Waving in the Wind - free motion quilting cameo 27

A bit of a break from the black and white theme for this post. It is time for another fmq cameo.

Waving in the Wind - free motion quilting cameo 27

This is one of my motifs that was born of putting pencil to paper and just watching and waiting to see what happens, going with what I like, dropping what I don't and constantly trying out the 'what ifs'. For me it evokes crops waving in a summer breeze. Although the line crosses it is a continuous line and has a nice swing to it. I think it looks better stitched all in the same direction, which is a bit of a pain because it means you have to stop at the end of each row and start on again for the next.

Thanks for dropping by..

Hilary Florence

P.S. I'm linking this post to:

WIP Wednesday at freshly pieced   @   http://www.freshlypieced.com/

WOW = WIPs on Wednesdays  @ http://www.estheraliu.blogspot.co.uk/  

WIP Wednesday at TN + TN  @ http://needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.ca 

­­­­I Quilt Thursdays http://prettybobbins.com/

Really Random Thursdays http://www.liveacolorfullife.net/
Off the wall Fridays @ http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.co.uk/

Fabric Frenzy Friday @ http://fortworthfabricstudio.blogspot.co.uk

Friday linky party @ http://www.confessionsofafabricaddict.blogspot.co.uk/
Do go and have a look at some of the other fantastic quilts there.

To cut or not to cut?

 Actually, that isn't  the question. The black on white quilted piece shown in progress last week, is now finished. The question is, how do I cut it up?

I admit, I am very nervous now. If I get this wrong, a lot of work will to to waste, so for the moment I am still working with my paper layouts. Here are some more.

The shapes are quite nice, but the layout gives a very boring negative space...

so a couple of different arrangements...

a few more with a kind of 'zipper' effect, playing around with the amount of separation between the right and left sides...

or in alignment...like this one, interesting negatives spaces...

could this be the one???

thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

P.S. I am linking this to:

Linky Tuesday at Free motion by  the river­­­­ @ http://www.conniekresin.com/  

Fabric Tuesday @ http://quiltstory.blogspot.co.uk/    

Sew cute Tuesday @ http://www.blossomheartquilts.com/ 

Show and tell Tuesday @ http://ihavetosay.typepad.com/randi/

Let’s Bee Social @ http://sewfreshquilts.blogspot.co.uk

WIP Wednesday at freshly pieced   @   http://www.freshlypieced.com/

WOW = WIPs on Wednesdays  @ http://www.estheraliu.blogspot.co.uk/  

WIP Wednesday at TN + TN  @ http://needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.ca

We did it Wednesday @ http://www.sewmuchado.com/

Off the wall Fridays @ http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.co.uk/

Fabric Frenzy Friday @ http://fortworthfabricstudio.blogspot.co.uk

Friday linky party @ http://www.confessionsofafabricaddict.blogspot.co.uk/
Do go and have a look at some of the other fantastic quilts and quilters there.

Black and white layouts - playing around

I showed this piece in a post last week and said when it was finished (there is about twice as much still to quilt) I would cut it up and applique it.  I have some hand-dyed charcoal material for the background which I will quilt in black - probably in pebble or some other overall pattern.Quite a few visitors were very curious to see how I chop it up. Well, so am I!!

I got out some black and white paper and started playing with layouts. For the next few posts I'll show you some of the ideas I have come up with - although I haven't yet decided which - if any - of them I will use. Today's layout is mostly squares, starting with just a few...

These just landed on the paper like that as I was cutting... so I added a frame...

but it is very basic, so I added more squares...

again framed, playing with strips of different thickness...

felt it still needed more squares...

more or less happy with those square, so now trying out different frames. Elements to play with are thickness of strips, weight given on each side by thickness/number of strips and the negative space between strips.

I'm not quite sure about the thick strip on the base...

and then if you turn it on it's side the whole thing looks different again...

These are just ideas. What is black might become white and vice-verse. The only reason it is this why around is because I have bigger sheets of white paper than black!

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

P.S. I have linked this post to:

Off the wall Fridays at http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.co.uk/#

Show off Saturdays at www.sewcanshe.com

 Do go and have a look at the other quilts and quilters there.

Trio of Leaves - free motion quilting cameo 26

Trio of Leaves - free motion quilting cameo 26

This is a spin off from the previous post 'Leaf Triplets'. The leaves have become more stylised and symmetrical. The curved stem has gone and the straight veins jet out at a 90 degree angle, each vein with an ending - triangles for the first leaf, circles for the second and kites for the third.

Thanks for stopping by...

Hilary Florence

Work In Progress

I like the idea of work in progress Wednesdays, but up until now, I have been busing working on a quilt for the British Quilt and Stitch competition and haven't been able to show that. Now I've finished that - all but the binding - I can join in the WIP fun!

This is going to be a black and white piece - not sure yet how it will work out, but this cloth will be cut up and appliqued when it is finished. Oh, by the way, as you can perhaps see, I haven't marked anything - not even the columns. I believe in learning to love your wobbles!!

Thanks for stopping by...
Hilary Florence

P.S. I have linked this post to:

WIP Wednesday at freshly pieced      http://www.freshlypieced.com/

WOW = WIPs on Wednesdays http://www.estheraliu.blogspot.co.uk/  

WIP Wednesday at TN + TN http://needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.ca

­­­­I Quilt Thursdays http://prettybobbins.com/

Really Random Thursdays http://www.liveacolorfullife.net/

Do go and have a look at other fantastic quilts and quilters there!

Leaf Triplet - free motion quilting cameo 25

Leaf Triplet - free motion quilting cameo 25

The vase majority of my designs come from just sitting with pencil and paper and doodling. Sometimes I have an idea already in minds eye that need developing on paper, sometimes I have no idea and just wait to see where my hand takes me. That doesn't mean that I am blind to inspiration elsewhere.  The above leaf was inspired by wallpaper. The design was printed with a vast array of flora and fauna, but this one leaf immediately stood out as a potential fmq motif and I think it works well. It would be a bit fiddly to make, but it would also work well as a stamp. Although each leaf is a continuous line - up  one side and down the other, making the steam as you go along - each leaf requires a start and stop.

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

P.S.   I've linked this post to   'Anything Goes Mondays' at  http://marelize-ries.blogspot.co.uk ,
 'Linky  Tuesday' at http://www.conniekresin.co.uk, 'Fabric Tuesdays at http://quiltstory.blogspot.co.uk, 'Sew Cute Tuesday' at http://www.blossomheartquilts.com  and last but not least 'Show and tell Tuesdays' at http://ihavetosay.typepad.com/randi/.    Do go and have a look at some of the other fantstic quilts and quilters there.

Leaf Print - free motion quilting cameo 24

Leaf Print - free motion quilting cameo 24

We are back to parallel lines. They are oh so flexible and rich in potential. I'm sure I have seen this idea in a drawing somewhere, but I can't remember where and when. Evidently I filed it away as inspiration for free motion quilting. Like the Funky spider web - this would be a great design for simple plain squares, especially if you kept to the idea of filling in the space between veins with parallel lines, but changed the size and shape of the leaf. Now there is an idea!

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Funky Spider Web - free motion quilting cameo 23

There is nothing original about parallel lines and spiral, but I'm rather fond of this funky spider web. I always like playing around with the dimensions of a motive - making it bigger or smaller. I find these 3 motifs work well together and giving the web nine arms lends a nice symmetry. I haven't yet tried the idea with other motifs - but I'm filing the idea. I have a quilt top of 6" squares that I made in my very early days of dyeing (idea was to see how many colours you could make using just 3 dyes). I have never got around to quilting it. This might must be the job. Watch this space!

Thanks for dropping by...
Hilary Florence

Hourglass - free motion quilted Cameo 22

Hourglass - free motion quilted Cameo 22

Rows of hourglasses flow across the page in gentle lines. Symmetry across the horizontal axis means this one looks the same quilted forward or backward. Depending on the space to be filled, the hourglass can be tall and skinny, or short and fat. It is interesting to see how that can quite alter its character. There is a good juxtaposition of angles, straight and curved lines - although some of the 'staight' lines can also be given a bit a curve if wished.

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

A bit of colour and something a bit different

When I decided to do my project of 101 free motion quilted cameos, I chose indigo blue partly because white stitching shows up well on that colour and partly to create a unified body of work. The downside of this, which I had not thought of, was that the blog colour wise begins to look all the same.
So I thought I would put in a small experimental piece which started off yellow. Once stitched, I then went over the quilting with Markal paintsticks - in blue and silver. So yes, we are still with blues, but it does look a bit different!

I'm linking the blog to nina maria's 'Off the wall Friday'. Go and have look to see what others are doing.
Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Keyholes - free motion quilting Cameo 21

Keyholes - free motion quilting Cameo 21

OK, so this quilt a jumble of keyholes all tangles up together, but that is rather the fun of it! I wonder what secrets so many keyholes are hiding?

Like Thorny Point, Cameo 17, this design is a 'there and back' one. In other words, the first line creates just one side and you need to quilt back again to finish the design, so ending up at your starting point. You could be absolutely symmetrical and make keyholes left and right the same - but you know by now I rarely do symmetrical. Here I've taken asymmetry even a step further and made the central stem occasionally shift to the right or left.

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Copyright, labelling your images and the second life of a work of art

There is a very interesting discussion on Annabel Rainbow's blog about copyright law, blogs, the web, Pinterest and having your work reproduced without your knowledge or consent - see link below.

http://grumpyandmad.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/help-please-with-pinterest-and-blog.html#comment-form

An art work really has two creative lives. The first is the process of creation between the artist and their chosen material. This can be a wonderful, frustrating, fulfilling, enriching experience, which is why so many of us indulge in it. The  is second is the life of the work after completion. This can be in the realm of its interaction with its audience - hopefully creating connection, pleasure, inspiration, feeling, opinion - provoking reaction. It can also be in the physical realm, including being reproduced by the artist or other, with or without the artist's permission, with or without the artist's knowledge, with or without acknowledging the artist.

This is not a new problem. As soon as an artist reveals her work to the world, she starts to loose control of it, and art has been copied throughout history, which is why we have copyright laws. But the web, blogs and particularly Pinterest seem to be producing very gray legal areas. Most artists agree that Pinterest has brought them a larger audience, but many have been dismayed to discover their own images of their own works on sites with no reference or acknowledgement of them at all. And the worst story I have heard was of one artist finding someone had made and was selling cards of her work!

I love sharing - most of us do. I have had hours of pleasure and inspiration looking at art on the web and I admit I love it when others look at my work and leave comments. I have also been frustrated when I have found something on a pinterest board that I like, but can not find out who created it.

For this reason, I will now put my name and blog address on all my own photos. You may pin away, I will at least know that the work will be traceable back to me. Unless, of course, you can remove the name? I know I can't. I've tried, as I wasn't happy with my first attempts. I didn't succeed so its a bit intrusive for the moment. Sorry. Hopefully I'll get there.

Hilary Florence

Wooded Hills - free motion quilted Cameo 20

Wooded Hills - free motion quilted Cameo 20

This is another cameo that was inspired by the work of another quilter, namely Freida Anderson. You can see her work at www.friestyle.com/

Frieda creates some wonderful fused and quilted collages, often featuring leaves. One showed leaves or trees arranged on hills. I have done a similar arrangement here, using a very simple stylised tree. The trees quilted on their own were not particularly interesting, but it is the rhythm of the background quilting, the close lines echoing the curve of the hills that makes the piece hang together.

At some point I will expand on this idea, perhaps using a different design of tree in each square.

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by

Hilary Florence

Stamping: funky foam, rolling pins and scrim = more procion paper play

More procion paper play, using a variety of home-made stamps. All but one use the turquoise/ rust colour scheme. These 2 days mix well to give a verity of greeny sludges.

This is just one overlapped and layered narrow stamp that I cut out of funky foam. I experimented using the soldering iron for this, as the design was quite fiddly. I wouldn't recommend it as the foam tends to bead. Also, I health and safety notice, I have no idea what fumes might be released burning through foam and I did this outside.

Another paper, featuring the same stamp. It also shows a line stamp that I made by cutting out uneven stripes to stick onto a cheap rolling pin.

Add caption

 More layering of various stamps. I've also added a bit of pseudo writing with a needle-noose bottle.

In these last 2 I've also used some hessian scrim as a printing tool.

Enjoy. 

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Tribal Sun - free motion quilting Cameo 19

Tribal Sun - free motion quilting Cameo 20

This cameo was inspired by the quilting on some cushions by Yoshiko Jinzenji. If you have never seen the work of the inspirational quilt artist Yoshiko Jinzenji, do visit her website at http://www.yoshikoquilt.com

The quilting created a variety of patterns using close parallel lines. It is quite a while since I made this cameo, and this is a technique I must return to. I find it very meditative and particularly enjoy creating the larger triangles. Any one of the 3 sides can be used as the starting point of the parallel lines, each side giving a very different result. You can chose whether to make the ends curved or straight.

Enjoy.

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Round Pegs and Square Holes - free motion quilting Cameo 18

Round Pegs and Square Holes - free motion quilting Cameo 19

I like the effect of this design. Perhaps it is the combination of right angles and circles, but it always makes me think of electric circuit boards and two pin plugs. I'm showing my age here and experience of a world that predates electric chips that fit onto a pin-head!

I think this one works best with a half-drop repeat. When combining lines of a continuous line quilting pattern to make an overall pattern, there is always the question of direction. Having reached the end of the line, the easiest thing to avoid stopping and starting again, is to turn the piece and go back. This means the next line will be upside down, which sometimes doesn't matter or is even desirable. The other alternative, which I used here, is to learn to quilt the design backwards. On larger pieces where turning is awkward, being able to quilt a pattern forward, backward and sideways is very  helpful. It is a skill worth practising.

enjoy

thanks for dropping by..

Hilary Florence

Stencils, soldering irons and inattentive mothers!

Procion paper play - stencils and rollers with thickened procion dyes

Quite a few years ago I went on a course for fusing fabrics together with a soldering iron - and did not enjoy it. No offence to artists who do fuse. In fact if you visit the website of Margaret Beal,  www.fusingfabric.co.uk, one of the great proponents of fusing, you will see some amazing work. However, as I said to my mother, working with a soldering iron was definitely not for me and not something I intended to do in the future.   

The only thing my mother remembered from that conversation was the word 'soldering iron' and guess what I got for Christmas?!! Well, this soldering iron has lain forlorn in my draw for years, but suddenly I have round a great use for it. It is wonderful for cutting through perspex to make stencils.

Here is the first I made - a sort of plant with berries. Not quilt successful because I didn't put in any bridges. So there a lot of loose bits flapping around in the breeze which allows quite a bit of seepage under the stencil. Still, I'm quite pleased for a first attempt.

It is amazing how effective it can be to restrict yourself to just 2 dyes. The first photo uses turquoise and rust, above and below uses turquoise and charcoal. I've also turned the stencil over and stamped with it, giving both a positive and negative print.

The second stencil is very loosely based on wisteria. 

Turquoise, violet and mustard.

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Thorny Point - free motion quilting Cameo 17

Thorny Point - free motion quilting Cameo 17

I don't think I can claim that this is an original design. Many quilters and artists have used images of thorns or barbed wire to great effect in their work. I find it a very powerful motif and of course, by its nature, every time you quilt it, it will be different.

I quilt down one side, creating thorns of different lengths and angles as I go, then go back up the other side and complete them. In general in my quilting, I pre-mark as little as possible, but here, if you want interlocking, but not crossing lines in a good rhythm, in can help just to mark the line in first.

It works well as a single line, or a collection of interlocking lines to create a texture. The line can be vertical, horizontal or even curved.

Enjoy

Thanks for dropping by...

Hilary Florence

Design Workout 3

just managed to de-glue my fingers from the latest 'design-workout'. You'll notice a change in colour scheme and an A4 format. There is no reason - again, I'm just using up old photocopies.Though  the odd word showing through adds interest don't you think?  Maybe is could double up as a workout for the imagination as well!

Just as a reminder, if you haven't seen previous posts, the idea here is to create a series of designs out of collaged squares and rectangles - not too much thought, just playing and producing.