Tag Archives: cloth company

opening

Of the many FINDS in my recent cellar-clean-out, this little house has grabbed my attention. I added the ‘beams’ to an existing felt and cotton and upholstery structure, and asked myself, “How to build a roof?”

After taking a series of pictures just now in the morning light near the spring bulbs and just now emerging but still coiled ferns, I got an idea.

What if I cut a hole in the bottom and positioned it over a fern and watched greenery fill my house? No roof. Open to sky, rain. Filled with the glory that is a fern stretching into its full summery frond.

Finishing small things

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Here is the word added to the small Journal Quilt. I think of ‘freedom’ as something robust and tawny (who knows why), and yet here it is in a whispery pink. . . freedom as something subtle and fragile.

This is the finished piece.

The moon gave me a few problems. The chenille vine upholstery fabric was thick, and seamed, even thicker. Next time, lay flat and don’t seam? In any case, to cover the bump, I added lace. And, to balance things out a little, I tore some of the blue netting.

The lower lunar section reveals an inkjet fabric print of an antique map of the constellations.

“Free” has been on my mind in the wake of handling all of my free fabrics. “Free” is on my mind thinking about what holds me back. Something about spring sets a little piece of me free. So grateful.

Back to it

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Finally put the taxes, a commission, a benefits process, and a series of gardening consultations behind me long enough to work on some quilts that have been languishing.

This little piece came from one of my ** New ** works-in-progress drawers and was constructed last spring, back when I was still making journal quilts.

The vertical edges needed bound, and I so wanted the blue and white swirly because of the way it picked up the floral motif and the black and white near the hut, but it was way, way, too much.

Or, maybe it wasn’t too much, but it was a different quilt in the making and I wanted to finish this one in the mood in which it began.

So I went with the soft green.

After binding it, I fiddled with the moon some more, added a word, and quilted here and there. I’ll show you tomorrow. The quilt reminds me of how fertile the journal-quilting-process was. I think I’ll begin again. Last year, I made a quilt-a-week (small, unbound) from January to about June, I think.

It rained again. Day was full, satisfying.

fragments coming together

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Closing in on a finish here. This ‘sampler’ wants an edge and completion.

Collage, collage, collage renders places many layers thick. Pins and machine will be useful.

Some layers have been peeled, ripped and shredded away to re-reveal what’s underneath.

A gessoed surface is not the most fun for poking a needle through, but the thing I will be careful not to do again, is to machine stitch right up to the edge of a piece with batting, because then it is tough to tuck the white under.

I have been mulling over what it means to be innocent (are we EVER innocent? or, do we ever STOP being innocent)… and what it means to be setting out in love. Letters from my 20’s arrived in the mail yesterday (!!) from an old roommate, and in organizing my sewing patterns (also yesterday), I found letters I’d written and copied (because I worked in a copy shop in San Francisco) when I was 21. All this stuff about relationships (‘ugh’ if I might say). In some ways, it seems like a different person wrote those letters (thank god). And in other ways, so much is constant.

The quilt, with its layers, fragments, re-attachments, ripped open words, stars, and ‘memories’, speaks to what it means to be any age and want to be seen and known, flaws and all. The quilt speaks to desire and the ways it will be stopped by our less-than-holy selves, or expressed, in innocence and wonder. If there were a spot of red in the panels, it could even be a valentine.

Cool Cat Commission

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This commission was made for a neighbor to give in gratitude to a bass-playing, Qigong instructor. I was told to give him a cigar, glasses, and to make him cool. Here’s his picture:

Jon Voight, Qigong instructor, bass player

Cool Cat with Cigar

It took three tries (first one was too feminine, second one looked like a “black dude with a tail” (it had no ears)), but it was worth it, I think.

If you’re interested in Jon Voight or Qigong in the Boston area, you can find more here: art-energy.org.

Pattern and Outrage : Dee Mallon

cloth, justice, writing, and food