Never Ending Winter

I shouldn't complain about this winter that just won't quit. It is still much colder and / or snowier in other parts of the country. Brrrrr. We had our first day of above freezing yesterday, and the sounds of chipping ice off the sidewalks could be heard all over the neighbourhood!  And my cats have spring fever something fierce. In out in out in out in out. . . .  It is nice to hear the cardinals singing their spring songs, though.


Meanwhile, I've been working slowly along on a few quilts. I've been doing some handstitching on this Red and White quilt. I've decided to add more hearts in those central white patches, so I had to cut out a lot more. I'm getting the skinny vine laid down, too. There is a lot of applique to get done, so you probably won't hear about this quilt again until later in the year, when I have it all put together.





And I now have backings and tops made for these two quilts, the Red and White Log Cabin, and the Turquoise Star.  I'm starting to think about sandwiching them, but I'm not there yet.

Red & White Progress

Yet another cold, snowy weekend to get in some good sewing time, while I watch the winter Olympics. Did you know that there is an Olympic connection to quilting?  If you are interested, Michele over at With Heart and Hands has a great write-up of all those colourful patchwork backgrounds at the Sochi Olympics. Very interesting concept, see the link here. And you can see the official website here.

I've got all these 9 patches trimmed up now, and wanted to see what they would look like all laid out with white alternating patches.  I also set out these hearts in the border, which I've had left over from other projects.  I think I'd like to cut smaller hearts and add a skinny vine to connect them along the border. So far, I like how it's going.

Linking up this time with Anything Goes, here.

Weekend Sewing

I've been working long hours during the week, and don't have much left for sewing, so I try to spend a bunch of time on the weekends getting some sewing done.  It's been slow progress, but progress is progress.

This turquoise star quilt had its borders added on last weekend. I decided to go with the sawtooth right into the corners, instead of having a tiny star which I think looked too small for impact. I wrote about it here. Today I was able to make a backing for it. So I'm happy about that being two big steps towards its completion.  Can't say when it will get sandwiched and quilted, though. I haven't planned that far ahead.

And this stack of 9 patches has been slowly inching forward as well. They are 3 1/2", and I've been trimming them up. Aren't they just about the cutest things you've seen lately?!  I need 198 of them, and have to cut 200 white patches to put in between these. There is still a lot of work on this, but I can work on it in bits and pieces, without it being a big thinking project. I'm considering doing an applique border on white, instead of no border, but I'm still not sure how it will go.

Other than that, I've been just hanging on until spring. This is turning out to be a tough winter in which to work. My mom used to say "just keep putting one foot in front of the other" so that's what keeps me going.   I do love the winter Olympics, though, and Canada has gold, silver, and bronze on the first day. Very exciting.

MUST QUILT

5% Red
by Ilene Atkins

I've had this big neon sign flashing inside my head for some time now, saying MUST QUILT. So that's what I've been doing. It does beg the question, why must I quilt?  I've always loved sewing, sewing anything, really. But why quilting, why now?

I was recently making the Dragonfly Quilt, here, and had some insight. After my presentation last week to my quilt guild, here, I heard those voices inside my head that say I'm not good enough, and Who do I think I am?  You know those voices!  But getting feedback on my quilts has been so positive.  This disconnect between the outside world and my inside world just didn't make sense to me.

5% Red, detail
by Ilene Atkins

So today I was emailing my friend about the dragonfly quilt, and I came to the realization that when I'm making my quilts, they are the visual representation of the essence of who I am. It is the deepest part of me coming out for the world to see. Any worries or troubles or discontent in my life become inconsequential.

The quilt I'm showing today is a finish from last fall, and I didn't get it photographed until recently. I think I pieced it the year before, and got it quilted in last years finishing frenzy. I've called it 5% red, since it has so little red. I think now I could have put in more red, but this is the way it turned out, so I'm leaving it at that. And I just quilted it with wavy lines. It's been added to my growing stack of finished quilts.

Linking up this time to The Needle and Thread Network, here, and Nina Marie's Off the Wall Friday, here.

Sewing Therapy

 I've put aside all of my other projects for the time being, in favour of working on some "easy" sewing. Just cut strips and sew them together. I needed something productive to do, without a lot of thinking! No planning and no designing, either. To balance the other challenges in my life at the moment. Turns out this kind of quiltmaking is very rewarding.

I had out my box of reds, and a selection of white/cream/lights. Just cut strips and sew them together.  I have 48 blocks made at this point, and am going for 64 blocks. 1" logs, 9" blocks.  I think I'll switch the centre to white, though, so the biggest full diamond ends up being red. And I could quilt something on the white centre, too.

Some of my inspiration for this one comes from Wanda over at Exuberant Color, link here.  She has made over 30 Log Cabin quilts, and I read through most of her posts about them. Very interesting reading.  I really like the way she puts her many different fabrics together into amazing quilts.

It's a long way from being finished, and I don't know when I'll get to quilting it, but I just love how this is looking so far.

Linking up with The Needle and Thread Network, here, and Nina Marie's Off the Wall Friday, here.

St. Jacobs Quilt Festival 2012 Part 6

This was my last day in St. Jacobs, for this year's Quilt & Fibre Art Festival. Good thing I'm not working at my actual job this week, or I wouldn't have had time for all this quilt stuff. And it seems my quilt quotient level is way up. I can hear a little voice in my head telling me to save some for next week in Halifax, but I'm going all out. I come home and work in my garden until it's dark, with a little sprinkling of sewing in my day, too. It all feels great, though.

Quilt by Ruth Kennedy

So today, I went specifically to see a trunk show with guest artist Ruth Kennedy from Fergus. She has been quilting since 2000, but had a lot of sewing exposure and experience since she was very young. Ruth loves sewing curves, and she showed us a beautiful quilt, shown at left. Her award-winning quilt, "You Still Give Me Butterflies" is featured on the International Plowing Match brochure. Check it out here.  Surrounded by some of her family, she showed us an incredible array of quilts she has made. She teaches quiltmaking as well, and it was fascinating and inspiring to hear her story. She wound up her speaking with a very moving tribute to her mother for encouraging her and giving her space and freedom to sew when she was young. Reminded me of my own mother.

 

Needle Sisters Quilt Guild display

Quilts for the World display

Also on the slate for today were the quilts at the St. Jacobs Mennonite Church. I enjoyed this show. As I've mentioned before, the local Mennonites are so much a part the area's quilting, and some of their quilts were on display at the church, some destined for the New Hamburg Mennonite Relief Sale this Saturday. Other local quilters also had quilts on display. Included in the show was Susanne Williams' very impressive collection of local antique red & white quilts, and a special display by the Needle Sisters Quilt Guild from Elmira.

New York's Architectural Detail

These are a few of the many photos I took along the streets of New York City. Everywhere I looked, the doorways had been carved, or were decorated with bricks. Very interesting. It was a feast for my eyes.

Looking at these photos now, or in the future, would provide much inspirations. As if I might ever run out of ideas. . .

It was easy to get a sense of the history in New York, the age of the buildings, some modern, some older, a great soup of architecural styles. I haven't included photos of the more modern buildings here, but they live in New York too, right alongside the older classic styles.  It is as if anything and everything is honoured here. There is history, new stories, many styles, many different kinds of people, all have a place here. All honoured as having a place here. It was a treat to take it all in. 

New York: 300 Years of Red & White Quilts

I've been wanting to write about a trip I did to New York City, specifically to see quilts, in March 2011. I've had the photos on my computer for all this time, and I was just looking over them, after my Houston experience, and realize now that it was an amazing journey that changed me forever.

I found out about this Red and White display when I was looking around on the internet one day.         It was put on by the American Folk Art Museum. Check out the link here.  Once I knew about the show, I had to go, I knew I would forever regret not going. All these quilts, 650 of them, had been collected by one quilt fan, and she generously decided to share them with the public all in one display. She had collected more quilts, but these are her red and white ones.  Many of them are very old, dating up to 300 years old, and some are more modern.

The amazing thing about this display was the way the quilts were displayed.  Many quilts you see in a variety of displays are hung all on one level, and you walk around to see them one at time.  In this display, the building was vastly huge and dark, and a professional stage lighting company had been hired to set up lighting specifically to highlight the quilts.  The other amazing thing about this display was that the quilts were hung on many levels, sometimes three or four layers up, with an intense circular spiral thing going on in the centre. 

So when I entered the huge vast room full of quilts, it took my breath away. It was stunning to stand inside the entryway and take in the enormity of the project. Wow. I was just in awe. People walked softly and spoke in hushed tones, and for the most part moved around in near darkness, because it was only the quilts that were lit. It felt somewhat surreal, but very effective.  It took some time, taking in each quilt, giving each piece its due.  I spent most of a day there, taking in the quilts, taking photos of nearly all of them, absorbing as much as I could, since I was aware that this was a once in a lifetime experience.  

There were other quilt things going that same weekend in New York, which I will write about in other posts.