Here’s what I wrote on my entry: Beneath the Surface of the Edges of the pink oyster mushrooms, the Space Between the gills forms rhythmic Patterns of shadow and light. My Affinity for fungi and lichen extends to the inspiration I find in the world around me in Maine, even at at the Belfast Farmer’s Market. Dyeing and painting white cloth is part of my artistic voice, my Personal Iconography.

I am over the moon excited that Pink Oyster Mushrooms has been juried in to the 10th and final (SOB) Dinner at Eight exhibit and that I can now share it with you–I made this back in the January to April time frame, and keeping it under wraps has been difficult!  From that website, “Dinner at Eight Artists is pleased to present The Best of Dinner at Eight Artists: Celebrating 10 Years of Exhibitions. Each artist selected a theme from the last 9 years for what will be our last exhibition. Quilt size is 30” wide by 50” high. The exhibit is sponsored by Havel’s Sewing.

“Artists considered the following:

We’ve explored the Edges and the Spaces Between

We examined things Beneath the Surface

We all admit that we have Rituals

We shared our Exquisite Moments

We Reflected upon ourselves and the world around us

We expressed our Affinity for certain things

We’ve noted the many Patterns in our lives

and expressed ourselves through Personal Iconography”

First and foremost:  Yes, oyster mushrooms really can be PINK!   Here’s the photo I took at the Belfast (Maine) Farmer’s Market last September:

Yes, the mushrooms really grew that color of pink!!!!! The tops are the usual brown, and apparently they lose the vibrant color when cooked, but still….Gorgeous!

Here are two detail images.  For this piece, I dyed the background fabric a very pale, warm pink. Then I used Tsukinenko inks mixed with aloe vera gel (the white kind from the organic food shop that is about 98 percent gel, not the green yuck that is barely 60 percent aloe gel from Rite Aid) and painted the browns and pink shadows on the gills.  I used stabilizer underneath and did all the stitching on the curled tops before layering up with batting and backing.  I then quilted the wholecloth top, outlined the brown tops/edges, and added a little more quilting where necessary to prevent buckling on the brown areas.

Detail 1

Detail 2

It has been such an honor to be a part of so many of the Dinner at Eight exhibits.   I am a better artist and a happier person for having met and worked with and become friends with the strong women involved, starting with Jamie Fingal (http://www.jamiefingaldesigns.com) and Leslie Tucker Jenison (http://www.leslietuckerjenison.com).  I am proud beyond belief of the work I have done for these exhibits, which I consider to be the best of everything I have done, and deliriously happy to be included in this final exhibit.  THANK YOU, Jamie, Leslie and all the Dinner@8 artists.

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Well it was certainly a surprise when Jamie Fingal, co-curator along with Leslie Tucker Jenison, of the Dinner@8 artist exhibits, wrote to say that my Descended from the Stars quilt  and the artwork of several others had been included in an article in Germany’s Patchwork Professional magazine about the Dinner@8 Artists!   It was a tad challenging negotiating the German (no English) website to order a copy, so I called my dear friend Jacquie Scuitto who, having lived most of her adult life in Germany, was able to translate it all and talk me through what to put where to make my order.   The magazine has arrived, and I am simply thrilled to be included in the selected works from the past eight years.

Cover of German Patchwork Professional, issue 04/2016. You can see on the left the banner for the article on Dinner At Eight Artists

The article begins with one of Leslie’s award-winning quilts and an interview with Jamie and Leslie, the co-curators of this annual exhibit.

I was thrilled to be included–there have been at least 30 quilts each year for 8 years, so that’s a LOT of quilts.  The article includes two each of Leslie and Jamie’s work, plus nine other quilts, including several of my favorites:  Haiku by Lyric Montgomery Kinard (a stunning simple but breathtaking portrait of her daughter), this year’s Tiles by Cathie Hoover, and my friend Susan Brubaker Knapp’s I see the Moon.   Congrats to all!

Descended from the Stars is in the top left, just above some of my favorites by Lyric Kinard and Susan Brubaker Knapp. Really, the work is so beautiful in the dinner@8 Exhibits that it is quite heady company to find that I, too, have work included.

Over the past six to seven years, I have been fortunate to be invited *and* be juried in to these exhibits, and I truly feel some of my best work has been for this series.   And of those, this quilt is one of my favorites EVER!

Well, I promised I would blog about the Artist’s Reception and take pictures.  So I remembered to take a picture of the food table (so boring it isn’t here), and as I was packing up I realized I hadn’t taken a single photo as I was busy talking with people, being the gracious hostess and…..I forgot.  But I CAN share the one photo we did get (thank you Terri Tooley!) plus the others I took not-during-the-reception.  And just for Patricia W, at long last a detail photo of the peony (OK, I was gonna share it anyway, but Patricia has asked and I’m happy to share now)!   Thank you so much to everyone who came on Thursday, has been, has visited virtually here and on Facebook, and will get here later this month.  For all the Library photos, if you click on them you can see them larger.

Click on the image to view larger! I’m standing in the doorway to the Picker Room and got it all!

When I finally realized I had forgotten to take pictures, friend and fellow wrestling mom Terri Tooley was still there.  She stepped in to take a photo…Paul said, “this isn’t going to be shared is it?” to which I replied, of course it is!  So here is a RARE photo of Paul, and he’s even smiling!

Husband and wife, flanking their sons (in cloth). Both quilts were of the boys at age 16. Joshua is on the left, Eli on the right.

This is the Rogue’s Gallery, also known as the Family wall (and seen above). From left to right you’ve got Pigwidgeon (of the dog walkies photos on Facebook), my hands, Joshua, Eli, me, a family “scrapbook” quilt called the Two of Us which was in the book and exhibit Inspired by the Beatles, the blue orcas quilt, an older painted silk sunset, and the “yoga” quilt. Unofficially, I am also calling this the Dinner@8 wall, since the five large pieces were all made for juried invitational exhibits put on by Leslie Tucker Jenison and Jamie Fingal.  You can learn more about those exhibits and this year’s here.  My best work over the past six to seven years has consistently been for this exhibit, and I’m honored to be a part of it again this year.

The far wall has two small pieces and my newest, the Peony. The center is challenging to hang, since there is a TV behind the quilt that is used a couple times a month, but it is THE most eye-catching spot.

Detail, Peony. I think I need to take more and better detail shots!  I believe I used 12 pinks, a white, and a couple variegated greens in this quilt.

The left wall as you enter is the second most visible spot after over-the-piano/in-front-of-the-tv. I knew I wanted my labyrinth, Descended From the Stars, to anchor that wall. This side of the room is really about my life, and my life in Maine and nature.

Between the entrance and the mini kitchen area, is a cabinet with a bit of wall.

In the case, I put a few of the many books and magazines in which I have been published inside the case, along with my book ThreadWork Unraveled, my DVD workshop, patterns, some class samples and smaller pieces.

So there we are!

Thanks to all who could come in person, and to all who are visiting virtually.   I’m so delighted, relieved it looks good, and pleased.  Thank you to the Camden Public Library and Ken Gross, who is in charge of the exhibits among many other duties, for this opportunity. Thanks go to Jamie Fingal and Leslie Tucker Jenison of Dinner@8 Artists for the opportunity to create works for their fabulous juried exhibits.

And last but decidedly not least and so very important, MANY thanks to the companies whose products I use and who have supported me over the years including  MistyFuse, Janome America and Superior Threads.  I couldn’t do what I do without quality materials and machines!   I appreciate your support and encouragement more than you can know.

The sun in the center of Descended From the Stars

When I left on in my last post about this quilt, I had shared the dyeing process and the stones and lettering.   Next, I fused trees in the four seasons into the corners.  I distorted the shape so the tree canopy served as a frame.  I had thought initially I might need an inner border, perhaps couched yarn or stitching of some sort, but the shape of the tree worked so well I didn’t need anything extra.   As I did with the stones, I cut out leaves, LOTS of leaves, separating the colors into the ice cube tray so I could place them carefully.

Detail, upper left corner, Spring Tree of Life.  Each of the leaves is free-motion stitched with several rounds of thread on each leaf.  The nice part about doing this at the top stage is that I could use the scissors on my Janome 15000.  I didn’t have to bury thread tails!

Detail, top right, Summer Tree of Life.

Detail of the lower right corner, showing the autumn tree of life.

Detail of the lower left corner, with the winter tree kissed by snow.

I did the stitching around the stones and on the trees, including the leaves, at the top stage with stabilizer underneath.  (See my post here to learn more about my current article for Machine Quilting Unlimited on the Fourth Layer–stabilizer– for densely thread painted quilts.)  I removed the stabilizer everywhere except for under the center because I knew I would want to quilt that area more densely than the rest of the quilt.

Here I have begun quilting.  You can see the custom-dyed cotton duck on the back.  The use of heavier cloth helps keep the quilt flat and stable; it also helps minimize shrinkage.  The final piece had to be 40 x 40 inches, and I wanted to have a balanced amount of blue on both sides of the lettering, so I needed to control the shrinkage that happens with dense quilting.

Next,

Superior Threads (Thank you Bob and Heather Purcell!) has come out with some tone-on-tone variegated threads.   I have been pestering Bob for YEARS to make threads like these as I prefer blendy to contrasty.  I ordered up all of the new earth-tone blendy variegateds in the Fantastico line and used them.  I began with a light green blend in the first row around the sun, switched to another in the next to rings, and then a third in the fourth ring that you see here.  If you look at the left, you can see how I snuck some of the current thread color into the next ring to get even more color blending.

Then, I had to decide what threads to use in the dark areas.  My sewing tables (two back to back) are each 24 inches, so I have a nice, HUGE flat surface to support the quilt as I work.

Choosing thread:  dark, pine-y green and deep blue.

With all the manipulation, I realized that some of the ink had rubbed off, despite being REALLY careful to heat set it according to directions.  I wrote immediately to friends Judy Coates Perez and Susan Brubaker Knapp to seek guidance.  Judy had only used the regular colors, not the metallics.  And Susan had an article in the just-out issue of Quilting Arts about lettering, including these inks!  She too discovered that the metallics seem to “shed” a bit.

After quiting, some of the bling had rubbed off my quilt, so I had to do it AGAIN!  You can see where I have inked over the letters and what is left to re-do.

After re-inking and heat setting, I tested on my scrap cloth several products to seal the ink including GAC 900 (a textile medium that one adds to paint), a UV Coating, matte gel medium, and Krylon Spray Fixative which says it is acid-free, archival and safe on fabric.  Only the Krylon didn’t leave tell-tale signs that it had been used.  So I carefully masked off the rest of the quilt, leaving only the lettering area exposed and sprayed the Krylon on it (stinky!) in hopes that will help prevent the mica flakes in the gold ink from coming off.

I was nearly done, except that I didn’t really care for the multiple layers of thread I had used stitching the sun.  Picking it out did NOT appeal to me.  So I trekked down to Clementine fabrics in Rockland and bought some perle cotton in the right color.

I wasn’t happy with the way the stitching looked, so I couched perle cotton on top of the outline of the sun. MUCH better! You can see the difference in this half-way-through shot.

At last, it was nearly DONE!  Time for facings, sleeve and label.

The back side of the quilt. By dyeing the back to correspond with the front, the quilting design shows up on the back as it does on the front.

And I couldn’t resist the temptation to place a moon behind the sun as my label.  One more time with the dip pen!

The End–the label is on, the sleeve is done, the facings are stitched!

(c)Sarah Ann Smith 2015; quote (c) Mirza Khan, used with permission

This quilt will be for sale–another reason I opted to not include a lot of personal details in the quilt.   As I said before, I am happy!

I am absolutely THRILLED with how my article for Machine Quilting Unlimited’s January/February 2016 issue turned out! I don’t think I’ve been this thrilled since the first time I was published, so thank you editor Kit Robinson and MQU Magazine!

The opening spread on my article about creating Descended From the Stars

Cover of the January/February 2016 Machine Quilting Unlimited (MQU) magazine with the article on the making of Descended From the Stars

In my last article for MQU about The Fourth Layer, Stabilizing the Quilt Sandwich (when doing intense quilting and/or threadwork), published in the  issue, I mused at the end that I might try to use my preferred choice, cotton duck, as the backing (the third layer) instead of as a fourth layer.  When I did just that in my quilt Descended From the Stars, I wrote editor Kit Robinson to share the results, thinking that readers might enjoy a quick update to the article.  Instead, she asked if I would write an article for their “Challenging Quilts” series!  You betcha I would, and now it is just published.

The quilt was made for the current Dinner@8 exhibit Affinity, and you can read the call for entry in the photo above, just to the right of the full-page image (and wow am I thrilled my photography looks so good and accurate on the page!).  At the top right of the right hand page you can read the quote written on the quilt, but I’ll also close this post with the quote which is fitting at this time of year.

The article takes you from the initial seed of an idea, to the call for entry, and through the creation process:  developing the working sketch, ideas abandoned, dyeing fabric (sometimes twice on the same cloth to get it right) and more.   I hope you will enjoy reading it; I certainly enjoyed making it and look forward to having it home.  And maybe entering it into shows or even selling it!  Yes, it would be hard to part with it, but a girl’s gotta make a living.

Squee! On the first page of the Table of Contents!

As soon as I get the pie, cranberries and stuffing made today, I’m going to treat myself to a good sit-down and cuppa tea with this issue.  I always love Margaret’s articles and her posts on FB–she is simply a brilliant quilter.  She can take an already-outstanding client top and make it over-the-moon fantastic.  And I am REALLY looking forward to (and trying out) my friend Lisa Walton’s article on painting on your quilt after doing the quilting.  I wanted to win her donation quilt in the last SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) auction, but missed out to someone with a larger budget than mine.  Good for SAQA, but sad for me.

And here’s that inspiring quote from Mirza Khan, the Religious Studies Director at my old High School, San Domenico:

We have descended from the stars.  We have risen through the forms of thousands of animals.  We have passed through the lives of our ancestors, our grandparents, and our parents.  And now we have been born into the moment of our supreme existence.  We have a life.  What will we do with it? –Mirza Khan (used with permission, and with great thanks)

Welcome back to the light now that solstice is passed (and I’ll get caught up on my Foto Fridays that have been missing since the demise of the old laptop) and on to the peace and joy of the season, and a long winter for making art!