Back to dyeing

High on the list for this summer has been to get back to dyeing fabrics. As August rolled in, I knew I needed to get going on this, to take advantage of the hot weather while it's here. I reviewed my notes from Carol Soderlund's great workshop that I took in April of 2009, wrote up step-by-step notes for myself, and began. I'm starting out with colors that I'd like for a midwestern landscape quilt (a fabric version of an earlier piece I did with pastel on paper) and also to build up a supply of fabric in the palette for further Pine Grove quilts. The results from the first two days are above. The three greens on the right are all the same dye formula, but with different methods for the dyeing. Not all the colors turned out to be exactly what I was aiming for, but comparing them to the one-inch samples I was working from (sample book from the workshop), I can see that this is because of "misreading" the color from the small sample. Two pieces of the green were done in a traditional low-immersion method, but the 3rd green piece and all the other colors I did with a flat-dyeing method from Robin Ferrier, which is easier for doing multiple pieces in different colors, and also easier on my hands (I'm trying to rest my right hand because of pain from too much hand-sewing). Both methods yield solids, with very slight variations that are pleasing rather than "defective." The pieces that were flat-dyed were consistently lighter in value than the sample swatches, so I'll just take that into account in the future.

And now for some bright colors

My friend Kay visited me a week ago for four days, and we collaborated on this quilt (about 25 x 32" with 6" squares). We'd been talking for a while about doing a quilt with black and assorted solids, and decided on making the sort of "liberated" crazy-pieced block that Gwen Marston has made popular. This was a fun project to do together; we each made 7 blocks for a total of 14, giving us some extra choices when we got to the point of deciding on placement. The top is done, and now is waiting its turn in line for quilting.

For those who like using black fabric, I recommend Michael Miller Jet Solid Black, available from Fiber on a Whim. This is a darker black even than the Amish black I previously had been using.

Small stone piece finished

I finished up a small piece I posted about on May 20. It doesn't look very different in its finished form, because all I did was stitch on the dark gray border, quilt in-the-ditch with invisible thread in some of the interior lines, and finish with a faced binding. Perhaps the border should be quilted. But somehow the starkness of the piece, without quilting, is what I want. The shape suggests a tomb to me.

Here's the back, which shows how minimal the quilting is, and also shows the method of faced binding with curved inner corners that I learned from my friend Mary Beth:


Below is a photo of several of the various things I've done on the theme of stones. The top right is a paper collage, posted about here, bottom left is a piece done with my hand-painted fabric, posted about here, and the bottom right is just a trial, may or may not go further, the stone made from my hand-dyed fabric and the background fabric from Janet Smith. All of them in the vicinity of about 15" wide.

Sample of machine quilting

I've finished all the remaining applique on the four tiers of "Shelter." Even though I tried to pace myself, doing all this applique was stressful on my wrist, and I've developed a ganglion cyst. So, I need to find a way to machine quilt this piece rather than hand-quilting, which would be even more stressful on my wrist than applique. On the small sample piece above, I've quilted every other strip with "in the ditch" quilting (which runs right up against the seam-line). I think this is good--maybe even better in final appearance than hand-quilting. You can't see it unless you look extremely closely, and it will give a more flat texture than hand-quilting would. I did a row of top-stitching also, just to see how it would look. If you click on the photo above to enlarge, you can see it on the middle strip in the turquoise tier. Top-stitching is easier to do than ditch-stitching, but it would add another visible line, which I don't want here.

I recently ordered some Japanese Daiwabo fabric. I think it is a possibility for background fabric for appliquéed stones. On some pieces, I've used linen, which gives a nice contrast of texture, but the local fabric store just has one color.
I also ordered some plain white linen to dye; if that works, I'd have a wide range of choice possible.

One summer project is to get back to fabric dyeing. I've cleared a table and taken out my notes. This week I hope to figure out the basic routine again and get started.

Back to Shelter

I put in a lot of work on "Shelter" in the winter and spring, to get to the point where I could roughly join the four tiers and show the quilt as part of the talk I gave in late April on "From Study to Studio: Meaning and Motivation in Scholarship and Art." (Here's a post where you can see what it looked like then, and where I explain problems that remained.) After the talk, I needed a break from the quilt. I also knew that I would be getting together in early June with quilting friends from the Chicago area, and that they could help me think through the problems. And they did! With their help I made a decision about what to do with the bottom right corner, and they also pointed out a couple of areas in the piecing that could use some adjusting.

Having spent some time clearing out the studio, and doing the easy-piecing of the four-patch posie quilt, I finally felt ready last week to put "Shelter" back up on the design wall. I pieced some additional orange-red to fix the bottom-right corner, fixed the piecing spots, and am now doing the final hand appliqué (photo above shows a basted part that I am now sewing down). I have some of the turquoise section, most of the black section, and the small added orange-red section still to go (the rest was completed before). This is my favorite part of the process, as I get to sit quietly with the colors.

The challenges remaining will be: 1) final joining of the four tiers (though I have some confidence on this, having done the rough join before my talk) and 2) quilting. I've purchased a low-loft ("Request") cotton batting. Quilting will be minimal--just enough to hold the layers together and to add depth to the piece. It would be easier to machine-quilt, as there is a layer of interfacing/stabilizer throughout the quilt, as well as multiple layers of fabric in many places. But my feelings about the quilt lead me to hand-quilting. My plan is to begin with hand-quilting, but if it is just too difficult, to fall back on machine-quilting. (I considered hand-tieing the quilt, but I think that would be the wrong look, even with the ties on the back.)

benefits of running out of a fabric

Here's the completed top for the "four-patch stacked posie" pattern (by HD Designs). When I was purchasing fabric for the frames, sashing, and cornerstones, I just estimated the yardage. Turned out I was short on the yellow/gold for the framing of the blocks, and the fabric store is 150 miles away. I had some other fabric that was close enough to work, but I thought I'd try out some assorted reds that I had on hand for the rest of the frames. I'm glad I ran out of the first fabric! I think the combination gives the top more interest. A couple of closeups:

A fabric stone collage

Time to catch up, now that teaching and the art class I was taking are both finished for the year. The collage of cut up images of stones that I did for the art class (last post) led to the fabric collage above, made from cutting up "stonescapes" I did a while ago, appliquéing hand-painted fabric onto linen. (You can see one such piece at the top of this post.) The collage is about 8" x 10." I think this is possibly a good direction to go in, accomplishing more abstraction for stone imagery. I'd like to try more pieces like this, possibly piecing them together into something much larger. But I can't go further on this until I paint some more fabric, one of the things on my list for the summer. I also realize that instead of being limited to the one or two appropriate colors of linen that I can readily find commercially, I can dye the linen myself. So that's on the list too, as well as dyeing cotton yardage in a number of colors to have available for a couple of other projects. But first I'm finishing up a simple patchwork quilt that I started as a side treat while grading papers last month, and I'm basting up a small quilt for a hand-quilting project, as I don't have anything right now for those moments when I just want to sit and hand-quilt.

The most daunting summer project is to finish up "Shelter." This will go back up on the design wall before long.

Here are some of the blocks for the patchwork quilt (pattern by HD Designs, "4-Patch Stacked Posies"):

All made from this fabric: