Travel Diary Quilt - Getting Started

The idea for my new quilt project is inspired by the above wall quilt created by Sabine Keichel, a dear friend in Germany.

It's made by stitching a bunch of separately made "pillows", stuffing them with batting, whip stitching around the edges, and adding embellishment and/or quilting stitches, then sewing them all together. Her quilt is full of play and fun and memories. I love it, and want to see if I can do something similar.

Mine will be about travels in 2014...

•  Feb - southern CA to visit my sister (Redland's area)
• June - road trip, with long stops at parks (Yellowstone, Itasca, Roosevelt, Glacier, Yakima R. Canyon, etc.) and college class reunion in MN - 1 month on the road
• Oct - visiting friends and meeting internet beaders in Europe (Denmark, Germany, Holland, Hungary) -1 month
• Nov - Columbia River Gorge and Portland area
• Dec - Tacoma, WA (tigers at Pt. Defiance Zoo, visit bead friends)

Took over 8,000 photos along the way, and collected stuff (seed pods, fabric, ribbon, thread, rocks, charms, beads, coins, etc.) in all these places.

Decided to make a wall quilt to tell the story, preserving the photos and ephemera collected and saved along the way. Working title is: 2014 Travel Diary. 

I began by going through all my photos, selecting a few (57 as it turned out) that represent the moments I absolutely do not want to forget, ever. These I sized to +/- 4 inches at 200 resolution. In MS Publisher, I arranged the photos, 4 per page, giving each a 1/2 inch colored border, as shown above, creating print-ready layouts.

I printed the photos, on inkjet printable fabric, "Printed Treasures" by Dritz. It's a decent quality, 100% cotton poplin, white. After printing, let the fabric dry for a couple of minutes, and then separate the paper backing, pulling it apart from the fabric, allow to dry further, then rinse and air dry. Cut the images apart, and they're ready to sew.

Digging into my rather substantial scrap bin (and mighty happy to have found a use for some of it), I selected a backing fabric for each photo. I chose on the basis of personality, subject matter, and color. This step was waaaaay fun!

After cutting the backing fabric about 3/16" larger all the way around than the photo, I cut a piece of cotton batting to just a tad smaller than the photo (not including border), made a photo fabric-batting-backing sandwich, and stitched around the photo area to create each pillow. (The batting does not extend beyond the stitching.)

The next step takes some time! Turning under the edges, I whip-stitch around the pillows using #8 pearl cotton thread. I've gotten better and faster at this step with practice, thank goodness.

After whipping the edges, the next step is really fun... to embellish and quilt each of the pillows! Here are a few I've done so far.

And here's an idea of what they will look like when they are sewn together. Of course, I will finish all 57 pillows before arranging them and stitching them together.

A few things I've learned so far:

• When you pull the paper backing off the inkjet printable fabric, a considerable amount of the bonding glue sticks to the fabric. It doesn't wash off. Bummer. It's really hard to hand stitch through the printed fabric.... requires a needle puller.
• Adding a color-matching border around the photos was a really good idea, because when I whip-stitch the edges there won't be little slices of white showing if the stitches are short of the edge of the photo.
• I'm having a difficult time beading on the photos, especially doing anything improvisational or where the embellishment takes over the photo.
• I'd like it to be more "funky"... more playful and fun, less like a photo album on the wall. It's a struggle, but I'm working on it.
• If I ever do this again, I will make larger pillows with smaller photos, piecing around the photos with fabric scraps. That way, the photo can remain plain, the embellishments on the surrounding fabrics.
• If I ever do this again, I will stuff the pillows with loose batting (such as you would to make stuffed dolls) rather than flat quilt batting. 

One more thing:

You might like to know that Sabine (my inspiration for this project) got her inspiration from Teesha Moore's set of 4 tutorial videos about making the pillows (in her unique way,) and using them as covers for her journals!  They are definitely worth a "look see!"

New Fabric Storage System

My Christmas present to me... no more lifting heavy tubs of fabric in and out of the closet!

The way it was:

• fabric stored in large tubs, each weighing over 30 pounds 
• tubs stacked on the floor in a closet located in my office/computer/sewing-storage room 
• when I needed something, I had to lift the tubs out of the closet, find the one(s) that might have the desired fabric in them (always on the bottom), and then carry the tub(s) to my studio, where I have table space and can sort through all the fabrics
• back breaking, daunting, not fun at all

The side-to-side measurement of the closet opening is about 70 inches. There is a shelf and clothes-hanging rod, which I want to keep, in case the room needs to be reverted to bedroom status again (its original use). The shelf is 65 inches from the floor. The depth of the closet is 24 inches. This space, where all the tubs and totes were stored previously, is shown empty, ready for the new system.

After thinking about what to do for many moons, my idea was to buy some sort of shelving units, like bookcases, and place them two-deep in the closet. The rear units would be bolted to the back wall of the closet, side by side. The front units would be on castors, so they could be moved out of the closet for access to the fabrics in the rear units.

An internet search followed, and turned up 4-shelf, composite-material bookcases, in white, by South Shore. Available from Target, they were exactly the right size, and the price ($56.99 each, with free shipping) was right too. I ordered them! I don't know how long this link will last, but here's where I got them.

I hired a good handy-man to help me get the shelving units ready for my fabric. The rear units are bolted to the back wall of the closet. We fortified the front units by attaching quarter-inch plywood to the back and adding wood blocks under the bottom shelf, to which we attached the castors. We also added handles to use when I am rolling the units.

Now for the fun (and hard work) part. For four long days, tub-by-tub, I emptied my fabrics onto my studio tables, sorting and organizing them into stacks. I ironed each piece of fabric and folded it into a specific size, the size you get when you fold the 22 inch length of a fat quarter in half and in half again, and then fold that in half along the 18-20 inch width. The result is roughly 9.5" deep by 5.5" wide, perfect for shelves that are 11.5 inches deep.

I have a lot of half-yard and fat quarter pieces. This folding system works well for them. Fabrics of 1 yard or more, I folded into a larger bundle, stacked separately, as you can see in the above photo (right side of both shelves). Note that you can see the handles (for moving the shelving unit) at the top of the photo.

It works!!! I am delighted to be able to see my fabrics easily, without lifting, carrying or rooting through the tubs!

Here's how the rear shelves look. (I haven't finished putting things that go here on these shelves yet.)

Here's how the front shelves look when they are in front of the rear shelves. The fabrics I use most often, cotton batiks and prints, are here, easily available to flip through when I need something.

This is what it looks like when the front units are rolled out. They are pretty easy to roll. As you can see, I've tried to keep more weight toward the bottom. My handy-man is concerned about earthquakes, and wants to figure out a system to attach the front units to the rear units. I'm thinking a couple of simple door hooks on the sides would work.

The curtains close to prevent light damage to the fabrics and hopefully keep the dust off them (partially closed above). I've been thinking about using Velcro to attach clear plastic over the shelves of the front units, but maybe it's OK with just the curtains. Any thoughts about that?

Nearly finished now... just a few odds and ends to fit into the system, and plenty of space to do that. I thought I had a ton of fabrics, more than I'll ever use... and probably I do. But, for better or worse, there is now room for more. Yikes!

Why Are Rosaries Called Rosaries?

Last week, while in the Portland (Oregon) area, I spent a day driving east along the Columbia River Gorge. Icy, windy, and cold, yet fabulously beautiful, I enjoyed every minute, both in and out of my car. You can see more of my scenic photos of the day here.

Multnomah Falls, Columbia River Gorge, Nov. 2014

At the "Bridge of the Gods," I crossed the Columbia and headed east along the Washington shoreline toward Bingen, stopping to use the facilities at the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center Museum. Seeing a sign on the admission desk about "the world's largest collection of Rosaries, over 4,000 of them," and remembering that rosaries = beads, I decided to take the time to view the collection.

Virtual Reality Photo by Jim Cole - Rosary Collection, Housed at the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center Museum

You can hardly imagine 4,000 rosaries... so many different types of beads... simple seed pods to elegant gold-capped jet, and everything in between. From a bead lover's perspective, it was heaven (except, of course, I wanted to fondle them all). The "virtual reality" photo above, "borrowed" from the internet, gives a correct impression of the quantity. This rosary collection is the life-work of Don Brown, a founder of the regional historical society.

Here are a few of the photos I took of the collection:

And now, finally, we get to the meat of this post! The word rosary... where did it come from? According to the online Etymology Dictionary, the word rosary dates to the mid 15th Century, and is derived from the Latin words rosarius, meaning "of roses" and rosarium, meaning "rose garden."

But wait, there's more to the story! In Medieval times, monasteries and castles had formal rose gardens, which provided baskets full of fresh rose petals from which to make beads for strands of prayer beads used by Monks and Noblemen. Of roses... the beads were made of roses, hence the term rosary, which over time was applied to most prayer strands (particularly those used by Catholics)  made from any type of beads.

A museum curator at a small natural history museum in Hungary, once showed me a 300-year-old rosary, the beads made from rose petals. "Cup it in your hands for a minute," she said, "and then smell it." WOW! After 300 years, it had the delicate fragrance of roses!

Rose-petal-beads don't look like much. They are matte black, imperfectly shaped, and a little bumpy or lumpy. Yet, in addition to their beautiful aroma, they have great character and charm.

The Don Brown collection includes several rose-petal-bead rosaries, most of which are toward the back of the display pegs. However, I'm willing to bet that the beads of the forward rosary on peg number 159 are made of rose petals.

How to Make Rose Petal Beads

YOU can make your own beads of rose petals! Collect a large basket full of fresh, dry (no mist or rain moisture) petals (early in the morning, when they are the most fresh). Mash the petals into a thick paste, using a mortar and pestle, or try grinding them in a meat grinder or food processor. The paste will be black. Allow excess moisture to evaporate for a few days if necessary, stirring several times a day. The natural rose fragrance may be enhanced with essential oil of rose.

Form the paste into bead-shaped balls. Side the newly formed balls onto a straight piece of stainless steel wire (piano wire, or similar). Place a row of balls on the wire, leaving a 1/4 inch space between each bead. Place the wire from side-to-side on the rim of a baking pan, and allow the beads to air-dry. The drying process can take weeks, depending on the humidity and room temperature. Turn the beads daily on the wire to prevent them from permanently adhering to it. Do not hasten drying by placing in an oven or direct sunlight, as they will dry on the outside and remain soft on the inside.

If there is absolutely no "give" when you squeeze them, the beads are ready to take off the wire and string. When properly dried, the beads are very hard and durable. Here is an on-line tutorial about making rose-petal-beads, a bit different than the way I've made them (described above), and very informative.

Other Exhibits at the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center Museum

Although my intent was to view the rosary collection and then get on my way, I could not help but take some extra minutes to see the Native American Beadwork/baskets and Vintage Quilt exhibits.

Feathered Star, c.1869, hand pieced and quilted, triangles are about 1/2" high

Feathered Star, detail

Embroidered Quilt, c. 1880, over 400 squares (3" each), wildflower designs embroidered with wool thread

Embroidered Quilt, detail showing wool thread embroidery on 3" wool fabric blocks

If you're thinking you might want to visit the Columbia Gorge Museum while vacationing with your husband, he might want to know there are lots of very manly things to see there, including this fabulous 1921 Mack logging truck, which still runs!

1921 Mack AC Log Truck - It Still Runs!

As always, you can click on any of the pictures to see a larger version (more detail). If your system operates like mine, you'll get a click through slide show of the photos in this post, starting with the one you clicked on.

Wool Applique Chicks with Emerging Personalities

When I saw an exhibition of Sue Spargo's embroidered, wool applique quilts at the La Conner Quilt & Textile Museum a half a year ago, I was beyond thrilled with her colors, folky designs, and flawless technique. Here are some photos.

Imagine my delight when a space became available in Sue's workshop during the La Conner Quilt Festival on Oct. 4th! We would make a sampler using one of three of Sue's motifs: leaves, circles, or chicks. You guessed it... chicks are my thing! To prepare for the class, we were instructed to cut out our chicks (36 of them!) and applique them to the background felted wool using matching wool thread.

Not having any wool thread, I stitched my little chicks using 60 weight cotton applique thread. It has a bit of a shine, which shows on the wool if you look closely. The wool thread is rather expensive, even if you just buy bobbins, but I'll probably invest in a set of bobbins if I keep doing this type of work.

I also made another deviation from the instructions, deciding that 16 chicks would be enough to practice the stitches and give me an idea if this is something I enjoy doing. Below is the layout for my sampler, ready for embroidered embellishments during the workshop.

Of course we didn't get much done, although Sue was great at getting around to each of us, giving individually tailored instructions. Although I have learned various embroidery stitches in the past, there were quite a few that were new to me, my favorites being: rosette chain stitch, palestrina knot stitch, bullion loops, and buttonhole scallops.

The other fabulous thing about her class is that she brought LOTS of examples of her work, and allowed us to photograph them, which gave me a library of possibilities for using the different stitches. So far, I haven't needed her examples for inspiration, but I'm sure I'll run out of ideas and be grateful for the photos I took.

A little over a month has passed since the class, and I've finished half of my chicks!

It's really fun to see the personality of each chick emerge as the stitches and colors are added. I haven't named them yet, but I do recognize definite character traits in each of them. Most are girl chicks, ranging from shy and introverted types, to flamboyant, to high class. A couple are boys, filled with testosterone, chasing the girls.

Which two of my first 8 chicks do YOU think are the boys?

In case you're interested in my process... I stitch eyes, beaks, or feet when I'm at a loss about what to do next, giving myself time to get inspired. I don't always finish one chick before moving on to the next. If I'm stuck, I just work on another chick for a while, one that calls to me (usually because of color). The single chicks pictured in this post need a lot more embellishments.

After I finish the chicks, the next step is deciding how to finish the piece. I'll probably quilt it, making it into a small wall hanging. But I'm not sure if I'll hand or machine quilt. Look for a related post on threads and embellishing materials soon.

Beads? Oh yes, if you click on pictures of the finished chicks they will enlarge to full size, and you'll be able to see the beads as well as the detail of the stitches.