The International Quilt Museum is hosting an auction for Ukraine relief. The money will go to the Rotary Disaster Response Fund. I donated a quilt, Nice to Meet You. It is Number 30. The starting bid is $25.00. Bidding will be open from June 8th at 6:00 a.m. CDT through June 10th at 6:00 p.m. CDT. You will need to sign in to Ready Set Auction or set up an account with them to bid on the quilts. (top right corner of auction page)
There are about 200 quilts in the auction. Quilters made pieces inspired by one of the museum’s sunflower quilts. I selected this Sunflower quilt as part of the museum’s Modern Meets Modern exhibit.
I wanted to experiment with brown as the dominant background color. Lately I have been making simple log cabins, inspired by the work of Josef Albers, and I was fascinated by how the other colors in the quilt played with the dark brown. I imagined that the yellow was saying, “Nice to meet you,” to the brown. I also liked that the “sunflowers” were growing out of the brown dirt.
I hope you will join the auction and bid on these amazing mini-quilts.
Since 2014 I have entered at least one quilt to be considered for QuiltCon. The first one I made was a quilt for the Michael Miller Fabric Challenge. You can see it here. It wasn’t accepted and I tried to figure out why, so I studied the quilts which were accepted. Before this year, I had four accepted:
Random Perfection
How to Play Hopscotch
Mod Drunk
Couch to 5K
This year I have two accepted:
Off the Square
Splitting Cat Hairs
My quilts have never won an award. I’ve entered quilts in Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival as well. The judge’s comments usually compliment the design and there’s almost always an execution suggestion. I was particularly surprised that the judges believed the hand quilting on Mod Drunk was distracting and the tension was too tight. Because of those comments, I have tried to be more conscious of “mistakes”. I fret over the binding and the quilting. But, I make mistakes and don’t notice them until it’s too late to fix them. Sometimes I’m impatient to finish a quilt and I’m not mindful of all the details. I enjoy the design process more than I enjoy the execution part. I’ll continue to make and share my work. I do enjoy receiving congratulations from you. I feel accepted and loved.
I accidentally added a period at the end on the title of this post. I meant to use a question mark. It’s seems so finite and I don’t feel that way. I’m referring to my quilting journey, but it could also refer to my life in general. Let’s discuss quilting.
Last year I took (one) in-person workshop with Sherri Lynn Wood then multiple virtual workshops. They were almost all improvisational quilting classes. I’m now working on the 100 Day project and all these classes have impacted how I now work. I can’t decide which approach to take. Sherri Lynn’s approach emphasizes a “go with the flow” and the process appeals to me. I recently finished the quilting the top I made that weekend, called Doodles and Curves:
Doodles and Curves
Since I took a workshop with Irene Roderick, I felt more inclined to plan out the final design. In her workshop we made units of pieced sections then assembled them in a composition. The goal was to sew the units together after figuring out how we wanted the final piece to look. The putting together to get that final look was frustrating. I also experimented with free motion quilting. I became annoyed with the tension on the stitching and had to take out large sections of quilting. In some places I used thread which was darker than the fabric color and I’m not sure I will take that path again. It’s distracting to me and highlights the mistakes. It does surprise me how exuberant the quilt is since I made during the height of the pandemic and felt very depressed. Here is the final quilt, titled A Thousand Yellow Rabbits Dancing with Balloons.
A Thousand Yellow Rabbits Dancing with Balloons
I also took a virtual class with Maria Shell. Her approach is more controlled with precise components and much more symmetry in the final composition. Her approach also pushed for more repetition in the components. Her approach is more like following a recipe. Here, a quilt I made after taking her class, titled Pit Stop:
Pit Stop
A friend recently called my approach to quilt design as “meandering”. That is a good description. For the 100 Day Project, that’s what I’m doing. I started making units like Irene, then I kept adding them as I felt like it, more akin to Sherri Lynn. I’ve made a few “short row” units from Maria’s class. It’s Wanda’s Meandering Approach. This is the top, almost finished:
I also took a class with Sheila Frampton-Cooper where I learned a new improvisational technique. She calls it applique plus piecing. She was very helpful with color choices and I’m very excited about where I can take my new skills. Here’s the top I created. It is titled Back of the Dragon. The idea came after I made a small sketch which looked like a mountain. Where I grew up, there is a mountain road called Back of the Dragon. It winds in and out with sharp curves. That is why this work looks very topographical.
I have lots of quilting to do to finish these new works. I hope to find my voice after learning from so many talented artists/makers/teachers this past year.
Wanda's Life Sampler 