"Love by the Moon"...Day 1

My nephew Andy is a force of nature. How many stories I could tell you about him! From his childhood he was a complete heller who broke more stuff and went to the E.R. the most of any of the kids...he pushed my buttons like a Master, causing me to scream dire threats at him, which he thought was funny (he did say, "Aunt Allie is the worst cousin ever.") He almost died as a young teen from an allergic reaction to a vaccine that resulted in his having to endure a bone marrow transplant. Yes, we almost lost him...
He blew off high school but managed to graduate anyway due to a clerical error in his favor.
Andy... So much untamed energy.
But so much heart.
Sometime along the way he made up his mind to become a fireman. So he channeled that incredible will of his and:
--went to his local Community College, got his EMT, and then went through the Fire Academy
--drove ambulance in South Central LA to pay for school and gain experience. He told his mom once, "Yeah, it was a brains in the hands week-end...."
--graduated from a Paramedic program last spring gaining the top class honor of "Best in the Field" (meaning, if you have a heart attack, you want Andy as your first responder).
--Laughed at the impossible job market and got hired by his local fire department, straight out of school.
His first day on the job he saved a baby's life. That's Andy.

This picture was taken the day he graduated from Paramedic school. He's 22.

So he called me yesterday.
He's in love.
He is commissioning me to make the Christmas present he wants to give to his new girlfriend. "I want to score major points with this one," he told me.
She has a saying she loves, "Live by the sun, Love by the moon"...and I guess they've enjoyed some special moonlit nights on the beach. So that's what my commission piece is about: the beach at night, with those words on it.
"I trust you, Aunt Allie, do whatever you want...."

Luckily for both of us, I have a window of free time over the next week, so today is Day 1 on "Love by the Moon".

This is where I am at the very beginning.
I'll be posting my progress at the end of each day, so stop by if you like....

Next week-end I will be delivering it to Andy in person in San Diego. Maybe I won't be the worst cousin ever anymore!

Baby Clothes!

I have two 3 month old grandnieces and I get to meet them this week-end in San Diego!
My oldest brother's oldest daughter had twins in June...I am so excited to finally be able to hold these babies in my arms.

It is never too early to have a good supply of hoodies (my favorite article of clothing), so I decided to make the girls a matched set of hoodies and booties. I didn't have a lot of time to decorate them, but still, it was fun.

I ordered them from Dharma Trading...nice white cotton, ready to dye.

This is one of the two sets, soaked in a soda ash solution (which will act as the mordent to set the dyes.)

I had some old procion dyes kicking around, so I mixed them up....

...and poured them over my wet baby clothes in these jars. Then I let them sit in the sun for a couple of hours. Next I washed them well with detergent, and let them dry overnight.

"A" is for Anna....

...and "H" is for Halle.
This is cut out fulled wool.

It was fun to applique them onto the hoodies with a little embroidery.

But most fun of all will be to see those precious girls wearing these things...


Given with love from their Aunt Allie.....

Have a great week, you all!

Aunt Sally's Quilt

A full circle story....

My beautiful Aunt Sally and cousin Tracy were the two who got me started quilting back in 1976. My mom was in the hospital in Baltimore, and we kids were staying with my aunt and uncle in D.C. At the time my aunt was making blocks for a Bicentennial quilt...and I wanted to do some quilting too. It proved to be the true beginning of my passion for quilting. (My first stash came directly from Tracy's fabric cupboard, an act of generosity on T's part that I will never forget.)

Sally has led a very rich life, full of art, travel, service, friends, family...she had a stroke over a decade ago which changed her life, but it certainly didn't change who she is.
And she still loves quilting enough to make another one, despite the obstacles.

She foundation pieced the squares, using the flip and sew method I had showed her and Tracy during a visit. As she put the blocks together it took two days of rearranging the sequence and my uncle thought he needed to help. (!) She assembled the blocks and then Tracy finished it with a border and binding. The quilt is about four by six. Sally did all of this one handed, guiding the machine with her left hand.

She looks so proud! As well she should. It's gorgeous.
Here's a closer look...do click on it!

These fabrics--Tracy never did update her stash from the 1970's, as she moved into basketmaking, leaving quilting behind--are a time capsule for me. They are my oldest friends, my first loves. I know many of them intimately! It is with wonder and happiness that I see them again, fresh off the needles of my aunt and cousin.

No matter who, how, or when...quilting rocks!
.....and....
Happy Birthday Uncle Bill!

Tracy's Pine Needle Baskets

My cousin Tracy's fine craft of pine needle basketry has grown from her innate talent combined with her deep connection to the place she has lived for over thirty years. It is an adobe ranch house over 150 years old, at the entrance to a beautiful canyon. Tracy and her husband John run cattle here. They breed and train horses as well. Along the top of the canyon grow the pinon pines that provide the needles and the pitch for her baskets. I took this picture during a horse ride she took me on. Those are the snow-covered Sangre de Christo mountains in the distance. She gathers the needles...even storing them in her freezer to keep them fresh until she can use them. She scrapes the pitch carefully from old injuries on pinon trees. It collects in big goo balls. The injuries are usually because a porcupine has eaten the bark. Removing the excess pitch does not affect the health of the tree. The pitch has been used forever--first by Native Americans to preserve their baskets and as a finish on pottery. The Spanish settlers boiled it into a varnish that they used on wood. The pitch is melted and mixed with beeswax that she gets locally, and which smells like honey it is so rich. She brushes this liquid on the finished baskets, which are "baked" in a very low temperature oven. They smell heavenly....for years. She stores her baskets in a collection of old Victorian trunks. When collectors come to purchase one, they have the delight of unpacking and discovering them. Let's do the same! That beadwork she does along the rims is so great. She loves to incorporate "found objects" in the lids as well. She uses the pine needle "heads" to create patterns. Tracy has always been an illustrator, and this horse is definitely her style. (And why did she take that Two Needle Bead Applique class with me if she could already do work like this? She was kindly humoring me...) In the pine needle basket world, the teacup is a form that all practitioners do their "take" on. It's a neat convention. The only comparable thing I can think of in the quilt world is how one might interpret the "Tree of Life". Everyone's is different but they are all Trees of Life, and they showcase where people are at in their quiltmaking. (I'd like to do one myself.) Those are porcupine quills around the rims of the cup and saucer, and yes, she gathers those too. Tracy gets plenty experimental with her work as well. The following two baskets show again how closely she is attuned to the elements in her environment. This is paper from a paper wasp's nest, applied when the pitch was still wet. I love this. But the last one is my all time favorite... John had shot a rattle snake...Tracy skinned it and applied the fresh skin to the outside of one of her baskets. It "shrank to fit" and is one of the coolest things I've ever seen. If it didn't already live in Italy, I would have traded her a quilt for it. A BIG quilt! Tracy and John were such wonderful hosts to me....it was so good to see them, and I can't wait to go back to the ranch. What fine people......

April Take It Further.....Finished

What I enjoyed most about this project, to be honest, was getting back to crazy quilting. I thought I had burned out on it a little bit, but this piecing and stitching and beading felt really good.

Here is the fan on the left side. Those cute little brass leaves were a gift from Pat Winter last summer. She gets them from Artful Market on Etsy.

And here is the fan on the right. I had to keep the embellishments pretty simple to reflect that this is about boys. No waste canvas this time around, but I did use one of Carole Samples' templates for the wavy lines. (Read about them here.)

My Lovely, Lovely Boys
15" X 15"

The title is a line from my favorite made-for-TV movie, Smiley's People. The character Connie Sacks is sadly referring to the young men she used to work with in British Intelligence, in her role as chief Russian analyst, before she got literally sacked (by the mole who was making her look bad, of course).
But with all the guys in my family--my two boys, my sister's three, and my brother's one, all born within 5 years of each other--"my lovely, lovely boys" as been in the family lexicon for years. And yes, I have lost them...at least a little bit, so I share some of Connie's regret.

Anyway, I am fairly happy with this piece though the technical glitches are what I learned the most from. I really should have been much more careful lining up the photos...I should have pieced the whole block and then appliqued the felted linens, and then appliqued the photos. I would have had better control that way. That they are crooked truly bugs me.
I would have been able to achieve a flatter surface with the photos if I had done that, too. It is o.k. that they puff out, but I would have preferred them flat in this case. Chad wouldn't look quite as weird as a one year old if I had done that.
I loved all your comments on this piece...thanks!!!

Anyway, it is done, it was fun....and the sun is out. We need to be out there digging and making ready for these:

My husband is taking the tomatoes quite seriously this year......

Take It Further, April...Day 2

Adding the embellishments to a naked block is always so much fun.

Above is a detail shot of the center of the block...

...and an overall view. (Please pardon the pins.)
When it goes over foam core I should be able to get everything square and aligned right. It looks a bit crooked at the moment.
More stitching today...but tomorrow when the sun is supposed to finally show up, all bets are off!

Take It Further, April...Day 1

The Take it Further challenge for April, as described by Sharon Boggon here, asks us how we view change...Sharon also gave us a color palette to work that, like last month's, reflects the coming of autumn in the Southern Hemisphere. (Hey Sharon, it is spring up here, you know!...)

I decided to address the change that is most important in my life these days....that of the attaining of adulthood in my children. This year Max is 21 and Chad is 18, two landmark ages in becoming adult.

No one tells us at the beginning of the experience of motherhood that we will have to stay very light on our feet during the transition period of "letting go". While we will always be moms and always give unconditional love to our children, we sure have to change the way we behave towards them, and what we expect from them too, as they become independent. We have to relearn some of our own independence as well...I am no longer tied to my kids in the same way anymore. This was hard for me to understand at first, but I am making great progress, especially because my guys are doing so well in their lives and are both genuinely happy. ( A special thank you to Esther on that score!)

So, my little piece reflects all this musing....

I started by felting some hand-dyed soy silk onto a couple of vintage linen napkins that Pam Kellogg so generously shared with me.

The boys at ages 4 and 1.....

...and today.
It is an extremely sentimental setting for them, but this is as much about me as about them....call it their feminine mom showcasing them in her love!

I kept to the palette pretty well except for using blue instead of green. It reflects their masculinity well.
I will square this all up when the stitching is done... for today, I will address those fan blades with some blue embroidery!
The square is 12" X 12"...on point it is 17" X 17".
*************

A few notes to commenters....Cherry asked for more info about finishing a piece with foam core. The next issue of CQMagOnline will have a how-to article by me on that subject, so please look for it online at the end of this month.

Kim asked what I do with all the things I make....I am thinking about setting up an Etsy shop to give some of them new homes. Stay tuned.....

Family Textile Portraits

I've been missing playing with my beads, threads, and fabrics lately! So I decided to do the third in what is becoming a series of family/floral portraits. It has been so nice to look down at my work this week and see my sister's beautiful face smiling up at me!

But first I'll just show the first two portraits, in case new readers haven't seen them. I combine photographs of the portraitee on silk with floral arrangement "frames" that have also been photographed and printed on silk.

Here's my mother's, in progress...

Here is the completed portrait of my sister-in-law's parents. Aren't they sweet? This was a gift for their 60th wedding anniversary.

And this week it was Mary's turn to go under the needle!

The floral print came out a little muddy, so I drew a few highlights on the flowers with my water soluable wax pastels, which when ironed become permanent. I also added that white around the inside of the floral frame.

Fast forward here...I've just added a few embellishments to this piece, not wanting to go overboard. What you see here is the ribbon border, *edit* done in a herringbone stitch, between the flower fabric and its silk jaquard frame, which is sari fabric I found on eBay.


And here she is, my incomparable sister! This has been stretched over foam core, like Marne's cottage portrait was.
I am going to give this to Mary's daughter Qwen, who turns 6 today, for her birthday.
Every girl should always have their mother smiling at them, don't you think?