Prospectors 1999 - Wildflowers

It's time to start my first design as part of the Prospector's challenge.

The first decision is what to design. I've always liked wildflowers, especially those from the the Rocky Mountains. When I was growing up we'd trek from Ohio to Colorado and Wyoming. For entertainment I was given a flower identification book. I would research in the car and then look for some of the exotic flowers when we arrived at our campsite. So, flowers would be my subject. And band samplers, which consist of bands of patterns, where popular so that was my format.

That's the easy part. So, I set out with graph paper to come up with the flowers for the bands. The Columbine that I stitched years ago was bigger than life. Each flower was maybe 20 x 20 or 30 x 30 squares. That's alot of detail to make up one flower.

I was making smaller flowers, some remembered from those early trips - harebell, fireweed and indian paintbrush. Other flowers where chosen for the colors or were flowers I discovered later on. With less detail each flower had to be simplified. But, if they are too simple the flower isn't recognizable. With a lot of work I finally had some bands.

But no matter how I arranged them they didn't look right. I added words. I added mountains. Things where looking better. I stitched my first attempt. It still didn't look right. Back to the drawing board.

I changed the scale of the flowers. Some where bigger and closer up. Others where off in the distance. More shuffling of graph paper rows and I finally had just the right balance of scale, color, flowers and words.

It was a lot of work but I was proud of my efforts. It was displayed at the Prosepector's exhibit in Colorado Springs in 1999. It was also exhibited at Margaret Parshall Gallery at the EGA Headquarters in Loiusville, KY from August 1 - October 31, 2000 as part of an exhibit of work from the Rocky Mountain Region.

Here's on of the first sketches that wasn't quite right:

And here's the final sketch:

Comments

It's about time - the big reveal

My bright quilt was finished in June but I wanted to wait until both were done before sharing the pictures. Quilting the blue quilt didn't take long but finishing the binding sure did. I did procrastinate a bit as it was too warm to have a huge quilt on my lap for most of the summer. After this, I'll probably do all the binding on my sewing machine (and stick to smaller quilts). Notice the cut-out corners? That was a challenge. I found instructions here and it looked easy enough but I wished I had practiced some. After a lot of finessing I finally got good miters but I could have done much better. The cut-out corners allow the quilt to hang nicely over the edges of the mattress and it's a perfect match for a full sized mattress. But, the top edge isn't even close to the pillows. I wonder how the quilt fit on the bed it was made for. Here, at last, is the original quilt that I was copying. I just noticed - all of the baskets are

The last 2 blocks and the tops are done!

I needed 2 more blocks to finish the gray version of the quilt. I ended up making simple 9 patch/half square triangle blocks. One is the yellow block in the lower left. Here it is closer up. When I made the half square triangles I had the red fabric going the wrong way so you are seeing the backside of the fabric. So the red in the triangles is a little lighter than the red in the center. It wasn't worth redoing. The other corner has a blue block and I managed to get the front of all the fabrics showing. So, here's what it looks like almost complete. And here's the blue version of the quilt. I've got the backing and the batting for the gray quilt (the backing is in the washer now) and I'm working on the thread to use for quilting and how to quilt it. They are too big for me to free-motion quilt. I don't have the space. As it is, quilting with the walking foot will be a challenge. These tops deserve so

Basted

A few weeks ago I was at the Local Quilt store basting my bright sampler. It's been ready to go for a while. I've been working on a baby quilt and it's now done. It's been a while since I've quilted so I'm glad I had a quilt to warm up on. Next I need to pull a folding table out of the garage and re-arrange my quilting space. This quilt will have a lot more drag than the baby quilt. I've also been looking at pictures of similar quilts looking for quilting pattern inspiration. I'm thinking of taking the easy way out and u se wavy lines like this quilt . I should start quilting next weekend!

Erica's Stitches

Search This Blog