Retrospective opening, Rainbow Maze, writings

Councillor Elect Cheryl Gaedtke opening my 'Retrospective of Patchwork and Textile Art'.
I was excited to see so many friends there.
More photos

Rainbow Maze

This is Brigitte's Ring.

How beautiful is that!

Such gorgeous colours and great workmanship!

I can't wait till my Test Team has caught up to where they are ready for me to teach them Machine Trapunto Appliqué!  I'll do the demo at one of our weekly Glen Rock Stitchers days. All welcome!

Added to my To Do is a How To on Shadow Appliqué for this blog. 

Writings

Sometimes my words fly out of my mouth without going through any kind of thought process.

'I'll write you a manual for the next Art Awards' I said to my SASI committee colleagues. 

This was while still on a high from the incredibly successful Somerset Art Awards 2015. 

To be honest, it doesn't seem such a fun thing to do at the moment. Part of it is that I am not totally happy with the format but I don't know how to fix it.

Maybe my graphic artist friend Ros can help when she gets back.....

My Novel

Gosh, I was so pleased to have found Aeon Timeline to keep track of  events and characters. The programmers have brought out a new version and I am getting tired of constantly having to relearn updates of programs. I am not even sure the new version will suit me as well, but unless I learn, how will I know? 

Bought the paperback version of:  Hex, Vex, Smash and Smooch.

Most surprisingly was the speed it arrived: one week from the US. It is a great book for anyone who is interested in the English language, how it developed and how to use it.

Re rules:in a living language(unlike Latin) the spoken word happens first, rules are created i to try make sense of it. 

'Choices'

I do have a working title for my novel, but it gives away too much of the plot.

So here is the new working title: 'Choices'.

However it started, it has become the stories about women, the choices they have, the consequences of those choices. Of course, there is a connection between these women and the connection is my antagonist Nick.

Was surprised this morning, 1000 words and one of my heroines made a choice I had not expected. 

But that's the fun about writing: that you only have to nudge your characters and you can see what they are up to. 

I've started working on the flyer for the Retrospective Exhibition of Patchwork and Textile Art that will open on 2 April. 

Thank you to my friends Ros who will design them!

Going through my images, gotto love this bit of stitching I did on my Tibetan Panel Coat, which will be on display during the exhibition,

A lovely surprise in my inbox from someone I had given a wall quilt to in appreciation for what she had done for me and my husband during his illness.

Here it is: beautifully framed:

Fantastic to know the work was appreciated!

Thank you to my intrepid team of testers!

Thank you Brigitte, Mary, Helen, Carol, Trish and Lesley who are now making sure the instructions I am writing for this quilt are the clearest and easiest to follow they can be!

Loved what I saw of your versions today!
Will take photos next week to post here. 

The quilt was received well in Melbourne and the instructions will definitely be in time for next Quilt Market. 

Thank you Victorian Textiles for your support and encouragement.

What else did I do: I updated my website, with a bit more to go, I changed  my facebook name Hetty Vb to  Hetty van Boven....

New project

I am so excited to be creating a new Double Wedding Ring project for Victorian Textiles, to be ready in time for the Australian Quilt Market next month! No pressure ...
I have been working on the design for a while, but today the gorgeous Bali Pops  arrived: 2.5" strips to use for the arcs in beautiful rainbow colours  and Bali Snaps, 5" squares I will use for the flowers, plus the background, a colour called 'Dewdrop', soft hand dyed of blue  splotches and swirls on a white background. 

The idea is 3 x 3 rings, but the centre is just a plain circle for some appliqué, which of course I will do in my favourite machine trapunto.

Some arc pieces

Here are some of the arc pieces. This Bali 1895 fabric is so lovely and crisp, 

a pleasure to cut and sew. 

The Double Wedding Ring  will be cut using the super templates by Victorian Textiles.

Here I am cutting the Melon shapes: note the smaller cutting board, it allows me to turn it instead of having to turn the partly cut patch and maybe shift the fabric. 

Can you spot the difference between these two images?

On the top each ring consists of four arcs, each in a different colour group.

On the bottom, each ring repeats the same arc four times.

At the moment, I prefer the bottom one...

Progress?

What did I do since my last post?
I tidied up the cupboards in my sewing room, re-organising the fabrics so I at least knew what I had and knew where to find it.
I expect my power bill to be way up, as stood there for days on end ironing each piece of fabric.

It not only looks good, I enjoyed meeting up with these fabrics again, some that have been in my stash for a long time.
I also sorted beads and anything else that comes into making textile art.

I visited family in PNG and taught a patchwork class there for the local ladies. I'll do a separate post on that.

Next I wanted a new design wall. What I had was a sheet of Masonite, covered with a padded and gridded piece of calico.
I wanted something larger and lighter and covered a 5 x 190 x 120cm piece of polystyrene first with bleached calico, then pinned a gridded flannel sheet on that.
I wish the sheet was white instead of medium grey, as the colour shows somewhat behind thin fabrics and make them look a bit darker.  Apart from that, it works well. The patches adhere to it and if necessary, I can push pins right through. The whole design wall is light enough to move it around and will fit behind the sofa bed in my sewing room when not in use.

What you see here is 2" squares and on the right is the border fabric.
It is more a colour wash than a Trip Around the world, I don't mind it, but once I stitch this together I don't have enough light coloured background for the actual design.
So I'll sew these up, but it won't go into the ACE quilt and I will buy a single background fabric on Wednesday at the Craft Show in Brisbane. I have some gorgeous cream background fabrics, but not enough of any of them.
I may even get another border fabric, if I can find something with apple green in it.

And this, dear reader, is how my design process goes: two steps forward, one step back. I am grateful for having been given carte blanche and not have to submit a final design for approval.

Deconstruction 1 and 2

What if....
I opened up one glove, so I could applique it and see both sides at once?

This is what it looks like. Because you can't see the thumb, you can't appreciate how unpleasantly organic this object looks!


Next: just cut each glove in half, so I have 2 outside and 2 inside pieces.

OK, this was an experiment and I was very much prepared to sacrifice this pair.
I don't have to sacrifice the 4 pieces, but I learned NOT TO USE STEAM ON KID LEATHER!
It makes it shrink like plastic would.

Next step:
I have a piece of gorgeous magenta Dupion Silk for the background. Thought I could tuck it, but tucking needs more fabric than I have.

Still more about EQ6 and wondering about the centre of the block

This morning I opened EQ6. Nothing in the Fandance project. NOTHING!!
How could that have happened?? I knew I had saved, saved, saved.
Rather than bothering Penny again, I went online to the FAQ and there was the answer:

I named a project, added things to my Sketchbook, and exited. But when I opened the project again it was empty. Why?
You may have over-written your full project with an empty project of the same name. So be sure, when you want to open a project you have saved, that you click the "Open an Existing Project" tab, and choose your project from the list, rather than typing a name in the "Name a New Project" tab.

If you type the name of a project, and already have a project with this same name, your new project (empty), will replace your existing project (full).

OK.....
Lucky I had saved the image of the quilt as a gif file and didn't really need anything else.

I've made a few fan blocks and have started adding the quarter circle. Tried a few different sizes and also considered how best to get the smooth curved applique.
When I do a full circle, I make 2 templates. A plastic template of the circle plus the seam allowance. I used that to mark and cut the patches.
Then I have a  cardboard template of the circle's finished size. I stitch a running stitch along the edge of the circle, place the cardboard in the centre on the wrong side of the fabric, pull the stitching tight over the carboard template and press. After it cools off, I take the cardboard out and give the circle another good press. Voila, nice, neat easy circle.
That doesn't work so well with a quarter circle.
What is working reasonably well is this:
Make 2 templates: one of the quarter circle plus seam allowances, another on where the seam allowance is cut off the curved edge.
I cut 2 patches from the big template: one of the fabric, one of some fine white lawn.
With the smaller template, I mark the sewing line of the curved edge only on one of the 2 fabrics.
I stitch the 2 fabrics together with a very small running stitch.
Turn the fabrics, cut some of the excess white lawn off and applique stitch the curved edge over the fan blades.
The straight edges are lined up with the raw edges of the block and I baste them together.
This really seems to take longer to write it all down than it is to stitch.

Here is Fandance!

OK, this is a VERY ambitious project, because it has 14 x 14 blocks and is 100"x 100"
I may well still make changes because if I make it as a large quilt for my own bed, it needs to be rectangular rather than square.
Anyway, I got fantastic support from Penny at EQ6, especially when you consider this was in the silly season, between Christmas and NewYear.
The problem lies with a another program interfering with EQ6 and one day, when I need a challenge, I'll sort it out. Meanwhile, I can use it the way it is and of course, I mustn't forget to SAVE!
So far I cut about 100 6.5" background blocks for the centre and hundreds of fan blades.
I don't care how long this takes. It is like a hexagon quilt, once everything is cut, I'll just work on it when I feel like it.