Show at Birmingham Botanical Gardens

This past Friday, September 6, I had an opening reception for my exhibition at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens Library Gallery.

Since I print on fabric I feel this blog is an appropriate place to tell about my show.

 In 2010 the president of Birmingham Quilters Guild Pat Lovelady

was instrumental in getting the fabulous Ginny Eckley to conduct a workshop here in Birmingham.

This got me started screen printing and I still get my screens from Ginny.

 In fact two pictures in my show, 'the Ranch' and 'Geisha' were inspired by Ginny's own pictures.

Thanks to family and friends my reception was more than nice.
 And the library staff members were really great.

And my baby granddaughter got a new friend, three weeks her junior.

Copying an Old Quilt

    

Here is the quilt I spent two weeks in January making

                                                   Lena quilted it on her long arm machine.
                                                            We chose yellow flowers.

       I tried to make it authentic,

       like the old quilt I copied.

                                                      So I chose different tones of yellow
                                                       and reds. Making it was great fun.

                                            Down to the charming corners,
                                             which I chose to perfect

                                                         12 squares in all on the new,
                                                      the old one has 30. Makes a difference.

                                       Compare the two - well mine lacked the borders at that point

                                                              The old quilt

                                                           Five across, six on the long side.

                                                          Who dares these color combinations ,
                                                    well, whoever made this  quilt, was that daring.

                                                      I would love to know who made it.

                                           Old shirt fabric. I'm looking for that particular blue.
                                          Then I would  make another copy with all 30 squares.

                                         

 And here is one of the old quilt's corners

A Lucky Mistake

My Allsorts candy quilt. I wanted a print out,  but.....

 

pressed the BLACK button on the printer and got ... lots of shades of gray!!

That became the start of a twin bed quilt,
 which now is on its way across the ocean for a favorite niece.

Kathy Joiner quilted it for me and....

did exactly, what I had asked - and more. I wanted the quilting
in white on the black backing, so the quilt could be turned.
 

This photo shows it better.
 I am very pleased with this quilt.

Photos and Silkscreen Prints

You are invited to view

my photos and silkscreen and Gelli plate (!) prints

during the month of December, starting Dec 4th

at the Levite Jewish Community Center gallery.

The title of the show is

" From the Wintery to the Whimsical" 

I have included my 

"When Happiness Knocks ,......"quilt

I was given very short notice and am just now putting the last touches on some of the pictures.More later, next week, I hope.

Marimekko Fabrics

Two months since last post.
What's been going on?


Well, vacation trips, yard work, swimming every day etc.

But I've got something of my own to show this time:

Two quilts and a softie.

The Birmingham Quilter's Society had a challenge, where we were supposed to show a nine patch as part of the quilt design and also supposedly be inspired by mirror images, since the theme was Alice Through the Looking Glass, ( Looking glass was how a mirror was described - back in the time.....)

Well, I stuck to the theme somewhat, had my nine-patch and did a mirror image of the back of a  Bassetts Allsorts liquorice bag.  I wonder if it shows in the photo of the front of the quilt, but it took me hours to do that, and then suddenly Quilting Arts arrived in the mail and a contributor wrote about dissolving thread. Next time when I need to quilt back to front I'll definitely try that.

Or I'll buy a backing with lines and go ahead again and quilt from the back, as I did on the Marimekko quilt  to show sun rays and waves This is my first whole cloth quilt and there is a story.
 Last year when visiting Berkley my husband had seen there was a Crate and Barrel outlet. Off we went on the bus to find it, and they had tons of Marimekko fabrics on sale. I really went crazy and we ended up taking a taxi back, because of my heavy bags of fabric.

 But there the fabric stayed until about a month ago, when I found that the baby shower for my first grandchild was fast approaching. No time for patchwork or piecing, so she gets my first whole cloth quilt. The three family dogs were appliqued and she is looking out to sea at our favorite beach, Neptune Beach Fl. looking at a ship coming from St. John's river. I don't know if the fabric was supposed to be dyed in two colors, or if it was a mistake from the factory, but the quilt is just one entire piece of cloth.

And then of course Charlie the Elephant.
A soft toy all the way from England, pattern obtained for free from Bustle and Sew.

 Our guild is addicted to hexies since two members are getting a book out soon, devoted entirely to  hexies. ( See  Julia's blog The Hexie Blog)

 The color of the elephant? To match the stroller. We already know it's a girl.

Carpets

I can't believe my last post was May 5th.

This time i want to show some carpets that relates to quilting.
Last week we stayed at a motel, a reasonable place, BUT the carpets in the halls were awful.
They made you dizzy even if you hadn't drunk any alcohol; I would hate to come back one night
with a hangover to those carpets.
I wonder what  effect a quilt with that pattern would do.

 The second carpet was with the tumbling blocks.
 It was at my son's workplace and it somehow worked.

When you were in the room it was calming. Coming from the door however one feltt that one was taken to a higher level, which of course is the effect a place full of programmers induces has anyway.

Carpets

I can't believe my last post was May 5th.

This time i want to tell  about carpets that remind me of quilting.
A reasonable motel we stayed at last week has the most amazing carpet.
Even without alcohol it made you dizzy. I should hate to go through its hallways under the influence.
I wonder if I could translate this into a quilt  and what effect it would have.

 The second carpet was on the floor of my son's workplace. That carpet was the tumbling blocks,
 It worked somehow. Not at all disturbing, when you were in the room.

 Standing at the door however it seemed to want  to take you to a higher level which is just right for a
 place that  masters computing way past the level of most of us.