Craftsy Quilt Designer Fellowship Finalist!

Posted on March 19, 2018March 19, 2018 by thenotsodramaticlifeadmin / Posted in Quilting Community / Leave a comment

The finalists for this year’s Craftsy Quilt Designer Fellowship were announced today, and I am thrilled to be one of the top ten! The second round is public voting, so I hope you check out all the entries and vote on the Craftsy Quilt Blog. All of the finalists make fabulous work and represent a wide range of styles, so it is definitely worth checking out!

Each finalist has three of their submitted photographs and an excerpt of their statement included in the voting. The original statements were up to 400 words, so this is definitely a good choice for voting, but if you would like to see all of the quilt photos I submitted and my full statement, you can keep reading!

I submitted six quilt photos:

Infused Plaid

iSpy

Columbus Block of the Month 2017 with 12 blocks representing specific locations in an abstract way

Raise the Roof

Lateral Ascension

Overlay

And here is my full statement:

My goal as a designer is to elevate the ordinary. I seek inspiration in both the unusual and the mundane. My training as a theatrical scenic and costume designer influences my approach to quilt design, and allows me to reinterpret the patterns and rhythms of the world around me. When designing, I locate and isolate specific aspects of an environment, then combine them in unexpected ways. This process creates a strong abstraction of the original inspiration without being a direct representation.

I am currently a longarm quilter, designer, blogger, and local quilting teacher. My quilts have been juried into numerous internationally recognized shows, and several have won awards at major shows. These awards include the first place award in the Modern Category at AQS-Paducah in 2016 and 2017, a first place at QuiltCon 2017, and a third at QuiltCon 2018. One of my quilts, Pivoted Plaid, will be traveling with the Best of QuiltCon exhibit this year. Another quilt, Infused Plaid, was included in the book, Modern Quilts: Designs of the New Century.

I have designed fourteen patterns for a local quilt shop which are inspired by local landmarks, and have had several projects published in magazines, including a quilt that is currently on the cover of Modern Patchwork.

Patterns can function as a stand alone project, but they can also be a tool to teach and empower the maker. Many of my patterns are written as skill builder patterns which are intended to walk the maker through a new technique step by step and help them develop confidence that increases as they move on to other patterns using the same technique.

Skill Builder Patterns may incorporate techniques for:

Accurate machine piecing and pressing to enhance the quilt
Foundation paper piecing
Applique
Using quilting to enhance the design of a quilt

Producing printed patterns with a wider distribution is a major goal that this fellowship would assist with. I look forward to sharing my work and inspiring makers across the quilting community!

One of my major goals was to apply for everyone I want this year, and this application was a part of this goal. It is a definite honor to have my work side by side with so many talented individuals!

QuiltCon Judging Comments

Posted on March 5, 2018 by thenotsodramaticlifeadmin / Posted in Quilt Shows / 2 Comments

One of the best parts of entering major quilt shows is receiving written comments on your quilts. There are usually a mix of positive and negative remarks, and frequently quilts resonate differently with different people. The comment sheets from QuiltCon are no exception, and I thought it may be interesting to share them here. I can only imagine how challenging it is to judge a quilt show like this, and I really appreciate all of the work that goes into the process.

When your box of quilts is returned, they are wrapped in clear plastic bags to protect them during shipping, and a packing slip is toward the top of the package. This year, only three of my four quilts were returned immediately, since Pivoted Plaid will be traveling.

The cards which hang next to each quilt are also included in the package.

Complementary Composition

Pivoted Plaid

This one has a judges comment sheet, but the quilt and description card are traveling this year.

Overlay

Lateral Ascension

This quilt had an extra special bonus- a hand crafted ribbon!

Raise the Roof

Posted on February 19, 2018February 19, 2018 by thenotsodramaticlifeadmin / Posted in Finished Quilts, Publication, Quilting / 1 Comment

I made a pretty quilt! I very rarely make a quilt that I would call “pretty”- typically I describe my work with terms like graphic, clean, dynamic, or vivid. Raise the Roof is an exception to this trend.

Inspiration for Raise the Roof came from the architecture of the Horticulture Building on the grounds of the Ohio State Fair. The low volume background of the blocks echos the design of the rafters of the building, and the central stars are an abstract representation of the over-sized ceiling fans.

The pink, violet, and orange blocks appear to spin around the focal blocks in blue and orange.

Value plays a huge role in the design of the quilt blocks. The colors in the low volume background triangles have the same placement in each block segment, but the brightly colored star tips change depending on the block placement. Intentional placement of a dark and light version of each color on every point creates a three dimensional look.

After creating a few sample blocks, I decided to submit the design to Modern Patchwork. I was thrilled to have it accepted, and quickly finished the top. For the quilting design, I chose an all-over organic free motion design with a botanical flavor.

The juxtaposition of the organic quilting lines on the regimented, foundation paper pieced quilt top reminds me of the relationship between the beautiful floral displays against the architecture of the building. To make the quilting stand out even more, I used double batting for the first time. The top layer is a yummy Hobbs Tuscany Wool, and the bottom layer is Hobbs 80/20.

To top it all off, this quilt made the cover of the magazine! This is a first for me, and I am over the moon!

You can get your very own copy of the March/April Modern patchwork here!

Quilt Stats

Title: Raise the Roof

Size: 59″ x 59″

Techniques: Foundation Paper Piecing, Traditional Piecing

Quilting: Hand guided, mixed motif free motion quilting done on an A-1 Elite Longarm

Fabric: Assorted quilt shop quality, 100% cotton fabrics, and backing of wide-back Kona Cotton

Batting: Hobbs Tuscany Wool and Hobbs 80/20

Thread: Pieced using light grey Gutermann Mara 100, Quilted with 50wt cotton Aurifil

Binding: Cotton and Steel grey and silver dot bias binding, machine stitched to the front, hand finished on the back.

National Backwards Day!

Posted on January 31, 2018 by thenotsodramaticlifeadmin / Posted in Finished Quilts, Quilting, Works In Progress (WIP) / 3 Comments

Today, January 31 is National Backwards Day! I decided to celebrate by taking a closer look at the back of some quilts and quilt tops.

The backs of quilt tops hardly ever get the glory that they deserve. Here are some hand appliquéd circles . . .

And some machine pieced circles . . .

I love when the quilting transfers the design of the quilt to the back of the project.

Sometimes the design isn’t completely transferred to the back of the quilt, but you can get a general idea of the quilt front.

Occasionally I do simple, light quilting . . .

But more often it’s heavy quilting that shows on the back of my quilts . . . (these two mini quilts are the same design)

Recently I even tried out using doubled batting, which really made the quilting design pop on the back of the quilt (as well as the front).

I frequently love the backs of quilts as much as the front!

Central Ohio Modern Quilt Guild Charity Quilt

Posted on January 29, 2018 by thenotsodramaticlifeadmin / Posted in Finished Quilts, Quilting, Quilting Community / 1 Comment

Every year the Modern Quilt Guild issues a Charity Quilt Challenge and the results are displayed in the hallways of QuiltCon. The MQG gives a theme and color palette, and any guild or small group of members is invited to participate. This is the second year the Central Ohio MQG has participated in this challenge.

This year the theme was Modern Traditionalism and this is the palette.

When our guild does a group quilt, we gather design submissions and vote to determine which one we will make. The design for this quilt was a collaboration between Lissa of Lovingly Lissa and me. This project is a potholder style quilt, which was a popular method for charity quilts made in New England during the Civil War era. Each contributor would piece, quilt and bind a block. When the volunteers would gather, all they would have to do to finish the quilt is whip stitch the blocks together. (If you would like to see some other potholder quilts, check out these posts: Modern Log Cabin, Petals in the Wind, and In the Garden.)

For our updated version of a potholder quilt, we used Ohio Star blocks. This is the block that I contributed to the quilt.

Each block is constructed so that the pieced block is visible on either the front or the back of the quilt. This also creates a fully reversible quilt. The blocks are joined with a triple zigzag stitch done on my mechanical sewing machine.

The first side of the quilt incorporates the entire color palette and has more of a “daytime” feel.

The reverse side of the quilt is intended to appear more like the nighttime sky.

My favorite part of this quilt is that we have so many different people contributing their personal quilting style to the project. It has a mix of straight line and free motion quilting, several thread colors and weights, and various quilting densities. It really became a beautiful representation of our guild.

The quilt gets shipped off to QuiltCon this week! We are all very excited to have it displayed with all of the challenge quilts from around the world. We don’t have any members who are able to attend this year, so we are hoping to have some photos come our way!

Quilt Stats:

Title: Two Sides of the Same Star

Size: 71″ x 89″

Techniques: Potholder style, machine pieced, block machine zigzagged together

Quilting: Free motion and walking foot quilted

Fabric: Kona Cottons

Batting: Warm and White

Thread: Pieced and quilted with a variety of thread brands, colors, and weights

Binding: Blocks were individually bound with Kona cotton bias binding, cut 2″ wide, machine stitched to the front of each block, and hand stitched to the back.