I'm back finally

In my last post I showed you a photo of the kitty that came to our house. Well no one has claimed her so I guess she is ours. When she is sleeping, at first glance, you think there is a skunk laying there. You can see her lovely colors from the top down. She hasn't earned a name as of yet, but "stinker" is beginning to rise to the top of the list. grin
I found the kitty screen prints in a pile of quilt "stuff"-- I had forgotten I had them. so now they are in a small wall quilt. The second is the progressive with the border added and quilting completed. This was done with a friend from Las Vegas. Her group was doing the individual progressives, so I did it with her.
Will actually try to get more up on here in the next days. Its snowing outdoors and supposed to do so until Monday, so doubt I will be outside a lot. Enjoy the photos.

pretty kitty

Anyone want a pretty kitty, this little sweetie showed up on our porch a couple weeks ago, I hope she has a home and will go back to it!!! I don't need another kitty, but we will put out food and water so it eats and she can sleep in the shelter we have set up for strays.
She is tame though and tries to come inside, so we figure she was originally someones pet. Have a picture up in the post office asking if she belongs to anyone. Sure hope she does as she is a beautiful cat.

New painted pieces

These are the new pieces I painted the last few days. I used the air brush paint to do these. I love the colors that came out and added some pearl to some of the pieces for glitz. I did find out that the pearl pieces need to be heat set from the back side first, then turned over and using a teflon sheet, iron on the front side.
I stacked some in the same curing cups also, it caused a bit of bleeding onto the fabrics below, but I rather like the results.
The pieces with black in turned out kind of neat too (my opinion here--grin) Now to figure out something to make using the fabrics. Next time more yellow/oranges.

Christmas

I got this small quilt from my friend in Las Vegas for Christmas. I love it, such a neat idea to use the ribbon crossing over the pieces and then adding bling to it. Thank you so much Shirley, its hanging in the living room.

I've been busy!!

The little angel will become a pin as soon as I make a trip to the craft store. She needs a halo and some flowers for her hands. I want to use a multi thread to make this, with maybe, gold running through it.
The silhouette is of a fairy sitting on the moon, I couldn't figure out what to use for wings that didn't completely obscure the figure. I finally used metallic gel pens and drew it over the figure. It worked, but-am not totally happy with it. Background is hand painted with air brush paint.
The last is for our art quilt challenge for February (yes, I actually have it done ahead of time!!!) Usually am working on things at the last minute. The flowers and leaves were first stenciled on with stencil paint, then when it was cured, I thread painted over them. The center is gold glitter. Background is painted fabric using the air brush paint. I am loving the air brush paint for fabrics. Its far less problem than most methods of putting color on fabric. Will be doing a workshop for our guild in April. We will use a friends garage so no one gets any stray paint in their home. Although this paint did come up off my kitchen counter when I accidentally dripped. Wiped away quickly it didn't cause a problem. Not sure what would happen if left to dry on a surface.

argh

Didn't catch the typo before I hit send. its OF Course!! of course!! Merry Christmas to all and hope you have a safe journey if you travel over the holiday. Happy New Year to all too.

Finally something made

I finished the top for this batik quilt in the last couple days. I had this piece of orange batik in my stash for years (and years) Finally decided something had to be done with it, so found a piece of brown batik to go with it. The nine patch and snowball quilt is what is the result. The small piece is the leftovers from the snowball blocks, I double sewed the corners and have a bonus piece. OF COURCE, I ran out of the brown and had to send a quick SOS to Lea to send me another yard. Thank goodness I got right to it, or would not have had enough fabric. The large quilt will be bound with the brown as well as the small piece.
Now to get a few more pieces completed. Yeah right, thats going to happen soon. grin.
anyway enjoy the new pieces.
By the way the orange in the small piece is the same, just was closer to the flash.
ice,sleet and snow last night. A bit of ice, a couple inches of sleet and then about 5 - 6 inches of snow on top. Thank goodness there was not a lot of wind.

Finally

Finally something to post. No whoopie biggie, but at least something.
I'm on the abstract Challenge list at Yahoo and rarely get anything done. Thought I had best participate or they would kick me off. grin. The theme was beginning and end. This is a piece of my hand painted fabric and I thought it reminded me of the beginning and end of a stream cutting a path through hills.
Ok so its a stretch---now back to some real stitching.

no news

They say no news is good news, but---I am working on a throw size piece and hope to get a photo up in the next few days.
First snow/ice event--yuck I hate winter.

project done

This is the finished leaves block from a couple weeks ago. I added thread painting to the crayon/inked leaves, then free form quilting in the center and on the border. I think it turned out OK, although I lost my path a few times while quilting. Hopefully am getting a bit better at it though. Now on to the next project, I'm on a roll!!

full block

This is the completed star candle mat. 4 hours of quilting in this. UGH, but I love it.

blocks

This is the red and cream version of the previous block. I have it completely quilted (12" and took 4 hours.) I forgot to add the complete quilted block so will make another post to include that one. The closeup shows the quilting on the 6" center of the block. What fun. Used the feather technique from Patsy Thompson DVD. If you are interested in seeing the DVD ad go to her web site. www.patsythompsondesigns.com No affiliation just a happy customer.

I've actually been stitching a bit again. finally-- the heart block is for quilt guild --Each year the retiring president gets blocks. This is the official block. The green red and cream is for the Christmas block drawing. Was fun figuring out how to get a 12" block, also made another that will be posted later.

This is our rescued kitty, she was an outdoor kitty and wild as could be. When she was heavy with kittens I finally tamed her a bit. Then a few years ago we let her become an indoor kitty. I love her green eyes.

3rd set

I really like the dimension in these two pieces too. What fun to play.
I used pfd fabric and air brush paint Createx brand. Squished into plastic containers from Dollar Store (15 for $1)

two more

Two more photo's, I love the blue/red/white one looks like mountain peaks to me.

new dyed pieces

Looks like blogspot will only add 2 pictures at a time this morning. Here are two of the new pieces. Love them. will try to upload more in different messages.

first batch

Here is the first try using the air brush paints to dye fabric. I learned a bit and hope the ones "cooking" in the containers comes out as well. This time I tried for just mottled fabrics. the ones I am drying now are all mixed colors. They look like they will be good too, but we will see tomorrow.
this is lots easier than the dye powders and also is non toxic. Even some metallic paints, you can see the over lay in the pink fabric on the left.
Still cold and windy here, but at least the snow missed us this time.

Patches

Forgot to add this with the new block picture. This is patches, so named because her patterning reminds me of patches on a quilt. She is finally becoming a "lap cat". For the 3 years she has lived here she was very aloof. Now suddenly she has turned into a lap cat. When either of us sit down, she is immediately ready for some attention.
Ah these four legged friends--ha. She loves to sit on my sewing rocker on the "quilt afghan".

new experiment

Here is the first of experiments with crayon, color pencil, ink designs. After the leaves were completed, I then mixed some pigment ink and spritzed the background of the block plus the leaves.
I kind of like effect, however the next time I do this I will put paper over the designs and only spritz the background fabric. I think it was OK because the design was leaves so just looks like leaf spots, wouldn't work on anything else though.

Long time since last post

Whew, what can I say, the last month has been a blur. It started out with the Hancock Fabric retreat in September. Was a very fun weekend with lots accomplished. This was at Ashland at Camp Carol Joy Holling.

Accommodations have been remodeled so the rooms are a lot nicer than before, new beds too, which was good. We worked on a kaleidoscope quilt (which I do not have all the blocks done yet) Will show it when I get them done.
The first week of Oct was Threads across Nebraska in Grand Island. Spent two days helping at that. It was a good show with previous state fair winners being featured. Visited with lots of old friends.
The next week was DesMoines AQS show. We spent 4 days at the show. Plus hit some shops on the way to the show. Not sure that was a good thing, as there were lots of really neat "stuff" in the shops. I wasn't to bad though as I was hoping to find lots of new things at the vendors. The convention center in Des Moines was really nice. Plus it was only a block from our motel, so we didn't have to drive to the events. weather was great too.
This last week was our Calico Quilt Club retreat at Camp Moses Merrill by Linwood, NE. Its a beautiful spot. Way up on the bluffs overlooding the Platte River valley. WOW what a view. Lots of wild life around. Deer and turkeys are thick. We also took in the Fremont Quilt Guild show and stopped by Sarah Dillows estate sale. All in all a very fun weekend.
Now for a few pictures. Thought those would come up after the printing--oh well. The first picture is of the throw size quilt (no border yet) that I made from the jelly roll batik strips I won at the Hancock retreat. The on point is a block that I worked on while selling tickets at Threads. Did that as a demo while selling tickets. The third is the progressive I am doing with Shriley from Vegas. The last two are taken from our 7th floor window, across the Des Moines river into Des Moines. The domed building is the court house (capital building?) not sure which. One was in the morning and the other at night. Thought the lights were neat.
Between all that I was peeling pears!!!!! The tree had around 30 bushel on this year, so between putting them in the freezer and trying to give them away, it took a lot of my time. Hope to get back to more regular posts now. Enjoy