Four in Art Reveal

This year each member of the Four in Art Quilting Group will be interpreting the theme of LITERATURE in their 4 works. We have worked with a 12" x 12" square quilt limit in the past challenges and I am continuing with that this year. (The other reveals are scheduled for May 1, August 1 and November 1.)

My focus for the theme is Children's Literature. I will donate my Literature quilts to my local library for permanent display.

My series begins with children's books as the building blocks of reading. 

From my elementary school teaching experiences of more than 26 years and reading to my own daughters, I had an extensive list of books (as well a quite a collection!) to picked from in developing this first piece. I think this small quilt will bring the child (and parents) into the quilt and thus its message.

Around or at the reading table -- that is one place children experience books. The center of my quilt is the "wood" table. One of the first books my daughters enjoyed listening to and "reading" was Pat the Bunny  by  Dorothy Kunhardt. That is the first block sewn to the table. I built the COURTHOUSE STEPS around the table to indicate the steps of reading, climbing the ladder, and moving down the steps to begin the wonderful journey that reading can provide. 

My goal was to use a variety of techniques to put words on the fabric. I took a class with Susan Purney-Mark a few years ago where we explored various media to add LETTERS to our quilted pieces.

These are the marking tools I used in the process: 

• Pat the Bunny was printed directly to fabric using my computer printer. I taped the edges of the fabric to paper to feed it into the printer. 
• The Bic Mark-It ultra fine points were used to print Little Bear (by Else Holmelund Minarik) and Planting a Rainbow (by  Lois Ehlert). I found they bled a bit too much for my liking.
• I found the Pentel ENERGEL pens to be the best to write on fabric. They were used to write Today is Monday (traditional words illustrated by Eric Carle), Harold and the Purple Crayon (by Crockett Johnson) and outlining the letters of The Foot Book (by Dr. Seuss).
• The letters for The Foot Book  were painted with Jacquard Textile (Color 111 Sky Blue).
• Plaid latex Craft Paint (20586 Canary Yellow) was used straight from the bottle for Corduroy (by Don Freeman) and Goodnight Moon (by Margaret Wise Brown). 
• It was a bit difficult using the paints with the thin brush. The fabric fibers were rough enough to stop an even spread of paint.
• A medium black Jimnie Gel Rollerball by Zebra worked nicely for Winnie the Pooh (by A. A Milne). I did like the way this wrote on the fabric.
• The Velveteen Rabbit (by Margery Williams) was written with a medium Zebra Z-Grip pen I found in my pen basket. I liked the way it rolled on the fabric. 
• Strega Nona (by Tomie dePaola) was written with a black ZIG Chisel tip and the gold dots were made with a Krylon 18kt Gold Leafing Pen. This was cool to use and would be interesting to use on a larger area in a quilted project. 
• The Magic Fish (by Freya Littledale) was painted using a mixture of Liquitex Soft Body Cadmium Red Light and Cadmium Yellow Deep to try to make a goldfish color. Unfortunately, I had added a bit of Folk Art Extreme Glitter for a shimmer (which did not occur) and it made the Liquitex stiffer and plastic-y.  

I was not sure I liked the appearance of the piece when it was only a block. But after layering and quilting in the ditch, it began growing on me. The binding is simply the backing brought around to the front, held down for stitching using 1/4" water soluble basting tape--the best "third hand" I can ask for when working with hemming! Adding this binding, I thought, finished it off very nicely. 

Let me and the other readers know what  book you remember reading at a young age or reading to a child. Or if you have you ever incorporated words or letters into a quilted piece and how you did that.

Thank you for visiting. Be sure to look at the other members' pieces at their sites below to view their works:

Betty at a Flickr site: http://www.flickr.com

Catherine  at Knotted Cotton

Elizabeth at OPQuilt.com 

Jennifer at Secondhand Dinosaur 

Nancy at  Patchwork Breeze (You are here.)

Rachel at The Life of Riley

Simone at Quiltalicious

Susan at PatchworknPlay

Quilt Retreat and Unexpected Surprise

This past weekend I went to a quilt retreat with 11 other ladies. Some were from the Tall Pine Quilters Guild, some were friends.  It was relaxing and fun and with only 12 of us we had more room than normally is available at a retreat. 

It was held at KETTUNEN CENTER in Tustin, Michigan. 

In 2004 I had attended a quilting retreat here with another group. Only two of the other ladies had been here before. It is owned and operated by the Michigan 4-H Foundation. There are 160 acres and a lake and unfortunately it rained while we were there, so we did not get to explore the grounds. 

But we did a lot of quilting. I took projects that were nearly complete. I do this when going to retreats because I can bring more items to work on and usually get most of them done. I don't have to cut much more than bindings, backing fabrics or small pieces. 

And these are the things I finished: 

I sewed bindings on:  

The Give and Take quilt I made
after taking a class from Susan Purney Mark
at the 2012 AQS Show in Grand Rapids, MI

Small Square in a Square quilt for me.

A small Square in a Square quilt that will be donated for the church bazaar.

A Christmas table runner for the bazaar.

For the bazaar: 9" and 12" table mats from orphan blocks I had.

A 15" table mat quilted and bound, for the bazaar,
made from an orphan block given to me by a friend

Another block given to me by a friend. I added the 4 corner triangles,
quilted it and bound it (bazaar donation). 

Another Christmas table runner that I quilted for the bazaar.
This is made using the Triangle Frenzy Pattern.

A table mat for donation made from a leftover block I made
using Quilt Smart Interfacing.
I sewed backing and front right sides together with the batting.
Then I quilted the curves of the center "flower".

I sewed the sashings on these slash and sew blocks I made a few years ago.
This flimsy will be a small quilt that could be a wall hanging,
child's quilt or used on a table.

Pillowcases for my daughter to go with the Chevron quilt that we made. 

Now, for the strangest occurrence at the retreat. 

I attended a retreat (at a different place) in the early 2000s, where I supplied a kit and showed the ladies how to make a 3-D flying geese block. Some of them chose to keep their blocks, others combined them to make quilts for auction or giving. While exploring the various areas of the building this weekend, I found a stairway with lovely quilts which had been donated over the years by retreat groups. 

And I found the quilt, shown above, hanging quite high on the wall; but I saw right away the 3-D flying geese made from the fabric I had supplied. And sure enough, when I searched the names, they were the ladies who had been at the retreat when I taught that block. You can see 2 of the blocks in each of the 4 corners. Some of the fabric around the signature blocks have geese flying in them. This quilt was donated to the Kettunun Center in 2008, atleast 4 years after the retreat! I am so happy to see that they used the blocks in the quilt they named: 

What do you take to retreats to work on? What kind of quilting retreats do you like to go on? 

Have you ever had something from your past show up in an unexpected place?