Christmas on the Cards

 A little Christmas post on Christmas Day.

This year's Christmas challenge at IPS Eastern branch was making a fabric postcard to be sent to a care home resident. I made a few and sent some to friends and neighbours too.

After posting the cards on Instagram I was also invited to take part in a fabric postcard exchange by some Russian quilters, and I made a special New Year  themed one for my exchange partner in Moscow.

It took some time, but the card arrived safe and sound, almost at the same time as her card came to me:

So, this is how I dived into the world of textile postcards and started to discover its possibilities. If you haven't tried them before, there is a little tutorial on IPS website, and Instagram is full of inspirational examples.

Forgot to show the backsides - here I got to play with some of the decorative stitches on my machine that I do not normally use for anything.

Linking up to:

Off the Wall Friday at Creations by Nina-Marie

Can I Get a Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Of Flowers and Letters

This project lies at the intersection of two of my interests - quilting and lettering. I heard about the #36daysoftype challenge in Instagram several years ago, but didn't have the time then, or the year after, or... until this year, anyway.

The commitment is to design and post a letter or number every day for 36 days, the reward is to enjoy all the beautiful, quirky, mind-boggling, sweet or provocative interpretations of the same letter posted by artists, calligraphers, animators, illustrators from all over the world.

I only found out that it started on the day that it started, so I didn't have the time to make a couple of entires in advance or even to think through my concept and it emerged gradually through the first couple of days. I think D was the first really nice one.

The concept, as it developed, was Art-Nouveau inspired illustrated initials with floral motifs. Three fabrics for each letter: a pastel background, relatively dark letter, and a lighter tint of the same colour for the flowers of leaves. Detail and stems were added with a thread, which more or less matched the main colour. The appliqué was done on Pelmet Vilene with the help of Bondaweb, then free-motion quilted.

I did the initial sketches in Procreate on my iPad, several at a time, whenever I had the time, so the process of making the letter itself did not take long and could be fitted into most days. I fell back a couple of times, but then caught up making two or three at a time.

Unfortunately, I ran out of Pelmet Vilene before the end of the project, and not just anywhere, but right after I completed the letter X. None of the scraps left was big enough to cut one last 6 inch square.

Obviously, I knew it was coming, and I had ordered more, but that was the beginning of the strict lockdown and the shop closed even its online operations, so the order was left to hang there for several weeks. I finally received my materials when the instagram challenge was over, but I still completed the last letter and decided not to go into the numbers this time.

So, here they are, all of them:

Morning star

It's been a while. It's been such a while that it's actually time to give back the trophy I wrote about two posts ago...
Our little lady has finished her wonderful Daisy Chain quilt and is starting a new one, called Morning Star.

It measures about 8'' and is all machine pieced and quilted (in fact, I think I quilted it too much for the size, I like the effect, but it's now very stiff). The main thing here was playing with colour to make it shine.

So, it's all ready to go to this year's winner and I really hope they like it.

This is the nice thing about IPS James Lawlor Trophy - although the figurine moves on, every winner gets to keep the previous winner's mini quilt forever and ever. Just to remind, this is the beautiful Daisy Chain by Linda Cowley that I get to keep, it's also about 8'' and it has hand appliqué and embroidery as well as mind-bogglingly precise crosshatch quilting.

And this is the bronze quilter when she is not working on a quilt (but planning the next one, apparently):

Linking up to http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/2019/06/silk-painting-101-off-wall-friday.htmlOff the Wall Friday at Creations by Nina-Marie

Rehearsing Crafted Applique

I've set mastering Crafted Appliqué as my challenge and goal for September. Before starting "the real thing" I decided to try it out on some batik scraps, because I'm going to use a batik for my planned project. And to make it the toughest test possible I chose a mini-mini format))

I'm happy to say it worked well on the tiny pieces (the stems are about 1/8'' wide and the petals 1'' by 1/4'', the whole thing in just a bit larger than 6'' top to bottom). The most difficult thing was to finish the mini-mini, binding and everything, instead of starting the new project)))

I chose dark green and light blue scraps, so the subject came naturally - squill, the first flowers to appear in spring on the forest floor, sometimes amidst the remnants of snow (I decided to add some snow after I finished the flowers))). The flowers are almost life-size. I had to fight the temptation to play with different colors, because that would mean pre-treating lots of different scraps, and just stuck with the chosen ones.

Without further comments: