Painted Threads

Wishing you a fabulous holiday!

2009-12-24T09:00:00.012-06:00

My daughter Nina illustrated this image of our dog Abby on Photoshop a couple years ago, I think it is so cute I just had to show it again. I hope your holiday is filled with warmth, good cheer and loved ones. Thank you so much for visiting throughout the year, your words of encouragement, friendship and sharing mean so much. peace, love and creativity, Judy

Felted Soaps

2009-12-20T16:49:00.001-06:00

Did you notice the recent Anthropologie catalog had felted soaps for $14 each? You want to make some of your own for gifts? Well here is what you do: You need a bar of soap, I like glycerin soap for these but other kinds of soap work well too, roving and pantyhose. I cut the pantyhose into 6-8" sections or use knee highs. Start out by making a layered roving blanket just like you do for

Some inspirational gifts for your holiday shopping

2009-12-13T13:38:00.013-06:00

Several talented artist friends have recently self published beautiful books with Blurb and the really awesome thing is Blurb is offering a special through December 31st $10 off any books with a value of $29.95 or more. That means you can order an image wrap hardcover copy (mine is normally $29.95) for $19.95 or get a couple softcover books with the $10 discount. To get the discount enter one of

Brrrrrrr.....

2009-12-13T12:38:00.008-06:00

No I haven't dropped off the planet since finishing the quilt, I have just been working on trying to stay warm and catch on the things I put off while working on it. Our heater died wednesday, I woke up to frost on the windows (on the inside) thursday morning when it was 2° out. The service man came and told me they have to order a replacement unit for $2500 and they won't get it until tuesday.

Oh Deer, Look What's Become of Me!

2009-12-08T18:57:00.001-06:00

It is officially done, yay!, except for the label which I am sewing on tomorrow. Then it gets sent off to Kaufman Fabrics to be in a traveling special exhibit using their Kona Solid Fabric line. When I find out the schedule of venues I will post it.

Nearing the finish line

2009-12-07T22:59:00.003-06:00

Last Thursday I called my photographer and made an appointment to get the quilt photographed Monday morning. In order to make that happen, I worked all through the weekend to get this quilt done. I still had grass to quilt, scroll work to quilt, the little deer to trapunto, block the quilt, trim the quilt, bind it in some manner and stitch a sleeve on it. The label could wait until Tuesday.

Happy St. Nicolas Day!

2009-12-06T00:12:00.006-06:00

The mingling scents of cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg and allspice fill the air as warm Speculatius (Saint Nicolas Cookies) bake in the oven. The tradition is that children put out their shoes the night before and Saint Nicolas puts cookies in them for morning. We could never go quite that far because our little four legged friends also find these cookies quite tasty. The legends of Bishop

Good friends and inspiration

2009-12-05T09:31:00.007-06:00

It's a great combination. Frieda, Trish, Laura, Gretl and I started our day seeing Jane Sassaman's glorious quilts at the Metcap bank in downtown Chicago. Jane's quilts are so gorgeous and they are amazing to see in person because in photos you don't get to see all the beautiful machine stitching and quilting she does on them. Jane really knows how to use thread and make use of those decorative

One of a Kind Show

2009-12-04T08:29:00.001-06:00

I am taking a short break from the quilt to go to the One of a Kind Show with Laura and Frieda today. It's becoming some what of a tradition, this year our friend Trish is joining us. We are going to see Jane Sassaman's exhibit at the Metcap Bank first and then on to the show where I will be sure to stop at Susan Hinckley's booth to say hello. I will post pictures on saturday of our antics.

Trial and Error

2009-12-03T09:27:00.021-06:00

I am now quilting the grass, while delaying my decision about what to do about the little deer. My initial thoughts on quilting the grass was to use three shades of green; light yellow green for the lower half, a leafy green for the mid section and darker green for the darkest part of the grass along the top edge and quilting between the painted blades, but then, I was not sure exactly how to do

Scared!

2009-12-01T23:10:00.002-06:00

I have to tell you, I was so scared to start quilting the big deer. I was having a hard time trying to decide what was the best way to tackle it, so I put it off as long as I could. The issue I struggled with was trying to figure out the best way to do make him look kind of furry and not obscure the painted hairs. In the paintings, the deer appear very shaggy, so I stitched around the painted

Quilted hills

2009-11-29T08:43:00.001-06:00

I quilted the hills with a simple contour quilting line. I chose to use that design for several reasons; one because I want the hills to be a simpler pattern than the foreground imagery, also if I quilt the grass area vertically I like the contrast of the horizontal line and lastly with time being an issue, I didn't want to do anything too complex. For the sky I am quilting between the scroll

Getting ready for turkey day...

2009-11-25T19:57:00.001-06:00

This afternoon, I made cranberry sauce with zinfandel, white and brown sugar, cinnamon sticks, clove, allspice and orange peel, then a pumpkin pie and Nina made the cranberry pie, only this time with apples. She added 3 chopped up granny smith apples and an extra half cup sugar to the recipe and baked it in a large deep pie dish I made several years ago when I lived in Texas and was making

Quilting details

2009-11-25T19:29:00.001-06:00

To quilt the details on the plants I am drawing them on with my Bohin marking pencil. I have put in a pink lead to give a little more contrast than the white since some of the leaves are a bit light.

Quilted trees

2009-11-24T09:31:00.001-06:00

I have finished quilting the trees, I did not want to obscure the lines of painted images so I am opting to quilt slightly outside the painted image lines. I want it to retain its painting quality. I often have a tendency to quilt over my lines, so it becomes harder to tell if it is painted. I am outlining all the plants in the grass with green thread, then I will add quilted details to the

Technical difficulties

2009-11-20T17:26:00.001-06:00

I started the quilting by outlining the deer and tree trunks to stabilize the fabric and the batting. I always try to work around the quilt covering some broad areas very simply and then slowly work in more detailed quilting, working evenly across the quilt. The reason for that is to avoid having areas with really dense quilting that pulls the fabric in, shrinking its surface area, making big

Mmmmm....

2009-11-18T15:44:00.001-06:00

Nina loves cranberries, she eats raw cranberries all the time, so she did a Google search for desert recipes with cranberries and found a recipe for cranberry pie! She made it last night and it came out so good, nicely tart and such a pretty color. We were also thinking it would be really good to make a pie that combines apples and cranberries using this recipe. Now I have Posole bubbling

Batting a thousand

2009-11-16T19:15:00.000-06:00

I have spent the last few days catching up with life; cleaning the house, going to the bank, getting groceries, doing laundry...and trying to figure out how to tackle the quilting. Usually I like my quilting to create a certain amount of depth and texture as well as interesting thread work. With this quilt I want to create a flatter, more like a painting or tapestry quilt. So I have been in a

My first book!

2009-11-13T08:35:00.003-06:00

I just self published this little portfolio of my art quilts and mixed media work using Blurb. I have seen several people write about using Blurb on their blogs and thought I would try it out myself. You can preview the book here. The book is 7 inches square, 40 pages long, printed on premium paper and can be ordered with a soft or hard cover. One of the nicest things is that I can reorder any

Hey West Coasters, Mark your calendars

2009-11-12T08:24:00.001-06:00

I just got my paperwork from the IQA that I will be teaching in Long Beach at International Quilt Festival July 22-25! I will have three classes: Thursday (all day)- Mixed Media Painted Fabric, Friday night (6-9)- Ornamental Fiesta and Saturday (all day)- Wholecloth Painted Fabric. Mark your calendars so we can make some art together!

Painting- done I think

2009-11-11T08:34:00.000-06:00

I think after eleven hours of painting yesterday it is done. There is always the possibility I will tweak thinks here and there. I had to force myself to stop last night at midnight, I was touching up lights and darks on the leaves on the tree on the right to give them a little more contrast. I probably could have spent another hour touching them up here and there.

A little blue

2009-11-10T09:24:00.007-06:00

I only had a short amount of time to paint yesterday so I didn't get as far as I would have liked. Hopefully today I will get the rest of the flowers painted and begin the grass.

The flowers are starting to bloom

2009-11-09T12:15:00.003-06:00

I have finished painting the greenery and am now painting the flowers. I am only using red, yellow, white and blue for the flowers since that is the limits of the flower colors in the hunting paintings. I have chosen to make the white flowers tinted a little pink just so they are not a stark white. So far I have worked through red and yellow, next I will start on blue. After I finish the

SOFA and Ellen

2009-11-07T00:07:00.011-06:00

Friday morning I went to two wonderful textile themed lectures at SOFA. The first one Fiber Art: Expressions & Aesthetics, Part I: fiber artists Marcia Docter, C. Pazia Mannella, Carol B. Shinn and Barbara Lee Smith share their ideas and inspirations. Barbara Lee Smith Carol Shinn The second was Fiber Art: Expressions and Aesthetics, Part II: Fiber artists Jon Eric Riis, Geoffrey Gorman,

Not much different and I'm going to SOFA

2009-11-06T08:02:00.000-06:00

It doesn't look much different and I won't have chance to paint because I am going to SOFA today. I love this show, it is always so inspiring. This morning I am going to two textile lectures, I'll tell ya more later, my ride is on the way.