Tag: QuiltCon

Remember 2020?

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I made this quilt in 2020 for The Modern Quilt Guild’s Quiltcon Together Wedge challenge.

I haven’t shared this quilt, Make Wedge Love, before now. Probably because I didn’t think it was that successful, but looking at it now I feel 2020 in it. I see those COVID-19 spiky things in the medical illustrations. Plus the virus curves. There’s a feeling of disjointed fun— how could that be? And, where did I get that purple? It feels like a bad circus poster. That is how I feel about 2020.

I hand quilted in the ditch. I probably did that because of the deadline and a desire to just finish it. It wasn’t selected for the show.

41” x 45

A Cabin in the Sticks

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I made this quilt for the Modern Quilt Guild’s Super Scrappy Challenge, sponsored by American Patchwork and Quilting.

Improvisational work with scraps touches me in a way a planned design does not, but the work also makes me question my intuition. I’m not sure why some things work and others annoy me. In the beginning, I wanted to make lots of small log cabin blocks, but after making about a dozen I stopped because it felt like something I had seen many times before.

I moved onto strips of scraps. I chose them randomly from a large box of solid scraps. I tried not to cut any of the length of the scraps. When I pieced the long strips together, I loved the movement and the color combination.

I used almost exclusively thread from my mother’s sewing cabinet and I felt a connection to the past while creating this piece. I grew up in the mountains of Southwest Virginia, and I’ve often said I grew up “in the sticks.” The wonky sides make it real for me and create that organic feel I wanted.

It was not selected for QuiltCon so I’ll have to find another exhibit.

Dear Orcas

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I made this quilt for the Modern Quilt Guild’s fabric challenge for QuiltCon 2024. The fabric is Windham Artisan Cotton. I used Turquoise-Copper, White-Aqua, Apple Green-Chartreuse, and Grape-Dark Pink.

Dear Orcas, 50.5″ x 50.5″

I used artisan cotton previously, and I liked the feel of it. It does fray and it’s hard to fix mistakes because it thins almost to the point where you lose your seam allowance. Making curves felt easier though. This type of quarter circle requires precision and I didn’t fix some of them because of the fraying (or at least that’s what I’m telling myself).

I used Latifah Saafir’s Clammy 10” template. It took some guidance from her and quilty friends to understand how to cut the pieces correctly.

I used variegated thread (4655 color), 12 weight, from Aurifil because I wanted it to have the feeling of water. I also quilted one large quarter circle. Do you see it?

At one point of making the quarter circles, I saw a ship, followed by a whalelike creature.  I called it Dear Orcas because they were in the news for attacking boats.  We do not know why they are doing this, so I wrote them this letter.