28 March 2010

Zac Louis Hornstein's Quilt



This is the beautiful quilt I made for my beautiful grandson Zac. My son Russ chose the color, blue and I took it from there. I decided I wanted to do circles made out of the drunkards path pattern which is a square with a quarter circle in one corner. If you placed 4 squares, quarter circles touching, you get a big square with a whole circle in the center. I have always been fascinated with piecing curved lines.
At any rate. Here is the quilt. I call it 20 moons. Zac was born on a “blue moon”. On a lighter turquoise square I free motioned in cursive Zac's name. The one “moon” was done in a chrysanthemum design but it was hard to see on the printed fabric so I snapped a pic on the wrong side to see the details. I have about a dozen or so “details” of some of the moons. Click on the Flickr photostream and use the slide show feature to see the moons to their best advantage. The entire quilt is 4X5 feet, machine pieced and free motion machine quilted.















details:

09 March 2010

“Avery Note Tab” Stencil

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I received a sample of these Avery Note Tabs in the mail. The minute I touched them I said, “Stencil”. These note tabs are made of heavy slightly textured plastic to receive marks from pens or pencils and the reverse side has a tacky repositionable film. They hold pretty firmly to paper and to fabric as well and even after 20 uses and washings remain pretty tacky and very usable.
To create a stencil I use a piece of beveled glass that I've had for almost 40 years and use as a pallet, an X-acto knife and the Avery Note Tabs. I bought these at Staples where they are a buy one get one free item right now.

Next I made a copy of a leaf image from the internet and placed the note tab over the image

I used a pencil to trace the outline of the leaf onto the note tab

I removed the note tab from the paper and adhered it to the glass plate. I cut out the shape using and X-acto knife, rotating the glass for ease of cutting.

I lifted the leaf shape from the center of the stencil. I save these in case I want to do a negative impression (a resist) at some time in the future.

I place the stencil on fabric although it can be used on many substrates.

I pour some paint on my glass plate and use a “pouncer” to sponge paint on the stencil. The stencil can be pressed onto the substrate and there will be no “leakage”.

Then I carefully lift the stencil from the fabric.

This is the stencil after washing. I dry them in the standing position so that both sides can dry. The tacky back will remain functional.

This spiral shape stencil has been used over 20 times and it remains tacky although I have to really press it firmly onto fabric. I have had no leakage even after 20 uses. Of course just like tape, these note tabs can get “fuzzies” on the back and they will eventually lose most of their tackiness.

This is the journal cover I used these stencils on. The spiral is my oldest stencil and the chinese characters are newly cut and used once.

I store my stencils by adhering them to the side of the wooden bookcase.

Hope this lights the fire of creativity in you. Happy stenciling.

07 March 2010

A few new things

I had a dream as I was coming awake and in the dream I was making this quilt. I call it Maiden, Mother, Crone because you can really see woman of all ages in it. One of the rectangles has a button that belonged to my Grama Rose and I know I wore clothes like the bottom row back in the '60's. Can't you see some of those women  to impress? I can.


 

Tomorrow is Jane's birthday and I decided to make her a journal. This is a beautiful batik fabric; black with turquoise dots. I fused a crescent moon and free motion embroidered a tree with leaves on it. The tree represents the lineage of Jane's family. The multi-colored beads are the people in the tree. On the back of the cover I free motioned Jane Whitten in a circle.



I am taking an online course and had to make a fused composition. I made this one and called it "House hidden by trees".
It's just a composition.