Exhibition Time

Contemporary Quilters West 

Our next exhibition, Unfolding Stories 2 

Come and meet the artists, we 

love to chat about what we do!

Fossils

I haven't posted for a while because I have been busy finishing my pieces

for our upcoming exhibition at Rook Lane Gallery in Frome.

Below is just a little taster of the pieces all inspired

by Hagstones.

Each piece measures 10" square

There are 9 in total and when hung will

form a 3x3 tile measuring

32" square with the spacing inbetween 

each one.

 

So now they are done I have been playing with Xpandaprint

and some stencils of fossils and fish.

I followed the technique shown by 

Lynda Monk 

I used EZ screens and exposed them using my 

own designs.  I find I have better results exposing them

using sunlight rather than an exposure lamp.

With the weather we've had here in the UK lately 

I had to wait a while!

Two of the screens exposed and drying on the washing line!

 

Xpandaprint printed through the screen ready for heating.

I think there is a little too much Xpandaprint on the fabric.

 

Two of the ammonite fragments on a stitched

grid on the Tyvek, the one on the left

didn't need to be on on the grid as it has connecting lines.

The one on the right has lost some of it's definition as too

much paste was applied.

 

 

I love the fragments left over from the heating/melting

process, these have the potential to turn into pieces of rock!

 

As well as using Tyvek I decided to try out the Xpandaprint on

soluble paper.  Above is the fish stencil, the one on the left is the 

soluble paper.

 

After heating I popped the paper into water and as you can

see from the above picture the result wasn't what I had hoped for!

Xpandaprint doesn't gel well together on its own, it

definitley needs a stabiliser behind it.

Finally I wanted to add some colour to the fossils.

For these two I used Adirondack Inks with a 

little bit of  bronze acrylic brushed over the top when dry.

 

Am fairly pleased with the results for a first go.  Ideally

I would like to try and get the Xpandaprint a little thinner 

when printing through the screen.

Chinese Whispers

A little Chinese Whispers Challenge

has been taking place within our

Contemporary Group.

This is my little 12" quilt

based on the one I received.

The little quilt I received to 

interpret was a landscape.   It

had what appeared to me to be a

rock face as part of it.

I chose to focus on this and to zoom

 in and produce it in more detail.

I used rust dyed fabric, painted vilene, smocking

thread, sweetie papers, tin foil and sheers to create

the rock face. 

Machine and hand stitch added the layers of texture

that finished it off.

Hexies Hexies Everywhere

For the last 18 months I have been

going Hexie mad!

After having a huge sort out of fabric I ended up 

with a pile that consisted mostly of pieces

of fabric that I no longer really wanted to

keep, or weren't big enough to use for 

any of my projects.

So....rather than just giving them away the

decision was made to turn them into a new

quilt for our bed, and so the Hexies Quilt

was born.  

Three thousand, two hundred and seventy seven little

1" hexies later, along with some half hexies

 the quilt was finished!  

Yes, that was 3277 hexies!!

All that was left was to put the boarder on and

decide on how to quilt it.

It was at this point I wimped out and decided that

the best thing to do would be to get it 

Long arm quilted.

Luckily for me we have a lady not

far from me in Newbury who

provides this service!

Barbara at 

Fir Tree Quilting

was very helpful and took plenty of time to discuss

pattern and wadding options.  Wadding

chosen was 70/30 poly which she supplied, so I 

only needed to supply the backing fabric.

 

My choice of quilting design is called Entangle,

quite approiate being that the quilt certainly 

entangled me, I loved making it, even though

I did question why I decided to use such small

hexies on more than one occasion!

 

It now resides on my bed, waiting for the cold

weather to arrive so we can keep warm and snugly.

Poppies

These little beauties are currently

being used in a shop window

as part of their display in

the run up to 

Remembrance Day

and form part of a bigger raffle

that includes a 

Tower of London

ceramic poppy.

Altogether there are 45 of these poppies.

Restoration Work

I was asked by a local embroiderer, along with a few other ladies

if I would like to be involved in the restoration of a textile piece.

It was originally hung in the United Reform Church in Newbury, 

which closed recently.  The piece was then donated

to the United Reform Church in Hungerford but needed some

attention, lots of cleaning and some repair work before

being remounted on it's frame.

It is made up of 1200 squares, all made by members of the 

Newbury Church

There was a lovely feeling of  friendship amongst

us all, Though most of us didn't know each other

before we started new friendships have been forged.

Open Studios has finished for this year.

A big thank you to all who visited 

and for the lovely comments

 left in my visitors book.

The studio has been returned to normal

working mode so it's back to the

sewing machine for me!