Sunrise Series

Lately I have been enjoying working in series. My latest series is inspired by the sunrises over Nantasket Beach in Hull Massachusetts. The pieces are 5" square (8" with matting).  They are composed of fabric which I lay down improvisationally and secure with fusible products. I then layer with batting and muslin and quilt on a domestic (sit down) sewing machine. The quilting designs are inspired by Zentangle® patterns and I use several thread colors.  

They are available for  purchase click here.

Sold

Sold

Sold

 Sold

 Sold

Hull Artist Studio Tour

On July 7th and 8th I participated in the Hull Artists Studio Tour. This was a great event that featured 22 artists opening their studios to the public. I had a fabulous time showing my art quilts, Zentangle (TM) inspired art, and my original designed fabric pocketbooks and totes. This event occurs twice a summer and I'll be participating again on August 25th. Here are pictures of my "front room" all prettied up to show my work.

 Wholecloth quilt - this is inspired by the sea. It is one piece of fabric with intricate stitching. All of the stitching is done freehand by machine without any computer assistance.

Staccato Sunrise (Sold) Pieced, machine quilted and beaded. The machine quilting is detailed showing the motion of the grasses as well as the ocean and the sky. The sun is represented by a mariners compass block that was bisected to show motion.

The seascape series below was constructed and quilted in a similar manner. On a smaller scale, these pieces are stretched over a deep 1 1/2" canvas frame.

 10" x 10" seascape 1

 10" x 10" seascape 2

10" x 10" seascape 3

 detail - seascape

 detail - seascape

Detail - seascape

This is a small (5") quilted piece.

Below is the tree series. Zentangle (TM) inspired art from pen, ink and pencil. Each piece measures 3 1/2" square.

And let's not forget the kitchen ladies quilts -

 quilted, beaded and mounted on 1 1/2" deep canvas stretchers.

And the purple sunset! Machine quilted and fibers.

More pics of the front room turned studio for the weekend!

That's all .....see you in August!

Tangled iPad cover

This weeks Diva Challenge is to use the new tangle Pea-nuckle. I decided to use it on one of my ready-to-tangle iPad cases! This was so much fun. I used Identipen markers in black, Fabrico marker in 181 cool gray, and Copic markers BG15 and BG10. I decided to fill the entire space with tangles but to work really big. On the first side I did three tangles - Mooka, Pea-nucke, and Tipple. A really nice thing happened at the transition between Mooka and Pea-nuckle - one of those happy accidents!
If you haven't tangled on fabric yet you should give it a try! The way that the pen works with the weave of the fabric adds a texture and richness that's really fun to play with.

 On the fip-side I used to black Identipen marker and gray Fabrico marker. I used several tangles and again filled the entire space.

The ready to tangle and decorate canvas iPad cover is availabe on my website. I make each one individually from canvas with a zippered closure and two inside pockets for your stylus and small accessories. Each is lined with beautiful batik fabric.Click here to order! If you email me a picture of your decorated iPad cover I'll mail you a handmade Pen-holder for your sketch book!

Or - you can order a Pen-holder here!

Sanibelle Quilted

Sanibelle Quilted!



Sanibelle - drawn with Pigma Pen and pencil



The Diva Challenge this week is to create a tangle submitted by one of the blog’s followers. The tangle selected is “Sanibelle” and was designed by Tricia Faraonce. This design is a natural to adapt to quilting. 

This is the Diva challenge tangle I made this on a Zentangle® 3 ½” tile.



This is how I draw it:

I use teardrop shapes instead of the scallop followed by straight lines. I feel that I’m able to create a smoother line this way. Also it is easily adapted to a continuous line for quilting if you retrace some of your lines along the way. This is shown on the bottom left of my sketchbook page.

And again here is the tangle quilted out. I used Signature and Bottom Line threads on a Sew Batik fabric.

 

Hey Lefty

The Diva challenge this week is to create a Zentangle (r) tile using your non-dominat hand. Well this really was a challenge - I found that I had to turn tile a lot to make up for my uncoordinated left hand!

That was fun, sort of. I don't really feel like doing another one though!

Last Saturday I had a group of Certified Zentangle Teachers (CZT) at my house to network, learn, and socialize. We had a great time! Plans are already in motion to get together again!

Here's the group!

And we had a surprise visitor - Maria Thomas - co-founder of Zentange (r) !

I gave a short demo on how to machine quilt tangle patterns. A very mini-version of the class I'll be teaching at MQX in Providence RI this April. I gave people a chance to try out the longarm sewing machine - it's harder than it looks! Here's Maria trying her hand at the longarm.

Jeanne Paglio showed us how to make tangled earrings. Here are the ones I made - I'm going to make more of these earrings - it was so fun!

We also heard from Dr. Meredith Yuhas on the clinical study she is conducting on Zentangle.

I've been hard at work in the studio this week making earrings and planning some awesome quilting projects. I've also spent some time on marketing my sewing patterns - you can check them out here.

And..... on Monday I'll annouce a great giveaway!

Go Purple

I took a class at Quilts and Treasures in East Longmeadow MA where we made baskets by wrapping fabric around clothesline rope and sewing it together. Well – that was not only fun but very addictive.  I made this basket during the class (I got extra credit for the ric-rac –ha ha!)

Then I started to make this little one. My daughter wants me to finish it and give it to her!

Then I kind of got carried away and started to make a beach bag out of just rope – purple rope! I’ve used two spools of rope – that’s 150 feet of rope folks, and it measures  about 16 x 7 x 3. My daughter links I should add a lime green stripe – should I?

All of this basketry is cutting into my quilting and tangling time. But I got back at it. The Diva challenge recently was to add purple to your tangles. Here’s a page from my sketch book with a couple of purple tangles on it. I used Prismacolor pencils for the purple.

I’m still trying to add all of the official Zentangle™ tangles to my sketchbook. Here are two pages with lots of tangles on them. I tried working with the negative space. It was a lot of fun!

To learn more about Zentangle and to see my teaching schedule visit my website.