Amy Jarvis

Amy Jarvis has a wonderful etsy store. You might want to check it out. There are some nice summer gift items there.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/arjarvis
There are beaded bracelets, chokers and beaded wall hanging.

Friendship

What is friendship?

The book I’m listening to “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” by Stieg Larsson says;  

When you like someone and trust them you can be friends. You can’t be friends if you don’t trust someone.

Images

I collect images. I think I have mentioned before that I take lots of digital images of things that interest me. I store them on my computer in files in Picasa, a free program from Google. I then back up my images off of my computer on a portable hard disk. Images take up a lot of space.

Here are some the images I have of windows. Some day I may incorporate these ideas in to my art work. Anyway the images themselves attract me.

Katazome

Katazome is a form of paste resist surface design. That is, a paste made from very sticky ingredients, in this case rice flour, that is pushed through a stencil to define a pattern on a piece of white yardage. Wherever the paste sticks to the cloth, it will resist, or prevent, any color from staining that spot. So the rice paste is resisting the color to create a design on the fabric.

This past weekend I took a Katazome class from Karen Miller in Madison WI. Lois Jarvis organized this weekend after seeing that Karen Miller was traveling cross country with her husband on vacation ending up in Nova Scotia.  Karen posted that if there were any groups along her route that were interest in taking a class she would be willing to stop and give a class. Lois decided it was a great idea and contacted Karen and set up this great opportunity.  We held it at the Goodman Community Center,  a renovated  iron works building.

We had a great time carving our own stencils out of mulberry paper called  "shibugami". Shibugami has been treated with persimmon tannin and smoked as a preservative, and has a deliciously nutty aroma.

Anna, Angelica and Ute cutting stencils.

Diane getting ready to laminate her stencils.

Joy, Sue and Lois working on their stencils.

Stencil designs, we didn’t cut these, they were Karen’s stencils that she let us use, pasted onto fabric, drying and waiting to be dyed.

silk scarves pasted with rice past and drying.

Diane’s, Kathleen’s and Lois’s designs with dye added.

Some of Karen’s designs. These are all carved stencil designs.

We had a great two days, I learned a lot of new techniques and I enjoyed being with creative people.

T shirt quilt

I blogged about an easy way to make a T-shirt quilt five years ago. I just recently made a new one for my nephew who just graduated high school and  I thought it would be a good idea to re-blog about the process.

I think this is the easiest way to make a big heavy t-shirt quilt and wanted to share the steps of it for you.

The first thing I did was take my big 15” square and cut out all the t-shirts. I aimed to get any writing that was on the front or back of the shirts. Don’t worry too much about the sleeve or collar seams and be sure and save the backs as well you may need them in the long run, depending on how many t-shirts you have. Cut out bigger around than the 15” as it will shrink up a bit as you quilt it. Just use the square as a guide.

Second thing is to get the backing for the quilt. I decided to use flannel on mine, it makes it nice and warm, but it also makes it heavier so keep that in mind.

It takes 35 t-shirts to make a twin size quilt. I cut out the flannel using my ruler and rotary cutter, cutting across the flannel every 17 inches and then cutting that into 2 17” x 20” pieces.  I used seven  different boy prints of flannel to give the back a patchwork look to it. You can’t squeeze out three squares across unless the fabric is 54” wide and you want to have the backing pieces bigger than the front pieces. I then used a 17” square piece of batting to create individual sandwiches. It is much easier to have the batting and backing bigger than the top square to easily place the top square over a larger backing unit. I then quilted each of these squares individually and once they where quilted I squared them up again to 15”.

I then laid them out on the floor to arrange them. If you use different color flannels you might want to lay out the t shirts on the floor first and arrange the flannel so that no two that are the same are next to each other before you start the quilting process. Take a picture so you can remember the way you laid it out.

Jacob’s new quilt                 Erik’s quilt 5 years ago.

Once I had the arrangement that I liked I sergered all the squares together so that the serging is facing up on the top of the quilt and the flannel is all enclosed on the back of the quilt. It was a very fast and fun way to make a t-shirt quilt. It has held up very well to college abuse and Erik will have his for a long time. I am sure Jacob will too.  By the way they were both TRILLED to get them. Boys love quilts too.

If you run out of t-shirt fronts you always have the backs. Remember it takes 35 squares to make a twin quilt. I used the backs and put family pictures on them using Bubble Jet and then quilted them. I put a traditional binding on the quilt using the left over flannel bits. You need to cut the binding wider than you normally would as the flannel adds bulk. I cut my 3 1/4” wide and then doubled it over.

Buckets Gone Wild

I met the most interesting woman in my class in Mountain Home AR. Her name is Georgia Manning Lewis and she has a business called Buckets Gone Wild. She is a retired nurse and has started making covers for buckets, baskets and cups to help us look pretty and be organized. She was wearing this purse all during class with her cutting and measuring tools all handy on her person and out of the way on her working surface. I loved it and immediately wanted it.

She originally made it for traveling and it has several places to keep your passport and money.
I haven’t made anything besides a quilt in a very long time, but I am going to make this very nifty organizer. Be sure and visit her website, you will not be disappointed.

Landscapes

Landscapes have been fascinating me for awhile now. I have been enchanted with my Midwest horizons for years. I have been pointing my camera out the window at cornfields and soybean fields as I drive down the interstates. I have been sketching them in my sketch books as my husband drives. The most visible of these landscapes is the one on the cover of my new book “Fabric to Dye For” Illinois Landscapes.

But I have made many others as well and am getting ready to do a series on weeds. Here are just a few of my recent landscapes.

In the fields

And two from an upcoming exhibit called Midwest Meditations

 

I will be teaching a class on Little Landscapes in September at the Indian Summer Quilt Show and Conference to be held September 24-26 at the Holiday INN in Fargo ND. I hope if you are in the area you will join us.