blond in hot pink shirt) pretty much dusted 2 adult males in wii tennis. Home for time with brown haired granddaughter Morgan. Christmas partyng is soooo exhausting.

Auditon Audition Audition!

No shopping today.... quilting to restore mental serenity.... working today on a thread article using small abstract sampler blocks. This one of many article samples is about using color atop neutral fabrics. Unless you are using heavy weight thread (what you see here is average 40wt. thread) you can use bold color choices to create interest on a neutral background. Just like one auditions fabrics for a quilt, audition your thread as well. Don't be afraid to change thread choices even after you "THINK" you have a committed plan. In this case, the plan to use light lavender in the lower left corner was changed for a warmer peach thread color as I liked the warmth the other threads were creating.I also changed to a lighter pink for the upper right corner as the pink in the fabric suggested i use less value in the thread. As we all know it is much easier to change our mind BEFORE we quilt. I hate removing thread quilting, but I'd certainly do it if it mattered.
Happy quilting! Patt

Merry Christmas To All

Hope all the shopping is done, baking done, and your feet are resting on a soft pillow. No??? Me neither. Bet you want a "Day Stretcher" for Christmas too. Hectic hectic, and trying to find at least 30 minutes daily to sew... or I fear the mind is to be lost.
Still working on samples for next quarters article mostly focusing on how one might use complementary colors of varying intensity to achieve desired results. Complements can be great to energize or neutralize fabric. In this example.... a complementary color 2 or 3 times lighter than the fabric may be just the ticket to create energy AND have the thread texture highly visible. Ofcourse I'm playing with Christmas colors given the date. Have a blessed Christmas and I give thanks to God for all our blessings.
PATT

Who says you can't go home?.... MOTHER NATURE SAYS

I'm writing this on a thursday night. I haven't been able to drive to my home since Sunday last when the snow started to fall on Mt Baldy, California. This photo was taken today, as I sat in my car on the flatlands looking upward toward home. I THINK I can go home tomorrow lest we get more ice. I'd say it's a good thing my studio down the hill has a bedroom, bath, and kitchen so at least I've been able to sew and bake for Christmas.

What a time to be writing!

It seemed like a good idea at the time I committed to this. I'm actually having fun but 'am a lil stressed meeting the holiday and business commitments. I'm working on an article about choosing thread colors to make your quilt top convey the message you want. This thread choice is a topic big enough for a book (maybe someday), but I'm focusing on complementary colors for this part. The article will be quite in depth but the basic message for what I'm showing here is that one can use a complementary color to the fabric color to create a bit of interest, excitement... let's call it a "lift" for the fabric color underneath. So if we consider the center of the thread stacks value to be an example color of a fabric... (let's just say the center red as example) than to add excitement to that red fabric... (if that's your intention) you might quilt atop that red with an equal or lighter value green to make that part of a quilt stand up and take notice. I'll likely add examples as I work on this, but didn't want you all to think I was completely taking the holidays off! :-)

Close Ups

This mother and offspring seemed to me okay without alot of thread so their bodies and face are quilted with clear monofilament just to secure the quilt sandwich and add texture. The ostrich is a strange looking thing to begin with, but looking closely at a baby chick at the Los Angeles Zoo cracked me up as they are even more animated than adults.

Quilting For Spring!!

This piece is just about quilted for a traveling exhibition commencing next month. The subject of the exhibition is Spring and pretty much anything goes! This type of challenge beckons me to have plain old fun. I have always loved words or phrases with double meanings.... This one will be titled "Spring Break." Soooooo many times I have forgotten to pin back the backing toward the front so as to prevent a screw up of quilting through a double layer of turned back backing. Remembered this time.

In Winter Issue of Machine Quilting Unlimited

Those of you that do your own quilting may want to check out this quarterly magazine.. MACHINE QUILTERS UNLIMITED (www.mqumag.com). It is a quilters quilting magazine by Meander Publishing(Don't ya love the name?) This 2008 piece of mine is featured on the last page of the magazine reserved for their quarterly pick of a JAWDROPPER (their name/not mine). His name.. Endangered!

How slow can you go! :-(

Well I'm still working on this mountain lion... ofcourse I'm working on 3 quilts at once so that complicates timing but this lion, which I think will be pleasing when finished, is perhaps the slowest going quilting ever... largely because I'm working with light values where precision is more paramount than ever, and secondly because it is so heavily quilted. Working too many hours at a time rears the head of tendonitis I've had long before I started quilting.

I often like to leave parts of quilts unquilted.... like the nose of this lion. In my mind, it adds interest but ofcourse which such heavy quilting as is shown here, ya gotta be careful not to select large areas to leave be or things will distort. You can double click any image for a closeup look.
Hope all is well with you.... Here comes Christmas!!