Quilting.......on Sacred Ground

The Mail Man delivered a Package today...

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From Heartbreak to Hope

Purple Quilt Project

This package contained purple strips of fabric with names signed on them.

The purple strips were sewn together and measure 7 feet long

I do not know the people whose names are on these strips, but I feel a genuine closeness to them.

They have all been touched by Alzheimer's

Charlotte H. of Waldwick New Jersey

I was born in New Jersey

Thelma V. OBrien Bergenfield, New Jersey

I was raised in New Jersey and most of my family lives there today.

Louis Petix Bronxville, New York

I lived just minutes from New York

Myron S. New York City

School Field Trips took me to the Statue of Liberty, riding the ferry in the New York Harbor, and to the museums of New York.

Ted Lannigan of Seaside, Oregon

Margurite Miller of Phoenix, Oregon

I have called Oregon home for the last 26 years.

These names are important to me.

I feel as if I am on sacred ground.

I have been invited to quilt this 7 foot purple quilt.

It will be part of 118 purple quilts in a new exhibit:

Alzheimer's Illustrated

From Heartbreak to Hope

As I quilt on this sacred ground, I will choose my stitches thoughtfully and treat this quilt with gentle hands, as I know there is another quilter out there who is also quilting one of these purple quilts which contains the name of my grandmother, Helen Fusco of New Providence, New Jersey.

CLICK HERE to see the Quilting on this

CLICK HERE:  to see My Quilts

CLICK HERE to see Glitter for Grandma one of the Quilts I created in honor of my grandmother.

Please CLICK HERE to find out more about Ami Simms and her quilts to raise funds and awareness for Alzheimer's.

If you are a Quilter CLICK HERE to see incredible journal quilts!

May Your Bobbin Always Be Full,

LuAnn

Photo Transfer Journal Quilts

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Birthday Surprise

Our son came home on his birthday to show us his new puppy.

We went outside to take a few pictures and it began to snow so beautifully.

The puppy had snowflakes all over his head.

I had a difficult time printing this image onto fabric.

I ended up with 4 prints, and didn't want to waste them.

I chose the best for the center, then cut the rest up and added them to create a fractured piece.

Nicholas 24 yrs ~ Gunnr 9 weeks

I Do The Limit

This is my husband's grandmother.

Her son-in-law would tease her about driving too slow.

She would simply reply, "I Do The Limit".

Grandmother turns 90 this year.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Grandma Barker

The Guardian

As soon as I snapped the camera, I just knew this would become a quilted textile some day. I love when that happens.

This is Tony..... with Kent & Celia in the background.

His main job was to guard their car. If he was in the car, nobody got near it!

I chose to keep with the botanical elements and quilted wheat in the border and grasses in the center.

I plan to include these photo transfer journal quilts in the exhibit later this month.

It was good to get home from our trip early enough to have time to get these completed for the show.

May Your Bobbin Always Be Full,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Binding Grandmothers Flower Garden Quilt...

Machine Quilting by Day.........Hand Binding by Night

It is Amazing what a Deadline will do for you!

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Grandmothers Flower Garden Quilt

90 x 100 inches

1993 - 2003 This Grandmothers Flower Garden quilt traveled everywhere with me. It was my "Take-A-Long" Quilt. It has traveled on planes, trains and automobiles. Using the English Paper Piecing method, I hand pieced over 12,000 half inch hexagons at: football games, basketball games, wrestling tournaments, the dentist & orthodontists offices, the pediatricians, family vacations, at Seattle Mariner games...it was my constant companion......many times I was tempted to piece a hexagon while sitting at a rather long stop light in town.

I only pieced this quilt while I was away from home.......so it turned into a 10 year take-a-long quilt project. After the top was all pieced, I began to hand quilt it, but the pain in my wrists and hands from carpal tunnel soon let me know that I would never be able to complete it. I removed the hand quilting stitches and sent it off to a highly recommended long arm quilter in Idaho. She quilted feathered circles in the center of each flower. I used a wool batting and the quilt is absolutely yummy.

My personal quilts tend to get put on the back burner. The quilts that have deadlines are the ones that get completed quickly. I have never set a deadline for one of my own quilts. My quilt exhibit in September has given me a BIG DEADLINE to complete my own personal quilts. It is just the push I needed to get this quilt out and get to work on it again.

Yesterday I sewed the bias binding on the top side of the quilt with the sewing machine. Last night I brought it to the house and began hand stitching the binding to the backside.

I use hair clips to hold the binding around the edge of the quilt. The clips help to relieve the strain on my hands and wrists while I am stitching the binding in place. I don't struggle trying to hold the binding in place, the clips do that for me. I am able to bind for hours without any fatigue to my hands.

This is my Binding Tin.......I found it years and years ago at a garage sale with hair clips already in it. I added a small pair of scissors, a wooden needle case, Thread Heaven thread conditioner, and thread to match my binding fabric. All of these supplies live in this little red tin and are always ready when I need to bind a quilt.

The best part of this quilt is........the yellow center in every flower block is a piece of fabric cut from my grandmother's house dress......making this TRULY a Grandmothers Flower Garden Quilt. I have named it......In The Presence of the Past.

P.S. To answer a few of the questions I have rec'd since posting this:

1. I started out with a fanny pack around my waist. It contained a zip loc bag with fabric hexagons and paper hexagons, thread, needle, nail clippers and beeswax (I later switched to Thread Heaven conditioner). I was able to sit quietly and piece hexagons, going mostly unnoticed at any event I was attending. I sat in a church at weddings and pieced and nobody even noticed. This gets addicting once you get started. Every idle minute you have away from home, you want to be piecing on your take-a-long quilt.

2. These are mini-hexagons, each of the 6 sides measures one half inch. A standard hexagon is 2 inches on each side....much quicker to put together.

3. There are 63 mini hexagons in each flower. A flower takes about 10 hours to hand piece. There are 150 flowers in this quilt........1,500 hours to piece the top.

4. 5 spools of thread.....2,500 yards of thread to piece the quilt top.

5. This is made entirely from scraps of fabric. Over the years I rec'd fabrics from people who knew my history with this quilt, had watched me work on it for years, and wanted to add to the quilt........I gladly included the donated tiny bits of fabric in this quilt, which makes me cherish it even more.

5. ALL of my nieces helped with cutting hexagons from fabric, pinning the papers to them and putting them in zip loc bags for me. They enjoyed choosing the fabrics and designing flowers for me to sew. I cherished my time with my nieces. Two of them eventually became quilters! LOTS of warm and wonderful memories come to mind when I look at this Grandmothers Flower Garden Quilt.

In My Cozy Spot Binding,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Fairy Business Isn't For Sissies...

I have had this image of my niece since last year. I have been saving it for something special. The look on her face speaks volumes.

At first I thought about printing it on fabric and then painting over the background. I also wanted to add fairy wings to go with the wand and a crystal ball.

My inspiration kicked into high gear today and I spent the day manipulating this photo, the old fashioned way........no photoshop was used at all.

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This is the original image

Monarch Butterfly Wings Clip Art

Crystal Ball Clip Art

I printed the original image, then cut out my niece, taped the butterfly wings to her back, then taped on the crystal ball. All done manually w/ scissors & tape. No computer enhancement was used. I have photoshop......and maybe I will have the time to learn to use it in my next life!

I raise flowers and enjoy photographing them. I enlarged this pansy image to 8x10 and printed it out.

I placed the taped together image on top of the pansy image.

I remember the day I took this sunflower photo......the sky was such a gorgeous blue.

I printed it out 8x10.

I placed the taped image on top of the sunflower.

The yellow background really works.

This is a climbing rose on our patio.

I printed it out 8x10

Again, here is the taped image on top of the pink rose.

I like all 3 designs.

Here they are printed onto fabric w/words added at the bottom:

All 3 images are on cloth and ready for borders and quilting. It will be fun to stitch each one differently and see how they turn out. I will post the completed quilts when they are done.

p.s. To see the completed quilt CLICK HERE

CLICK HERE to view My Quilts

To see more journal quilts CLICK HERE

To see more photo transfers CLICK HERE

To see more New Work CLICK HERE

Remember........

This Fairy Business Isn't For Sissies,

LuAnn

Where Inspiration Comes From

Inspiration can come from most anywhere, especially the outdoors. Just being outside in the fresh air and sunshine gets your blood pumping and gets you motivated and just happy to be alive.

I went on a fishing trip with my favorite guy to the Rogue River. It was a sunny day and the river was gorgeous. The river water was so clear you could see the bottom.

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All day long I couldn't take enough pictures of the water. It glistened in the sunlight and was so pure and clear.

The water was such an inspiration to me, I just knew I had to use these images in a journal quilt.....a memory quilt to remember this day.

I decided the water images would be the perfect background. I printed out my favorites, collaged the images together, and the background was complete.

"You Rogue"

I added a few photos of Brad and Suzy over the top of the water images and it was done. I photo-transferred everything onto fabric and quilted it.

The water that inspired me while fishing, continued to inspire me when I returned home to work in the Thread Shed.

Here are a few more images I have taken recently that inspire me. I don't try to analyze why they interest me. I just try and enjoy the enthusiasm that they create in me.

Abandoned store in eastern Oregon

Frozen faucet at the sheep barn

trip to the Tetons

Hens and Hollyhocks in the yard

CLICK HERE to view My Quilts

What inspires you?

LuAnn

To see more journal quilts CLICK HERE