Projects completing

"Anne's Garden" made it safely to Sydney and now resides on my sister-in-law's bed. "Sunburnt Country" (the retreat quilt top depicted 2 posts ago) is now quilted (on my home machine) and proudly owned by my husband.

A friend in Tasmania (she & hubby own Foxhunters Return--a B&B and now bookstore too) is having twins so I finished a long-in-progress baby quilt (called "Queensland Dreaming") and a more recent project making felt baby booties.

I also had the opportunity to teach a very capable professor friend to hem pants. Funny how the little skills can drop by the wayside while acquiring the big ones.

So now nothing is under deadline and I can decide what I'd like to do next. Saturday I'm off to yet another needle-turn class (I'd like to be really good at it one day!).

Starting to look a lot like Xmas...

At the retreat, I found some time to work on some hand and machine stitched felted wool projects. Top left is a felted wool needle case; below is a retractable tape measure cover; and to the right is my take on the mistletoe project in the recent Quilting Arts Gifts mag.

Retreat 10 quilt top

I finished my Australianized "African Fire Flower" quilt top at the retreat last weekend. Now must decide on the quilting--probably a wavy pattern echoed over the land and something airier over the sky. Haven't actually measured it but it is about 5 feet (and a bit) by 7 feet-ish.

I also made some small wool projects at the retreat but haven't photographed them yet.

Retreat!

Tomorrow I have a 1hr and 46 min drive to the quilt retreat. For the show-n-tell, I'm bringing Laddie's Garden, Kieran's blue & white quilt and the finished project from last year. It was a big year of big quilts. Looking forward to lots of sewing, no cooking and just looking after myself (if you are a mom and have a dog, you know that's a bit rare). The boys will be fine and Subway will get a little extra business.

Fall leaves

Using a technique adapted from the most recent Quilting Arts Gifts article (they made mistletoe with 2 fused cotton fabrics), I fused a batik to a wool blend felt. The "patterns" were collected off the ground while walking the dog in our neighborhood. Mostly maple and oak, but also one I'm not familiar with.

I use a low contrast pastel crayon to mark the leaf edge on the batik.

Then stitched with variegated thread.

The trick is not to cut it out until afterward, using smallish sharp scissors.

Cutting Up

In preparation for the Smith & Owen Quilt Retreat next month (my second), I've been doing a lot of cutting (well, some shopping was actually involved prior to the cutting) in order to make the pattern provided as part of the retreat. The pattern is African Fire Flower (see) but I'm going to Australianize it.

I get to make use of some Australian fabrics given to me just before coming to Michigan by my Australian quilting buddies in the NSW Guild as well as some aboriginal fabrics I got at Smith & Owen. And anything sky blue, gum green or ochre or iron-oxide red that I could find in the stash. I've got quite a stack of 3x9" pieces now.

By the by, Jill Ker Conway (who wrote The Road to Coorain) spoke on campus last month. Helped me get into the spirit of the project.

This year my big "lesson learned from last year" is to bring a decent sewing chair with me. All the ladies who were veterans of the retreat knew to do that.

Krakatoa in situ

"Krakatoa" is now, I just learned, rather prominently displayed in the Women's Center at GVSU as part of their annual art show. I was near the center yesterday for an event and see that it is clearly visible from outside their glass-walled office. There's something weird and thrilling about seeing one's work displayed somewhere other than one's house.

"Krakatoa" is a storm-at-sea pictorial quilt made up of 800 pieces.

Can't seem to find the picture I have of it.