Quilt It -today magazine has featured my “Early Birds” wallhanging in it’s Spring issue (March-April 2014), in Gathering Inspiration!

“Early Birds” was created for International Quilt Festival’s “Celebrate Spring” contest and it won Best of Show that year! It is owned by the Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection.

Recently I attended a local art group gathering and we spent the evening dying fabric using baggies and a microwave oven – instant gratification!! I was specifically trying to come up with a fabric that might go with the scrap (shown) from the sky of the dog quilt that I am currently working on.  The results were not really what I was after, but perhaps some of it will work.  If not in this quilt, somewhere else. It’s always fun to see what you get, but I do not have the knowledge or control for predictable results!

Speaking of the dog quilt—I found out that I am not allowed to post pictures of it beyond what I have already done. So no more updates on that for now.

Since I didn’t go to Houston for Festival last Fall, I didn’t get to see all of the other entries for this exhibit in the Festival Awareness Project with the postcards to benefit “Friends For Life” a no-kill animal shelter in Houston. The post card project raised over $40,000.00!

Anyway-  I was real happy to see that The Quilt Show has posted photos of all of the “Raining Cats & Dogs” quilts, so I was able to see them all, and you can see them, too, including my  “Snow Buddies”, here.

With my trip to teach at Empty Spools at Asilomar coming up fast, I decided that I ought to get my books caught up before I go, and be ready early for taxes this year, so I have gotten a head start on that project, as well as getting things in order for the trip.  There are still spaces left if you are inclined to want to learn how you too can immortalize one of your favorite photos in fabric!  It is SO cold here, I am looking forward to going someplace warmer.  Doesn’t that sound good? Join me!!

Here’s wishing you all good things in 2014!

Yesterday I finished up the 7 x 10 “Goldfinch in Winter” for SAQA.  I have also been working some on the dogs, but with Christmas, and all, have not made a lot of progress.  I’m still not happy with my available fabric choices for the sky and since I have no pressing deadline, I can take my time….

I had the goldfinch’s head all done before I remembered that the male has a black cap. The one in the photo I was working with is a female and that is how I made the one in the trading card, But I wanted the one for SAQA to be a male. So I had to lop off the top of his head and add some black!

Male goldfinches loose their bright gold color in winter and go sort of olive green like the females. When I see them at the feeder with bits of yellow coming in I know Spring is not too far away.

Linking up to “Off The Wall Friday” – go see what others are up to! Sorry it came through in caps – really I am not yelling at you and I don’t know how to fix it!

I see that “Comments” is turned off. I don’t know why or how to fix that either, so if you want to comment, and I hope you do,  it looks like you can do it in the next post.

Can that be true? Already it is the 20th of December? Where did the year go!

The little “Alaska” piece that I showed recently sold on the evening of First Friday at the Topeka Art Guild, and there has been a round of Christmas parties to attend lately. Thankfully the weather has been good for getting out and about!

I did work on changing backgounds on the dogs; the picture in my mind’s eye is a riot of color with a flower garden background. In reality it was a too busy mess. I first tried the red and yellow flowers and then tried white ones for better contrast.

The actual photograph shows the dogs with a mostly grassy background and flowers. I pinned up some green grassy fabrics and that is better, but still too much all medium tones.

I thought perhaps sky would be nice and I do think it sets them off nicely.

This hand dye is one I did myself and used in “Spring Encounter”, but there is not much left. Certainly not enough, so I have been shopping for something to go with it, since I don’t really enjoy the mess of dyeing, myself. I darkened and tweaked the the grays on the dog for better contrast.

In the meantime I developed a plan for the SAQA “This Is A Quilt” collection. This exhibit travels for a period of time and the pieces only need to be 7 x 10″, so I thought this would be a good time to knock that out. I had purchased a wonderful piece of Marcia Derse fabric that was a mottled mix of greens and yellows with some reds and black with the idea that it would work for the winter color of male Goldfinches.

It is so good, I want more in case I decide to make a bigger version.

So yesterday I drove to Lawrence to Sarah’s where I had purchased that fabric, but I guess I was not the only one to love it and it was all gone!! I did score a batik though that I think will do for dog sky, and some more of the border black print that I am using on the dogs. Not all bad news though, because it forced me to go looking on line and I found Meandering Threads which has a lot of the kind of funky fabrics I love, so this morning I found the fabric online and ordered a yard of it plus a couple more that I couldn’t do without!

The last “This Is A Quilt” exhibit has retired and they are for sale in the SAQA store. I purchased “A Lotus Flower” by Chang Hsu-Hsing of Taiwan. It is gorgeous!! My little pieced dog is still available; the sale goes until Dec 31..still good stuff left, check it out!

We are hunkering down for a wintery blast of ice and snow, possible 10″, so I plan on sewing for the next few days! Check out “Off The Wall Friday” to see what others are working on.

Progress is slow on the new dog portrait. I think I will need to simplify the background which seems too busy right now. I have been pretty busy lately with other things and have had trouble finding blocks of time to really get on a roll with this quilt.

Yesterday I went to the Sewing & Quilting Expo in Overland Park, KS because I had committed to work at the SAQA booth there. The day turned out to be rainy, turning colder with the threat of icy conditions in the evening so, had I not signed up to work I would probably have opted out of the hour and a half drive and stayed home. I enjoyed the two SAQA exhibits, Deux and Georgialina ( a SAQA Regional exhibit from Georgia & S Carolina. Saw some gorgeous work. met some new people and reconnected with some old friends. We also had a meeting of regional SAQA members and did some brainstorming about future plans. It was a good day. By the time I made it safely home, just before 6, there was ice on the gate and some patches on the bridges. Today everything is coated in ice – it’s pretty but not to my liking. The birds are attacking the feeders and I am ready to go attack the work in progress!

Sorry to have been so out of touch! I have been having computer problems again. Problems getting on-line and problems loading photos.

Things have been pretty busy around here since last I posted. I finished the Alaska pieces (I made two)

and started the next big project, which will be another dog portrait featuring four dogs this time.

The weather has been lovely most days with beautiful blue skies and moderate temperatures enticing me to spend some time outside. Still there is so much to do before winter sets in and that is about to happen next week I think! We have also enjoyed a few rainy spells which are indeed welcome as we are so behind on moisture. A very windy day took most of the leaves from the trees so yesterday we were able to remove the cover from the pond, put that away and clean the filters. We are in the process of having a tornado shelter installed and right now things are a muddy mess but hopefully that will be taken care of soon. It should look OK once I can landscape around it.

This week I finished my 3 pet postcards to send off to Houston IQA for the Pet Postcard Project, so I am cross posting this to Nina Marie’s Off The Wall Friday. These will be for sale at Festival for $20.00 each. Last year if I remember correctly they earned about $20,000.00 for a no kill shelter in Houston and should surpass that this year. I hope lots of people will participate for this worthy cause.

These cards were super easy as all I did was to machine quilt the printed fabric and bind them, but i think they came out good.

I got word this morning that my entry to the LaConner Quilt Museum show in WA., “Foxglove Fairy” has won an award! They won’t say what til after the Award Ceremony, so we’ll just have to wait and see!

Exciting news on the teaching horizon as well – I have a five day retreat workshop scheduled for 2015 at the Hudson River Valley Art Workshops in New York!! I’m looking forward to this new direction in my workshops as I will be doing one this coming February at Empty Spools in CA., as well! If you would like to learn to design and piece your own original work of art, just choose your coast and join me!

The dog observed Labor Day correctly – chilling out on the sofa in the studio while I worked.

Yes, I finally got busy and prepped and pinned the Eagles top and started the quilting. It feels good to be sewing again!

I just got the word that “Snow Buddies” was one of the 30 pieces that was selected to hang and travel with the “Raining Cats and Dogs” exhibit debuting in Houston this fall. This was the exhibit I had in mind when I made this one, inspired by this photo of my two dogs.

You can click on “Dogs” in the side bar to see the completed quilt and to follow the making of it.

It is currently on display and can be seen at the Topeka Art Guild Gallery through the end of July.

“Snow Buddies” formerly known as “the dogs quilt” is finally finished! It measures 48 x 48″.

Quilting it took a long time due to the size of it and the density of the stitching. These are my dogs, a Komondor, 145 lbs and a Shepard mix, 165 lbs!

I took the photo several years ago and have wanted for some time to make it into an art quilt.   Komondors are a fairly rare breed and it is not easy to find them in art so I was especially interested in doing this for a special exhibit that will take place at International Quilt Festival in Houston in the fall.

For those of you who are not quilters, my work is entirely pieced by machine from bits of commercially printed or hand dyed fabrics and then machine quilted.I love the search for just the right fabric to portray my vision.

Koms are always white and are usually shown with long cords to the ground so they resemble a big rag mop. I don’t show this one so I keep his cords cut back so as to lessen the amount of stuff he can collect outside.  Still he can bring in a lot of trash as he loves to roll in leaves and dirt.  They both have huge feet and I dread mud season!

The Kaw Valley Quilt Guild met yesterday and I learned that my quilt “The Merchant’s House” won First Place in the Viewer’s Choice voting in the show last weekend.