Trying to be more creative

Well I finished the whole cloth mini quilt, have a look here and so moved onto another quilt that a client has asked me to make. This one I wanted to add too many things I think and when I started, lining it all up and making sure it was completely in the middle and symmetrical. I then looked at it and realised it did not look good at all. I had put a heart in there and it looked cheesy, bummer!! So I got out the fabric and started again. I had trouble getting back into the good groove, when I felt that I had gotten it wrong with the last one I had real trouble stopping the doubt of thinking this one sucked too :) It took me till about half way through and I stepped back and thought, Ok now it is looking not too bad.

So I have finished painting and now have started the free motion sewing, and I think it looks even better :).  Have a look and see what you think.

So there you have it, half way through and surprisingly ahead of deadline. Which is a great feeling :)

Have been reading some books lately but so far they are all very average and not worth mentioning. I have been watching The Walking Dead tv series and am totally transfixed by it. It is such great writing that I finish an episode and sit there thinking about the characters and what they are going to do to get out of their fix :) absolutely sucks me in and I love it. What about you? Any good tv shows or movies lately?

Jane

A New One

Ok, so this is  my new art quilt. It is a whole cloth mini quilt. Start small I say :). I started by finding a basic mandala pattern and then cropped and cut and pasted till it looked like I wanted it to, then I found a tile program on the net, put the picture in and then the program tiled it to how many tiles I wanted it to be, which was 4, then I printed it out and stuck them together!. Very cool and easy. And free :) sweet.

I then got one of the studio lights we use for my videos and carefully laid it down under my glass table, stuck the pattern on the table and then put the fabric on top. It took me about 5 hours to trace the pattern, the light got pretty hot as it is 500 watts :) so I had to turn it off after a while to give the light and me a break. But it is the best light for it as it is so bright. One day I will make myself a light box.

I traced the pattern with a yellow pencil, but unfortunately it started to rub off and fade!! After all that work too, so I went over the design with a black pen, which also started to fade. This was a good thing of course as I don't want black pen left on the pattern. I just made sure I worked real fast to not miss the pattern. Will have to go and find really good marking pens and pencils and try them all out and then I can do a review on them :).

So now I have sewn all the design on with a gorgeous old antique gold thread, nearly used it all so need to buy more, oh no have to buy more thread! :) what a pain. :) And now I am thinking about how to free motion the left over bits. I think it will be lots of bubbles and outlines and tiny swirls. Lots of fun.

All this sewing is helping me to stop eating. Christmas season gave me a taste for yummy delicious food again and now I don't want to go back to the diet. Darn. Addicted to sugar again. Doesn't help when I found a great recipe for a delicious chewy chocolate gingerbread cookies and wow I can't stop eating them mmmmm.

Here's for trying

Jane

Another New One :)

About 2 months ago I bought a new sewing machine. Not the one of my dreams :) but still a good one that will do all the things I need it to do. Then it started having problems and I ended up taking it back to the store twice. The first time they fixed it, the second time they said they couldn't. There were no more sewing machines of my model left, sooo they gave me an upgrade!! I had a brother nx400 and now I have a Brother nv400. And there is a big difference. I really really love it. The store, Echidna sewing club, were so helpful and willing to help me out when I had problems with the machine, very happy with the service. So now I am sewing on this...

This sewing machine is great!! It feels so solid and I noticed that compared to my last one, this has more metal parts, the needle itself appears to have been made of a stronger metal and the feeling of sewing on it is really smooth and nearly industrial. Just feels great. Still working out what all the buttons on the side do :) but they look cool :).


Now this is some more work on the book tree, I am liking it a lot more and it looks so much better in person :) Of course :)
 Soon I will put the puffed wheat/book pages on and then magically they will look like books :).

School holidays are going ok, not too much arguing and not too much computers. Time alone would be wonderful, but that will have to wait. Working on another youtube video for my channel, it should be up soon. Then straight into making another one. They are fun to do but who likes hearing themselves back?:)

Jane

A kid did it :)

Well to me this looks like a child painted it :) But since I have put a bit of work into this, I will not throw it out. When I used my gorgeous metallic thread on the tree wow it made it pop! So it looks better than before.

This puffed wheat thing is the pages of a book :) they will look better I promise and they look better in person. I had also thread painted book covers but alas they ended up looking like crispy bacon :) won't be using that now.

I have no books to read!!! What to do!! Anything to recommend? Just watched Castle's christmas episode, it was awesome :) and I loved it. Now we have to wait for more, so sad. What are you watching?
Jane

Books Anyone???

So this is the start of my new art piece. With wash away and thread, sooo cool!!!

It looks like puffed wheat :) but what they should look like is pages out of a book :) the will once I have worked some more magic :) here's hoping :) I am going to go over the edges and the middle with a darker colour thread and then black thread line for words. Then I will wash away the mesh and mold each one into the shape I want. Some will be flat, some will be half open and others nearly shut. This is all a hope and dream :).

Anyone done with their Christmas shopping? Me, not quite. Off to fight with honour next week before the kids finish school.

Jane

And Then There Were Two

Ok, so after finishing the commission quilt finished I went on to complete this one....

So, this time I went nuts with the feathers :) just coildn't stop... and the 3d tails are my gorgeous threads, why throw them out when you can use them like this :)

Don't you love the gold dots? I thought that this would help to keep the flow of the swirl going

More feathers, told you there was a lot

Some original filler, will be showing these in my video's.

Now I am starting on a tree with books :) just wait and see how awesome this will look like. I will be using the wash away again, so it will be very cool.

Jane

Finished!!

Well I finished the commission quilt last Thursday night. I was pretty impressed in myself :) Quite a quick one. The customer was very very happy and thought it was gorgeous. So that was a great response :).

Now for some pics.....

Feathers...mmmmmm :)

More feathers....

Love coming up with different free motion patterns... will feature them in my video's

The gorgeous back.... I used satin for backing and it was sensational. Soft to touch and nice against the skin and looks fantastic.

Back again....

One more back...

Can you tell I love feathers? And I love that it is still modern too :) And I love bubbles and swirls and soo many other patterns :) If you want to see how to do these, keep tuned to my youtube channel. :)

So now I am back working on the swirly thing, no name for it yet. Nearly finished that too and then will put it up on Etsy. Then I have another idea boiling in my head, just waiting to get out :). This has tree's in it! :) what a surprise :) with a difference of course :).

Watched a movie on the weekend called Safety not guarenteed. It was cute and I really had a good laugh. But a great laugh is Castle reruns :) sooo fun. So fun.

Jane