Hi all…have been working like a mad hatter this week, and HOPING to find an online link to the current QA Embellishments on-line, but not having much luck….that luck just changed…. this is what the top of the newsletter looks like…

To see my article for them, click here!

Not long ago I shared some leaf printing…well in the October 6 issue, #104, this online newsletter featured my tips on how to preserve leaves for printing later…like in mid-winter when there are no leaves (but time to do the printing).

Since the newsletter is still current, I won’t duplicate the information here at this point….  In the meantime, if you’d like to subscribe to the QA newsletter, click here.

I’m actually in the process of quilting the fabric pictured… it is the LAST project I am making for my book / manuscript…. a collective HOORAY please….. at least the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t quite so dim!   Back in a few days I hope, Cheers, Sarah

I swear it has taken longer to get around to writing the blogpost and take the pics than it did to quilt this little piece!  Well, not counting the nearly two years it has taken me to get around to quilting it either!  Only REALLY long-time readers will remember that in 2006 I did my first dyeing workshop with Carol Soderlund, which I blogged about here — there are actually three posts, late August and September 2006 I had this tiny bit of fabric… 9 x 22 inches or so… leftover, so one day at the end I grabbed a plastic cup, squished the fabric into the bottom and added some yellow dye or something (?).  Then I squished in more fabric and poured on blue dye.  My tablemate Debby Harwell took one look at it when it came out and said “OH, it looks like trees and a pond!”

(Note:  pics in this post are clickable to make them a bit larger.)

Of course I could never see the piece as anything else SINCE then!   Finally, I told myself I abso-positively HAD to get around to quilting something to take in to sell at Ducktrap Trading company, the gallery where I sell some of my work here in Camden, Maine.

My thought was to keep this a wholecloth.  However, when it was done, it kinda lacked OOMPH–the colored quilting helped, but not quite enough.

So what does any self-respecting art quilter do?  Add paint! I had just begun in the photo above, when it occurred to me that I really ought to get a before photo (and should have gotten a before quilting, too, but too late now!)… here’s a detail:

Then I went to town and colored all the smaller trees, the trunk and the boughs of the Maine state tree, the White Pine.  The branches reach out like arms, hands turned up to the sun….. here’s another detail to show what a difference a bit of color makes…MUCH better!

Since I’m not too sure how water-soluble these babies are (very I think) I sprayed the painted area with spray fixative to keep it from running in case of accidental moisture.  I couched yarn to the edges (one of my favorite edge finishes for art quilts that are on the small side), then thought some wind-fall branches from the yard would be perfect.  Making the hanging loops and sewing them by hand was a bit fiddly, but it worked.  Now, to go in and do the miserable color editing behind the quilt so it merges with the background of my website, get it posted on to the site, listed for sale, then do an invoice for $250 and take it down to the gallery and pray someone in this sad economy is still buying art!

I’m thrilled to be able to share that I will be demo-ing leaf printing at in the Open Studios part of the Make It University area( — more info is at Make It University (MIU)) at the International Quilt Festival in Houston, currently scheduled for 8-10 pm Wednesday on sneak preview evening!  MIU is sponsored by Quilting Arts, LLC, and is part of their mixed media branch of things (along with the magazine Cloth Paper Scissors which also has a cool article on sketching / journals in the issue featured on the current webpage).

For my I-hope-to-finish-it-in-this-lifetime-manuscript my last project to make is for a small quilt I’m calling First Frost.  It will be either a table runner, a wall-hanging or both.  Finished dimensions will be about 15×60 inches.  I wanted to offer a project that would entice folks to play with all the glorious metallic and holographic threads currently available….   so I dyed two-plus a bit-yards of cotton in these beautiful clear, light blues and lavender.   Then I collected leaves …..

The first time I did leaf printing I simply used a sponge paintbrush, daubed on the paint, then pressed the leaf with my fingers.  This time I have better supplies and technique (I hope).  I wanted a smooth, clear print.  To get that, it works a lot better if you pour paint on a piece of glass, roll a sponge brayer, then  roll the paint onto the leaf.

Notice there are TWO brayers in this picture…the one on the right is actually a black sponge brayer with gold paint on it.  The one to the left is a “soft” rubber roller.  In the top photo, you can see a piece of parchment paper on the side.  Place the leaf on the cloth, paint side down.  Cover with the parchment paper, then roll with the soft rubber brayer to get a smooth even print.  It is important (ahem) that you not have wrinkles in the plastic underneath and not be on the crack in the table, else they will show up in the leaf print.  Guess how I remembered that one.  A couple of times.  Ahem. (grin!)

Here’s the 30×60 inch piece of cloth…I will split it down the center to have a two-sided runner/hanging:

The paints are all metallic…blues, silver and gold (mixed with pearl).  Then I plan to quilt from both sides…with metallic in the needle and a matching heavy poly in the bobbin… then when I outline the leaves on one side, it will make a skeleton “print” on the other side…. Can’t wait to see how (if?) this works!)

Here’s a detail:

I’ll be demonstrating how to do this, how to preserve leaves for leaf-printing in winter when the trees are bare (I have just harvested leaves for this coming season!) and maybe some Shiva paintstik techniques as well.  Evening is not exactly my best time of day (think snooze) so I’ll bring some chocolate…please come and help me stay lively and say hello!

To my utter astonishment and delight, one of my newest pieces–Fields of Gold– (finished in the nick of time) has been juried into Art Quilts XIII at the Chandler Center for the Arts in Chandler, Arizona.  Actually, if I tell the total truth, the facings weren’t even completely sewn down when I took the photos for my entries!

I am mind-boggled to find myself in the company of so many of the leading art quilters today…. the list of those in the show is here.

A little bit about this piece:  I had designed the center part, which I called Sunset Trees, for a project / exercise for the applique section of my manuscript.  It is 9×12 inches (or thereabouts) and I intended for it to finish at that size…small and easy to manage as a learning exercise.  Then, I was able to help my friend Lisa Walton of Dyed and Gone to Heaven (Sydney, Australia) get an entry into the IQA / Festival at Houston when she unexpectedly got a quilt finished and photographed in time, but not enough time to mail reliably (i.e. quickly) from Australia to Texas.  I told her not to send anything, but she did anyway…a metre of her glorious hand-dyed fabric that ranged from rust to gold to green.  I pinned the fabric up on my design wall, next to Sunset Trees, trying to figure out how to make a journal entry for this year.  I couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t trite (the black silhouette of an Aussie cowboy and outback house against the glowing sun…been done well by others, and too many times).  Then I realized that if I used one section of the piece, it meshed PERFECTLY with Sunset Trees’ background.

Then I mulled over the quilting… at first I thought of blowing grasses.  Then, in the back of my mind, the song Fields of Gold by Sting came to mind.  I knew I had seen a quilt named after that song somewhere…and when the Frayed Edges got together in early September I mentioned it.  Deborah piped up:  it was on my blog!  I did one!  So here is Deborah’s version!  To me, the wheat fields of late summer /autumn are Fields of Gold, so I googled wheat images, learned that some wheat has the really long whiskers, other varieties have shorter, fewer whiskers, etc.   I think my favorite part of this entire quilt is the wheat quilting!  Once again, I seem to be moving toward nearly wholecloth pieces that are drawn with thread…. Here’s a detail:

Enjoy…now back to working on the Elusive Crested Batiki Bird, a small piece I’m doing for another Lark book on small quilts.  Cheers!

Creativity is like bunnies.  All you need is two and a little bit of time, and then you have LOTS, it just takes (ahem) practice.  Even in the few buildings and spaces of the top of Mount Washington and the observatory, I found lots of inspiration.  There is an OLD building half dug into the rocky top of the mountain that used to be an old hotel.  Inside were these gems….

An old lamp:

Wouldn’t that scrollwork and fill-pattern be wonderful in an applique or a quilting design?

And the woodstove…the top:

and the front…what a design!:

Then there are the converging lines of the observatory rooftop / pavers, with the guys at the railing:

Then there’s that cairn of rocks….

Repeating lines in the stairs:

And the stairs from the parking area up to the observatory from the side:

A grate over that stream by the entrance (with part of my shadow):

The screen in the Japanese (!!!) restaurant in Gorham:

Repeat after me:  harmony, rhythm, repetition….  and again but in circles:

I love that photo…the contrast of the red and black, the dark of the background/ceiling, the lines in the lanterns, the round shapes….

It all goes to prove that there are ideas for quilts, applique, piecing and quilting design EVERYWHERE…. once you get into the habit of actually SEEING what is there, instead of passively looking and absorbing, you can find inspiration all over the place…. the creativity breeds like bunnies….. the trick of course is weeding out the good ideas from the bad, but that’s another blogpost entirely!