quilt block interpretation & doodlins

I had so much fun doing the granny square piece that I decided to take it another step further and see what I could do with quilt blocks. After charting several different ideas, this is the one I decided to start with, a cross stitched spin on a star block. I'm doing my model in emeralds, but this could be changed up to just about any colorway. (And I've played with a few of them!)

Yesterday's stitching progress...

And a bit of stay-up-late doodling....

I tried to pull this one into PatternMaker, but the lines are too close together. It becomes one muddy mess on the digital graph paper. BUT...it has given me some other ideas.

Blizzard warning here last night, and there is still a windchill warning today. No where to be until 11pm tonight for my overnight shift, so I think today is going to be all about me and embroidery!

next up....i think....

Still revising and doing some editing, but this I believe, will be the next design I'll be working on.

I am working the overnight at the group home tonight, so I am tweaking this in another window even as I write this post.  I'm looking forward to starting on this. Kind of a departure from some of my other design work, although I've been meandering away from the "comical" stuff for awhile now.  Sometimes a break is needed, and I think that's what my work now is reflecting. Too much of my other 'stuff' was getting repetitive. I've a lot of sketches in various stages of charting, and I am really hoping that I can start 2014 off with a bang. 

I'm also hoping to get my quilt groove on, too.  Going to be working on a quilt for the 2015 National Quilt Museum contest using all my own fabrics.  Super duper pumped 'bout that one.

something different

In my early days of college, I use to paint abstracts. I used a lot of geometric shapes (triangles were my thing then!) and I deconstructed the shapes, leaving some edges intact, others were disintegrating, some of the shapes melted into the next. I liked the organic feel-- the way the hard bits were melted into softer, more natural elements.

Lately I've been pulled back to quilting and illusion and as I sat down to fiddle with some new design ideas, I found myself in Photoshop manipulating some urban pictures I had taken. Stretching things out, adding filters and so on. The image was then pulled into Pattern Maker and I started to play with flipping squares, deleting bits here and there.  This is the end result. It's actually quite small, which I think, once stitched, will make it quite dynamic.

I'm currently working on a quilt idea and I think that this might work into that. More details as I go!

Finishing up the quilt that I am submitting to Irish Quilting Magazine.  While I cannot share the actual quilt design just yet, I can share some of what has inspired it!

Thistles.  These images were captured in August, a family camping trip along the Minnesota River. 

I marveled at how tall they had gotten. Wondered, if left to grow in my yard if they would do the same. 

We're always so quick to groom away weeds. I think a yard full of these would be amazing.

Tell that to the neighbors.

These too...

I have been taking milk thistle and dandelion supplements for years. Amazing healing properties for both.

Just weeds?  I think not.

I want a wild yard. One that I don't have to mow, one that could just exist as its meant to. 

Until I find a way to get that (my neighbors just don't get it!) I'll just have to wander.

Which isn't such a bad thing either.

And finally, for today...
speaking of wandering, go check this out
Crashingly Beautiful
a wonderful place shared with me by one of my storytelling, role-playing, writing pals

freeform embroidered scarf & sketchy stuff

While working on my starry-night-meets-coral-reef scarf, I discovered a couple of tiny holes. With the fabric being what it is and what I wanted to do with this piece, darning the holes wasn't an option. SO. I worked one as an eyelet hole, and another, and pretty soon I was cutting more holes on purpose.  There is a ton of scarf surface left to stitch, but I am quite pleased with how this is coming along. 

I was at doctor's appointment this morning with my son, and while he was in visiting with his doctor, I sat and doodled. I'm not sure why these two came to mind, but I've a few others of them as well in recent pen scratchings. Kind of rough, but it feels good to be doing some random sketchy kinds of things. 

This guys eyes got way out of hand, but I was kind of digging the 'stache. 

Now I'm off to finish up block 3 of the Irish Quilting Magazine piece, and to look through fabric swatches for the traditional quilt blocks so I can order the fabric. I'm very excited about it!

thrift store and herbs galore

This morning I finally went and bought the first of my herbs and got them potted; sweet basil, globe basil, thyme and oregano, a bit of rosemary and this year I also tired a little summer savory. I also planted a few marigolds and other annuals and hope to fill out the flower box this week.

As soon as my daughter returns with the camera, I'll shoot some starter pictures!

I also stopped at the thrift shops today. Found a few goodies, including a book called
Weaving Designs for Needlepoint by Sally Nicolleti from 1978.

Chock full of motifs from various cultures, the book has lot of needlework designs that I think will  translate to  cross stitch. I have been looking for a source book for a long time with decent motifs that I can rework into pillow covers, bags and the like. So yep, was really rather tickled when I  found this gem tucked into a basket at my very first stop of the day!!  Another addition to my art library!

I also found two bags of wooden beads and some fun vintage handkerchiefs.  I think I might work a little more slow cloth to make  part of the garment for her...

I found this primitive, muslin doll form at the shop as well and started painting her face this afternoon. Hope to get a little more done later today after she dries.

Meanwhile, I think I need to lay down a few more stitches on Ghoulie Parade, and then maybe  figure out a little more of the quilt I'm doing for Irish Quilting Magzine.  After figuring out the layout and the measurements, its time to get all my supplies. Too many fabrics out there to choose from!  I am leaning a little more toward batiks.

Stitching the four cross stitched blocks will begin next week (I hope!) as I have a few days off with my brother and his family visiting. I always seem to get so much done whenever they are home. Weird, I know, as it should be just the opposite, but I am really creatively motivated when my family has the good fortune of all being together!

Part Two

Today I finished getting all the leaves and blooms ironed in place, and with fabric pastels I colored in the trunk and branches. Once I have heat set the pastels, I will add some detailing with embroidery. I am fascinated by trees, and I am already envisioning a few more pieces along this same vein.

Now off to finish backstitching "Walking the Cat"!

Creative 365: A Whole Bunch of Days...Um...56, 57 and 58ish

I have been working on many things through this last week, most of which I did not have enough done to make a suitable blog post until now!  Today's adventure was again, fabric painting. This piece was based on the stains left behind on a hunk of cardboard I had used to back a previous painting. It needs more work, but I am really liking the soft and watery effect I've got going so far.

It's worked with DynaFlow paints and fabric crayons.

I also started charting more designs for the 'no backstitching' group of cross stitch.  I am about half-way through stitching the first and hope to have it done after the weekend. I've yet to decide if I'm going to work simple buttons into these as embellishment yet, or if I'm just going to leave them as simple as they are.

And, last but not least, I completed a quirky little patchwork bit of recycled fabric out of the scraps of vintage handkerchiefs I have been using for the hanky flowers.

Finished my college courses and will have my AAS in Graphic Design now. The summer will be spent exploring a whole lot of things before I return to Minnsota State Mankato

 to finish my BFA in Painting and Print Making. 

Then, who knows! 

Photoshop and Fabric Design

My Special Problems class required me to work through a project of my choosing, and I decided to design a quilt fabric collection and then with the use of Photoshop, work those swatch images into  a quilt. This is the result! I was fairly happy with how it turned out. 

Playing with fabric design

I  have been playing around with quilt fabric design using some of my own illustrations from my cross stitch design. This is some of what I have done so far. I still have some serious tweaking to do with the colors. This turquoise is coming up reeeeally bright and not quite as it did on my Mac, and printing comps I found that it was pretty glaring and not as cool and icey as I had wanted it to be. Once I get the adjustments done, I will post them again for comparison.  I might need to run over to ColourLovers to play with hexcodes and palletes to get the look I really want. 

I am also working on another series using Jepedo from my FernFolk series and have started with a palette that I made in ColourLovers.  I am definately thinking it is the better way to pick the colors as you can see how they work off each other immediately. I want to work through a few different color schemes as well.

Color by COLOURlovers

My goal?  To finally get a line that I feel really good about (am almost there!) and get into designing fabric along with the needlework designing. I am envisioning a combination of the two. Maybe fabric that is coordinated with the cross stitch design for home interiors. Quilts, pillows, etc.