Holiday Quilts - International - Part 2

Now for my part in the other Remarkable Robins Quilts.  I'm sorry to say I don't have photos of all the finished quilts I can share.

My first assignment was an 18 inch block for Kerry's St. Patrick's Day quilt.  Kerry wanted a celebration of her Irish heritage. She made a six inch block with roadsigns on a potato print, indicating destinations in Ireland. Dorry sent me a tea towel printed with a map of England on Pure Irish Linen and a handkerchief embroidered with shamrocks to use. I cut out the Legend and the Pure Irish Linen label. I used a strip of the green that Kerry had used as the backing of her Round Robin vegetable quilt for the green squares and added a 100% linen for the background.

 

I never pieced linen before and found it was a joy to work with. It is stable and presses beautifully.  

Here's a closeup of that handkerchief embroidery.  It floats over the orange dot Kerry supplied.

 

For my Flat Stanley, I opened the atlas to the map of Ireland. Lu came right over to check it out and Kerry loved cats, so that was the photo I used.

Next I made a block for Jo.  Jo and all of our Australian residents said they don't decorate for holidays much, and instead chose holiday destinations for their quilts.  Jo's was the coast.  She gave us each a different water fabric with waves. Mine was a gradation.  

I bought a gradient hand dye from Vicki Welsh and had fun playing with a way to intermingle both fabrics. I took the Ocean Waves block and simplified it so I could leave Jo's fabric in large pieces.

 

It was a surprise when I realized that when Vicki made the gradient, she took the blue and brown palette from a  photo of the same rocky coast Jo used as inspiration for her quilt.

The center of Jo's block is embellished with charms, and a fish net I made with thread on a water soluble base.  The net took almost as much time as the piecing.

I took my beach towel outside for my Flat Stanley.  I have the rocks of the coast in Jo's inspiration photo, but no water.

My next block was for Dorry's Easter quilt.  She supplied a yellow fabric dotted with pastel colors.  I made her an Easter Lamb in a grape leaf wreath with a polka dotted sky.

 

Dorry's fabric wound up in colored Easter eggs for the wreath.

 

The design I appliqued on the eggs is an adaptation of the Rotorua quilting design I put on the quilt Kerry made for Dorry's son Casey (here are my photos of that quilt).

I couldn't decide between my Flat Stanleys for Dorry -but I'll just show one here, with the lamb nestled among my blooming native iris.

My last block was for Heather who chose a return to Spain on her holiday.  My sister-in-law Joanna went to Spain for a study tour during this time, and took lots of great photos I had permission to use.  These tiles are in the Castillo de Coca.

Heather supplied us with a rich print by Jason Yenter.  Here's how it looks in a Spanish tile design: it's the large ring.  The inner circle motifs were from a coordinating print.

I really had fun with my Flat Stanley of Heather's block, taping it to the tile wall at the Pavillion downtown Asheville, with locally made tile.  Afterwards, I learned that the ceramic artist studied under masters in Spain and credits their influence in her work.

My assignment for the next round was to make 4 18x 6 inch sashing strips for Rhonda's Christmas quilt.  She gave us the red hearts on tan that appears a bit left of center.

These are my four strips arrayed as for the quilt -

The last part I played in this International Holiday Extravaganza was to assemble Judy's vacation trip to Japan.  I had four very different, asymmetrical blocks.  Two used Judy's supplied aqua dogwood fabric in three inch strips on two sides, and one used it on just one side.  Japanese art generally is not about symmetry and I was already feeling challenged by the four blocks.  Then Kerry sent me a preview of what she was making for the sashing strips.  Kerry was a master with color, and what she was doing with brilliantly colored, high-contrast squares was scary for me.  So I changed the rules, and with Kerry's cooperation, we got Judy's quilt together.  You probably have to click on this photo to examine what's going on.

Judy's six inch block with magenta and lime green is just to the left and down from the little doll.  Rhonda came next with the floral spray on a sashiko-enhanced background that appears in the lower left corner. Heather followed with the six clever paper-pieced cranes that look like origami.  Dorry made the adorable kimono-clad doll with her framework of gradated pinwheels, and Jo appliqued the Noshi design near the upper left.


Jo's block had 3-D dogwood blossoms made from Judy's supplied fabric - she shipped her block to me with these foam supports to keep them from flattening:

 I mimicked Heather's aqua zig zags with white silk to set some lime folded fabric embellishments

and made white cotton flowers - both of these folded fabric flower designs are from Rebecca Wat's book. You can also see some of Kerry's sashiko embroidery in this next photo.

Kerry had pieced the sashing strips in various combinations following a tentative mockup I had done with the blocks in EQ7, and thoughtfully included lots of extra 3.5 inch squares she worked with, as well as the remaining dogwood fabric from her 1/2 yard piece.  My sister helped with the final layout of all the pieces. We tried to balance the bright colors and extended the gradation of Dorry's pinwheels into the connecting strips.  I used a strawberry pink gradation (also from Vicki Welsh) for two very narrow border strips and finished with a border limited to two fabrics and a few more white folded flowers.

The Robin quilts were always a challenge - so many talented quilters putting in so much effort really pushed me to my creative abilities.  Judy's Japan quilt took me so far out of my comfort zone I can't really say if I like it or not. Two years later, I will admit is is a relief that we have not taken up another project like this, but if such an opportunity comes up again, I'll probably jump right back in.

Holiday Quilts - International - Part 1

I'm overdue to post photos from the last Remarkable Robins cooperative quilt-making.  Our leader Dorry chose the theme - Holidays - and suggested each of the 7 participants chose one she would like to decorate her house with seasonally.  I chose Ground Hog Day, not with the intention of confounding my fellow quilters from other continents, but because I was already thinking about seasonal quilts and felt like Winter would not be my strong point.  Before they got too carried away with their protests about not even knowing what a Ground Hog was, I told them they were under no circumstances to depict the hairy rodent on my quilt, and suggested that since Ground Hog Day is all about the Shadow and there are plenty of traditional quilt blocks and settings that incorporate the Shadow, they need not look too far for quiltable ideas.

The plan for the quilt was a secret to most, but each of us was to make a 6 inch block, provide 1/4 yard of fabric to 4 other quilters, and 1/2 yard to two more quilters.  It was up to us how to divide up the fabric, and we could use 6 different fabrics or any combination we chose.

This is the little six inch block I made.  It's one of the many Robbing Peter to Pay Paul blocks, which is how I see those final six weeks the Ground Hog's shadow sighting predicts: will we have six more weeks of winter? Or will spring arrive in Six weeks?  I hoped the colors and prints would suggest winter, even to those who live where the our winter with snow and ice does not happen.

The next four quilters made18 inch blocks. The fifth made four 6x18 inch sashings, and the final quilter put it together with an outer border.



The first quilter to take on my challenge was Judy from Virginia, living in Australia.  She drafted this masterpiece of dimension herself, claiming it took every tool in her quilting studio to do it.  I have no idea how she was able to do it - or even where you would start, but I know it involved circles.  Keep staring at it and you'll see 3 different stars rising and falling from the hexagonal shape.

 

Next was Canadian Rhonda, who was not confused by the concept of Groundhog Day.  She made this clever take on the three dimensionality of Tumbling Blocks, amped up with holes for the groundhog to peek out of. The marble-print fabric that appears on the left side of the lowest left block is the one I supplied in fat quarters for the first four quilters.

Heather in Australia used Margaret Miller's Blockbender Quilts as her inspiration for a Sunshine and Shadows setting of the colors of my block.

And then Dorry from New Zealand living in Virginia took inspiration from one of Heather's inspirations and masterfully made all these shadowy triangles. 

Jo in Australia didn't shy away from all the Y seams of 12 Attic Windows blocks for the sashing strips.In the photo of Dorry's block above you can see the tiny Orange Peels she appliqued inside the window of the inner blocks of the sashings that mimic my starting block.  I quilted them in the other 8 blocks, as you can see below.  The light green fabric you see at the top of the photo below is the one I supplied for the sashing and borders.

My quilt was assembled by Dorry's sister Kerry in New Zealand.  It's hard to talk about Kerry's contribution to my quilt because it was not long after our group presentation that she passed away.  You don't see it in the above photo, but in this one you will see that she precisely copied my starting block - down to the fussy cutting I did of that Jason Yenter Wintergraphix fabric.  Where I cut four matching petals from that swirling print, she made 32!!  After all that, she left me some space to quilt more of those shapes all around, so my quilting stamp makes a big impression.

I was happy to discover this print, also a Jason Yenter Wintergraphix, that I used for the back of my quilt to celebrate that Orange Peel design I quilted after the inspiration of that same block. 

This is the quilt they made for me, after I quilted it.  It looks a little washed out in this photo taken on a bright sunny day in May.

In a follow up post, I'll share my input to everyone else's quilts.

I'm From the South

... that's the title native New Zealander Dorry has given her 7th International Round Robin quilt, which started with her requested theme of "South Pacific." There are a lot of pictures of this quilt already on my blog, but I think all the people who helped to make it for Dorry should see their individual contributions, so I posted quite a few more pictures now that it's quilted.

First an overview of the spiral layout I created for the blocks.


Dorry's block is the Tiki Man. He is the First Man for New Zealand's native Maori people. Dorry's Tiki Man did not need any embellishment - just a lot of outlining and stitch-in-the-ditch, with a fern encircling him to tie in with the spiral theme.


Heather made four six-inch blocks with Maori koru designs - I'm only showing two of them here. All four were echo-quilted to reinforce the strong design lines of her applique work. The blue and tan nine patch above Heather's blue block is possibly where the quilting of the colored spiral shows best in my photos.


Rhonda's block is in two parts: the upper scene of the Whangarei Heads includes the native Harakeke flowers on the coast. For quilting, the sky was treated with spiral swirls, the water got lines parallel to the shore to show waves, and the sand has pebbles. Below is the symbolic Silver Fern, simply outlined with a smaller spiral fill in the background.


Judy appliqued this flowing koru design that helps to keep the spiral moving around the upper corner. I echo quilted the white area and outlined the koru motifs on her green fabric.


Jo made this next block that combines the pohutukawa with another Maori koru design. Jo used two background fabrics, so the quilting is in two parts, with echoes for the floral side and the inside of the koru, and swirls on the outside of the oval-shaped motif.


This block by Dorry's sister Kerry takes the same pohutukawa flower and stylizes it to beautiful effect. The quilting consists of several lines of echos for some of the blossoms, then swirls to be consistent with the sky in other blocks.

Kerry also made this Kereru in a Puriri tree. I quilted some of the background fabric's leaves and curls, but kept the foreground leaves and bird simple so they would stand out in 3-d.


Kerry ambitiously made three blocks for her sister. The last of Kerry's blocks is Dorry's favorite Fish and Chips stand with a trio of Pukeko walking by. I quilted this scene with more swirling skies and pebbles for the road/sidewalk, and a lot of outline stitching.

For completeness, the John Dory (a species that might be served at the Fish and Chips stand) was my contribution to the quilt's blocks. In this photo you may be able to see the stylized fern background fill I used everywhere but on the colored spiral. You can also see how I used the Hoffman New Zealand Challenge fabric Kerry supplied me with to supplement all the swirling, spiraling, or leafy blues and greens in one-inch squares to fill in the background of the quilt.


And last is the border area. The 3/4 inch inner border has a little tiny leaf vine. The outer border got my quilted adaptation of a Maori border design.


The International Round Robin group has recently been tossing about for a name - "Remarkable Robins" has become the favorite - do you think it is a good one?

Feathered and Other Fine Friends

I posted photos of this international round robin quilt while I was working on the rays in the upper left part a while back. The quilting is finally finished and it is bound - though not show ready (needs blocking and there's no label or hanging sleeve).

This is how I resolved the quilting in the rays - there's a little alternating curl in the parts that were too narrow for leaves. The rays generally turned out to be more elaborate than I planned, but I like them!


I was also pleased with the way this next photo turned out (I just like the background with rocks and trees). I think you can see the oak leaves in the gray border on the right if you click for the higher resolution photo.


For the rest of the quilting, I started at the bottom with oak leaves, a pine forest and pine boughs, a deer, and a bear - and started doing some freehand leaves and echoes. Then came some cats, a hummingbird and a cardinal, a rooster, flowers, and a music staff. All of these designs were from books of quilting designs my parents gave me when I was quilting for others. I used things I like and took cues from the "I Spy" inclusions in the blocks to choose the motifs. The details didn't show up too well in photos, so I'm not posting all of them.




I was running out of ideas by the time I got to the top, but the little Kiwi inspired some fern fills and the precious Merino sheep needed to be fenced in.


It seemed like there were a lot of quilted feathers, the quilt was made for a round robin, and then there were birds as a repeating motif in the blocks and quilting, so the working name for the quilt so far is my post title, "Feathered and Other Fine Friends." The "other" refers mainly to my quilting friends - but includes all the creatures on the quilt.

On the Frame - a break with I Spy

The Round Robin quilt I wrote about has been on and off the frame in the last month. Yesterday I took it off again to examine what I was doing - it's pretty hard to see the back of the quilt when it's on the machine:


This is the part I was concerned about - in the above photo, you can see I quilted a leaf and curl in every third ray from the quarter circle at lower right. In the last ray, at the bottom edge in the photo, the leaves get very tiny and I didn't like doing it and it will probably just look messy if I make the leaves any smaller. So I wanted to see what it really looks like looking at the entire thing -

Most of the lower part and borders in the second photo is not quilted, -- the lumpiness is tack-basting.

I think there will be a simpler curling motif in the narrow parts of those rays.


Picky decisions aside, I'm happy with the effect of the feathers and leaves in the rays. The special personal elements my Robin friends included in their blocks are showing up just as I hoped they would. Dorry encouraged me not to quilt this traditionally, that is, as individual blocks and sashing, even though the quilt is put together that way. This overall design is much harder to manage because I have to roll the quilt back and forth many times for these rays and fills. But it is bringing the top together and makes much better use of her careful color-wash setting.

Eat Your Vegetables

Dorry's sister Kerry is one of the long-time members of the Round Robin group I make quilts with -- they had already been at this for years before I joined up. Kerry lives in New Zealand, and asked if I would quilt one of her previous Round Robin quilts. Putting a quilt into the international mail system is expensive and, well, scary, so Dorry carried the quilt back to Northern Virginia in her hand luggage, then Norris picked it up from Dorry when he was there for business.

Since Kerry will not see this quilt until some future, as yet unplanned, trans-Pacific crossing by a family member, I'm posting a lot of pictures for her to see what I did. But first, I have a photo of the full quilt for readers who have not previously seen what will be shown in parts. All photos can be enlarged for a closer look.



It took a double bed-sized batting and the layout of the quilt is a bit unusual, but isn't it glorious in color and energy?


Of all the vegetables, I was most happy with what quilting did for this ear of corn, adding a realistic dimension although the quilting lines between the kernels only go the length of the cob.


There were not many places for a quilter to add decorative elements of any complexity, but the two green borders that surround the center got bunches of carrots, radishes, and peppers, surrounded by tomatoes.

The border with the colorful medley of produce would normally have gotten a crosshatching or piano key treatment, but Kerry asked for Vegetables. A design with a chorus line of Chili Peppers has a similar effect.



I wasn't confident of my ability to quilt vines with peas in pods. They came out better than I thought, but are a little small to include in tonight's dinner -


Where I wasn't quilting vegetables and wanted background fill to bring out the intricate piecing, I chose swirls. It was these flying geese that made the choice for me - the swirls give them a little motion.



Jars of bugs and vegetables got a relaxed crosshatching, while the flowers and pieced ladybugs were simply outlined.


Larger pieced vegetables got lines of stitching to suggest roundness


The carrots, firmly planted in the ground, were surrounded by pebbles instead of swirls. You must notice the delightful striped fabric that makes those carrot tops!

The dark green borders that don't go all the way around the quilt got a treatment that made the quilter happy because it shows up well and but leaves the focus on the individual squares of vegetables. It takes more skill than the chili peppers, but it's worth it!



And with that, I believe we may all consider ourselves nourished within the FDA requirements for vegetables for the day.