The quarterly challenge that was due at the end of June for my 12x12 group was 'Leaves'.  I was initially excited about it because I wanted to try a technique one of you members, Karrie, showed me.  You take an Oliver Twist "One Off" and make a tree out of it .  Here is a picture of a "One Off".  You lay it out in tree form and stitch.  (Side note- I also love, love, love the Oliver Twist thread shown in the photo.  It quilts wonderfully.)  Another note- I did not have a "One Off" in the color I needed, so I created my own from fibers in my stash. Last note, when I look back at Karrie's tree, I begin to see where I began to go off track; hers is free-flowing and artsy.

I got to this point and my work just did not speak to me (in fact it was yelling some bad stuff at me). At this point, I was already late on the challenge, so I decided to experiment.

Next I used Tombow markers and drew around the trunk and branches and spray it with water.

I made leaves out of used teabags and used a combo of Tombow markers and Dye-Na-Flow to color them.  Still not loving it yet....

Finally, I painted polka-dots on the leaves.  

This is now a piece I can live with- still not one of my favorites!

What do you do when your art is not going in the direction you would like?

Remnants: Quilt Stand
Mt husband and I were recently visiting the Northern Michigan and its fabulous wineries.  We stopped at a quilt shop (of course!) and hubby found this quilt stand for me to rotate my 12x12 quilts. Here is the website for it http://www.ackfeldwire.com/, it is called a table stand.

Enjoy! Kathy

Erosion- Many Different Facets

e·ro·sion

əˈrōZHən/

noun

the gradual destruction or diminution of something.

I had to think long and hard about fear; I finally decided to focus on erosion.  Erosion can be applied to many areas of our lives...erosion of the beach at Lake Michigan..erosion of your health as you age...erosion of world-wide safety...so many things can gradually destruct creating fear.

My piece is inspired by an Edward Burtynsky photo shown below:

My piece is below. After creating the landscape, I used rust to create a tributary-like flow across the piece.  Some seed stitches finished it.

Enjoy!  Kathy

A CHILD'S WHIMSY by Kathy K.

I was so excited about the Whimsical Challenge and immediately began three months ago what I thought would be a brilliant idea.  I worked on the piece for bit-by-bit, but it seemed to never come together, soooooooooo finally last week, I ditched it and came up with the piece below.

I like that it is a happy and colorful piece. Besides the binding, the quilt began with all white fabric. You also may notice that I varnished the quilt- I just felt it needed the shine; I am glad I did.  I am not quite done with it yet; besides removing the painter's tape on the back holding the binding down on the back :-|, I would like to add a few beads on it.

Frost?

Happy New Year! 

The Frost challenge began smoothly.  I took hand-dyed fabric (ice blue) and layered hand-dyed organza (sage colored) on top.  I painted white snowflakes over the surface.  I then cut the piece into 3" x 3" squares (3.5" x 3.5" with seam allowances).  I sewed them together haphazardly and couched a thin silver braid around the snowflake edges.  I then sewed a inner and outer borders around the snowflakes using a silver rayon thread.  This is what the final background looks like...

I love the look of the background, but it needed something more and here is where my snag came.  I have hit many dead-end trials and ideas.  One of my trials was to add a cardinal bird sitting on a branch; here is my cardinal....

I really like the cardinal, but felt its style did not match the style of the snowflake background.  So, the cardinal "flew the coup".

I finished the piece by adding a butterfly, and here it is.....

Enjoy!  Kathy