Waiting is done

This is the finished “Waiting for Jessie” quilt. It had a strange history (see below) with much cutting and moving of pieces.  I started with a lot more purples.  At one point there was a little Japanese doll fabric square in the border.  The moon was bigger.  When the quilt resurfaced after a long hiatus of being hidden in a pile, I renewed my efforts to finish for my friend’s birthday in July (originally it was for her 50th – and made during a time when she was often up late waiting for her daughter to get home.  Now that daughter is a senior in college and her younger child just graduated from high school!!).

A couple of weeks in, during this round, I found myself hating the raw-edged trees with their zig-zag stitching, but wasn’t willing to begin again, so I kept embellishing to try and make them ok.  Added some mottled red kimono silk as a path.  I like that path.

But, the trees never really got to a place where I think they are ok.  I added some batik that looked like trees, and that helped, but mostly because it distracts you from the trees in the central square.

Because the process was a series of problem-fixes like that, and because I was trying to incorporate some new approaches as well (prime among them – more embroidery), it’s not surprising that it’s not quite a fully realized piece.

But this is how life goes (or mine does anyway).  We start.  We change our minds. We botch. We fix. We experiment.  And, at some point, it’s good enough.

Here’s the years-old starting point:

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many hearts

A couple of heart and strip-weaving samplers to share.  When I compare the largely off-white piece (above) with the chaotic, colored one I was stitching on last night (below),
I feel a (new?) preference for the blank spaces, the more subtle textures, signaling a shift in taste, perhaps?  We shall see.  The piece above received this plaid heart, plus three others last night.  I added the orange batik stripe and the tea-dyed damask linen ribbon to ground the design a little.  During the applique process, I found myself wishing that my stitches were being received on a plainer surface where they might show up a little better…

The top piece features an eco-print by Arlee Barr.  It is almost too much to embellish it at all, if you know what I mean, but I tried to let the leaf prints hold their own next to the hearts.  And, look!  Is that a shadow heart to the right of the striped-heart?!!

Both pieces show off some cloth weaving learned in a Jude Hill class (blog, Spirit Cloth, on side bar), as well as some heart treatments learned in ANOTHER Jude Hill class.

Perhaps it is Monday-mind, but from where I sit right now, I just want to finish these up – chop chop – so that I can move on to other things.

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sun in sun out

It is one of the those days where the sun and clouds cannot agree. A sunny morning turns dark at noon.  A dramatic spattering of rain dries to nothing, and the sun reappears.  Then it darkens at two, to the point of needing to turn on indoor lights, thunder threatens, and a half an hour later, it is over.

But I think it is a good day for a graduation, if for no other reason than it is the day that graduation is scheduled.

I am working on the former cardigan panel, quilting up a storm.

The areas that I had tucked and gathered to shrink the shoulder span of the cardigan cannot be untucked without significant reworking of the sky, so I am edging over the bumps and quilting more than I might otherwise to make the dimples of the surface somewhat uniform.

Here, a piece of the red and white Irish linen dish towel finds a place.  Because it was out.  Because I needed it.

The bottom denim edge I am contemplating leaving as a pocket, a place where prayers or ticket stubs could be housed.

There are lots of ways for cloth to be useful besides covering our bodies.

Once I determined that this panel would become a birthday gift for K., I consciously selected some clothing to represent his (our) family.  That grey paisley wool was a sweater I wore to work last year, which shrunk terribly during a less attentive laundry moment.  The blue and white checks were either D’s or C’s pajamas.  The denim cuff came from a rejected pair of jeans of K’s (pants which after I cut the cuff of, I tried on – and lo and behind they fit! I will be repairing them for me). A piece of C’s shirt is not yet there, in the mix, but will be.

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piece by piece

Back to the boards this morning.  Garden not quite yet calling.

Sometimes the scale of these larger pieces overwhelms.  Today I am liking the fact that progress is made piece by piece, section by section.  There is nothing to do except to keep composing each section, viewing the recently-pieced area with the entirety, then tackling another section.

Day will be interrupted, as usual, with a doctor’s appt.  Today’s involves a lot of driving.  Next week is officially “No Appointment Week”!!

 

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slow and easy

I am feeling a little washed out, not unlike my plaster buddies.  Tired from being on my feet yesterday, and possibly fighting whatever C. has had all winter.  HE is on antibiotics as of this morning.

It is a good day to putter about cleaning, and to sit and stitch.  The first season of Project Runway (borrowed from the library) is calling my name.  I’m hooked.

This landscape below is comprised of several split woven squares, as well as a ‘practice’ house for a commission made last year.  The silk sky looks horribly flat next to the weavings, and received a nice oily blotch during pinning.  So, it will be covered or removed.  But later.

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