The Omelet Sisters

I've been working on a quilt to commemorate our urban chicken experiment. The girls lived with us for about six months before they went to live in the country. They were lots of fun to watch but they ate every bit of green in our back yard.

Here's a peek at Lucy. She is a Rhode Island Red.

VAST 125-Mile Exhibit

"Rusty's New Teddy Bear" has been accepted in the Visual Art Society of Texas's 125-Mile Exhibit.

The show will include around 30 pieces in the Gough Gallery 

at the Center for Visual Arts in Denton,

The exhibit will be on display from January 17 - February 21.

The reception will be on January 17 from 5:30 to 7:30.

Hope to see you there!

Update: My quilt won 1st place in Category V: Ceramics, Textiles and Fiber. 

Thank you Jervis and Carmen Underwood for sponsoring this award.

I'm very honored to be chosen.

"It's All About the Journey" in eQuilter.com blog

Luana Ruben of eQuilter.com comments on these two motorcycle quilts shown at IQA Festival in her blog.

http://luanarubin.typepad.com/luana-rubin/2013/11/creative-nudge-two-of-a-kind.html

On the left is Linda Anderson's piece: It is a tribute to her husband's dream of riding Route 66 on his motorcycle.
On the right is my self-portrait, with my favorite motorcycle.

Thank you Luana for your thoughtful comparison.

International Quilt Festival/Houston 2013

I had a wonderful time at the quilt festival in Houston early this month. This show is so inspiring. I was honored to have my quilt accepted into the show. 

"It's All About the Journey" 35.5 x 56”

Judy Kriehn and I were wandering around looking at the show 

when we came across her quilt, "Blue Plate Special". 

I'm looking forward to next year.

Donation for The Arts Guild of Denton (TAG)

The 2013 Annual Auction for the Arts to benefit The Arts Guild of Denton (TAG) was November 9, 2014. I was invited to create 8 x 10" art for the exhibition and auction with the theme "Homegrown". I took photos of my friend Lynn's koi pond and altered the image in PhotoShop. I had the image printed on muslin by fotosonfabric.com and threadpainted it to add texture. 

 
"Water Lily"  8 x 10"

"Water Lily" detail

I was so excited to hear that "Water Lily" won first place in the exhibition.

Lynn, the owner of the Koi, was able to win the bid for this quilt 

at the 2013 Annual Auction for the Arts.

Thanks Shawn for being proxy.

It will be fun to visit my quilt when I visit Lynn.

Cicada Song

At my dye retreat in 2011 we experimented with some deconstructed silk screen 

prints. I have been looking for a way to use my prints. I started hand 

stitching around the colors with a single strand of embroidery floss.

Then I experimented with several direct transfer methods.

The most successful was a laser print – the kind with heated powder ink –

on high rag content letterhead paper. I transfered the print by applying Golden 

Soft Gel to the surface of the fabric. While the gel was still wet, I put the laser 

image face down on the fabric and rubbed to smooth out the air bubbles. 

After drying overnight, I wet the paper with water and when saturated, 

I rubbed the paper pulp from the print leaving the ink in the gel.

Here is a Website with video and instructions on 

“Direct Image Transfer” by Golden.

The cicada was a favorite of an old friend so I chose this vintage drawing.

I was inspired to try some freehand journaling by Deborah Boschert's 

blog here and here. Unlike Deborah, my writing is readable, 

at least to me. I wanted to explain my reason for the cicada.

"Cicada Song" 16 x 18"

I colored the cicada with Sharpie and added the organza 

leaf blades to pick up the red in the silk screen.

I'm still thinking about what to do next time.

I have lots more deconstructed silk screen prints.

The Recycled Challenge

Members of the Not Your Grandmother's Bee recently completed 18 x 18" works the were made of at least 75% recycled materials.

Just Crabby is a piece of a kimono that I dyed in 1992.

I used thickened procion dye to paint the crab.

The batting was purchased at a garage sale and
the back is fabric from the quilt guild free table.

Around the same time in the 90's, I created some batik tshirts.

I saved this batiked circle from one of them.

Aquarius

The circle of batik fish is fused to a piece of muslin from the quilt guild free table
that I dyed. The batting was a small sample of black 80/20 given to me by
Hobbs at a quilt show and the back is a man's dress shirt from a thrift store.

There are 15 quilts on display at the local SCRAP store in Denton for the
month of October. SCRAP is a non-profit creative reuse center in 
downtown Denton, TX that offers inexpensive reused art and 
craft materials, plus office supplies, to the Denton community in their retail store.

The opening reception is tonight from 7-9 p.m.

I can't wait to see the other quilts.

Hope to see you there!