hand painted fabric – Page 4

A Couple of WIPs

Posted on September 7, 2022 by Laura Kate

Yesterday I officially lost at yarn chicken.

I have about 16 rounds plus the toe left to knit. Grr. So I wandered through my stash to see if I could find a good substitute and come up with a gameplan.

This morning, entering my studio, I suddenly spied The Swatch. Then I remembered that I had knit two swatches for this project! Both of them included the cream yarn.

In other news, I have been painting fabric for the Badlands quilt. Here is a group of color samples in my chosen palette.

I also spent a lot of time simplifying my sketch and making a pattern on freezer paper. This pattern will become the cutting guide for the quilt’s segments. I don’t call them blocks, because they are all different shapes, following the major lines of the subject.

I actually got underway with cutting and sewing some of these segments, starting from the background.

I’m pretty happy with the work so far. But now I am waiting on fabric to be delivered. In acknowledgement of my rather crude fabric painting skills, I broke down and bought some batik fabrics with colors for the middle ground of the design.

In the meantime, I plan to paint the backing fabric and make the quilt sandwich this week. Then I will be ready to move forward as soon as the package arrives.

quilting

SAHRR Round 2: Fire

Posted on January 25, 2022 by Laura Kate

Photo by EKATERINA BOLOVTSOVA on Pexels.com

No, I’m not burning my quilt. Instead, I have applied this round’s prompt of Diamonds to my Fire block. My logic for this choice is that tongues of flames, such as you see in the image above, can be stylized as acute triangles, with the narrowest point at the top. If one has a more romantic leaning, one might say that diamonds are created by the forces of pressure and HEAT in the bowels of the earth.

The piece of fabric I chose to represent Fire is a beautiful brocade woven on white with a clear orangey-pink thread. The shape can be described as a series of diamonds inside overlapping circles.

I chose these fabrics for the diamond-inspired border:

**The yellow and orange print is one of my hand-painted fabrics. I created the circles by stamping red paint using the back end of a Nerf bullet.**

Fortunately, I learned how to make triangle shapes out of strip sets from a Craftsy class presented by Joanna Figueroa.

https://www.craftsy.com/class/smarter-strip-quilting/

After sewing a light and a dark strip together, I cut the sets on a 45 degree angle to get diamonds. Then I sewed them into strips and attached the strips to the right and left sides of my brocade fabric.

For the bottom border, I used a strip of the soft coral ombre fabric.

Here is my block so far.

It’s not perfectly square, and I have yet to decide on what fabric to use at the top of the block. I’ll have to let the options stew about in my brain for a while. Once completed, I intend the block to measure about 17″ square.

If you’re interested in seeing more Round Robin projects made by some awesome quilters, check out Emily’s blog and the Linky party invitation embedded in her post.

http://thedarlingdogwood.blogspot.com/

collage, quilting

Wednesday WIP – Art Quilt

Posted on June 30, 2021 by Laura Kate

Yesterday I spent some time working through the design and material choices still facing me with regard to “Catbird Sings.” I settled on the arrangement for the lower half of the work, tacking it into place. The violet satin cord will serve as a transition device linking the lower to the upper half of the piece.

It will be couched into place when I start sewing. Next I chose and cut out various bits and bobs from two printed fabrics to represent his varied “cat calls”.

The colors all link well to the palette chosen. The wavy lines will represent the loud squawks. Before proceeding to the next steps, I treated all the edges with Fraycheck.

Those wavy pieces in particular will shred massively if not treated.

I was ready to test some layouts for the upper half:

I like this grouping. But do I use the daisies with petal sides up……..

….or petal-side down. Hmmmmmmm….. I like the line created by the upside daisies.

And here is how I left the work. Before I finalize, I will need to decide on how I will quilt all of the different sections. It won’t do to fall in love with a layout and then struggle to quilt around it.

I’ll sleep on it and see how I feel the next day.

colorwork

Wednesday Color Experiments

Posted on June 23, 2021 by Laura Kate

While perusing Bethan Ash’s book on quilt collages, I suddenly realized something.

I have been experimenting with fabric paint on quilt cotton for the past two years. And yet I have never used the most basic of all paint techniques: Spatter!

I decided to remedy that omission today. First, I went to my fabric stash and picked up some muslin.

This most basic of all fabrics is lightweight and inexpensive. I cut a width of fabric piece, dividing into three rectangles to match the size of my work surface.

I decided on three color schemes: primary colors, secondary colors and artist’s choice option. For my spatter tools, I chose a 2 inch brush, 1 inch foam brushes and a toothbrush.

After pressing the muslin, I laid the first piece on my white board. Then I spritzed it lightly with water. Working from lightest to darkest shade, I dipped the brush into the paint and then shook, jiggled, and tapped it over the muslin until the drops reached all areas of the fabric.

Since it was a sunny day, I took the first one outside so it could dry quickly right on the board. Once dried, I moved on to the secondary colors.

This is a very pretty combination.

For my last combination of colors, I chose magenta as the first color. I had purchased this paint recently and hadn’t even opened the jar. To accompany the magenta, I mixed the left-over violet with the left-over blue to get a cool purple. The third color will be black.

I like this sample the best.

You may be wondering how I plan to used these samples. Well…….I’m not exactly sure. But since I am pondering improvisational collage quilts today, odds are good that they will get fusible adhesive attached to them and cut up into smallish pieces.

Then I will play.

quilting

Stay at Home Round Robin Quilting

Posted on January 11, 2021 by Laura Kate

Okay, so I got started on this project through fellow blogger Chris Knits.

SAHRR 2021 | chrisknits (wordpress.com)

In a traditional round robin, quilters make a block, then pass it to the next quilter who would add to it, then pass to the next, and so on, until the piece had completed its circulation. The final result is a big surprise to the original quilter when it returns to her.

This is a COVID version. Each quilter keeps her original block, but responds to weekly challenges by adding a border around her block. Each quilter in the round robin is responsible for providing one prompt to the group.

Can I try? I’m kinda new to quilting, but I have a few pieces of fabric left over from projects I finished last year. I invited myself to participate. Chris said, “go for it.”

Today each quilter is unveiling her center block. I better get started. First I pulled a few leftover strips that seemed to be big enough.

Both fabrics were experiments. The center piece is overpainted with opaque turquoise. then stamped with a metallic bronze color. The orange piece was painted pale pink, then a resist applied, followed by a deep orange paint. Removing the resist reveals pink lines.

So I have my palette, but I need supporting fabrics and a plan for the rest of the block. During my stash rummage, I turned up this beautiful batik that I had bought just because it was on sale.

The other two fabrics are too small, so I went to the hobby store to buy similar colors.

That part was easy for me. Selecting a block design? I needed help, so I got out a quilting reference book by Celia Eddy.

Gosh, I am so glad I bought this. Now, focusing on patterns that feature a center design and are not too hard for a beginner, I selected this one.

The pattern is called Economy, and includes a square, a right-angle triangle, a focus fabric and three supporting fabrics. It is rated for beginning quilters. Within an hour or so, I had put together my block.