Guilford Town Hall, November 2014

The display case at Guilford Town Hall.

Display case.

Top shelf of the display case.

My item is the hand-stiched center piece.

Currently, Sisters in Cloth have work displayed at the Guilford Town Hall this month. I have one small piece in the display on the bottom shelf on the right-hand side (see photo).

This hand-stiched center is actually from an old quilt that one of the sisters received and dismantled the squares. She shared the squares with us. The center has apple blossoms and the Michigan letters in the corner. I chose this square for obvious reasons... I'm originally from Michigan.

Sisters in Cloth at Color's Cafe in Guilford

A summer quilting meeting with Sisters in Cloth at the new Color's Cafe in Guilford. Yvette and her granddaughters made two baby quilts.

Dudley Quilt

So I created and made a quilt for the newest Dudley. Since, they help run the Dudley farm and know about farming and are "true" Guilford folk - I thought I would try to be creative and make a special baby quilt. Some of the different features of this quilt were:

• Stonewall - bottom of the quilt for all the stonewalls in Guilford.
• Three different fields which were quilted with the floating foot on my sewing machine. There was a cornfield, plowed field and a wheat field. Each field was quilted differently.  Thank you to the Sisters in Cloth in sharing fabric for this section and the back of the quilt. 
• The tree on the right has a heart stitched into it. That is significant to the parents.
• There are sheep (which there is sheep on the Dudley Farm!), ducks and rabbits on the quilt. The rabbits are hidden in the white fence on both sides of the quilt.
• The back of the quilt is one piece of cloth with a farm scene.

Office Quilted Piece

This is the quilt that got me making more pieces... 

The cloth is from Cultured Expressions in New Jersey - the link is: http://culturedexpressions.com

Spring Table Runners

I made my sister (top photo) and Katie (bottom photo) a table runner for spring! 

First Show with Sisters in Cloth

This was my first quilted wallhanging with Sisters in Cloth. We had this show at the Guilford Library in December of 2013. As you can see, the cloth had newsprint design which I had two different types of cloth in the same theme. I hand stitched around each piece in yellow embroidery thread. 

In addition to the wallhanging, I made a "selfie" of myself in cloth!! Everyone in the show each had a "selfie" and it was amazing the response I received over this little square!

Other pictures from the show...

This quilt is no longer available.

Playing with Color and Fabrics

Sisters in Cloth spent a lovely Saturday (June 14) at Laura Lyon's house in Madison, CT. We worked on dying, bleaching and painting cloth. It was a great time in the sun on a nice warm day. We each made some exciting work.

Bleaching - I bleached two different pieces of black material. The first piece made gray marks and second piece made orange marks on the cloth (see photo below). A big thank you for David for sharing his pottery tools with me to stamp the cloth and Diane for sharing her black material.

Dharma silk scarf, sharpie markers and rubbing alcohol (81%) was really fun and easy. I did one and took my other scarves home to do at a later date and time. You need a silk scarf, sharpie markers, decorate your scarf with the sharpie marks. Then use an eye dropper with rubbing alcohol and follow your lines. This will allow the color to run. You can go back and add more color if you are not totally happy with your first go around when making this piece. I actually wore my scarf to work yesterday!

The dying that I chose to do was with ice and I had four different pieces of cloth in the bucket. Thank you to Carol (below with the blue shirt) for sharing her knowledge, patience and especially her supplies.  In addition, to having a bucket full of cloth, I came home and did more. The picture with all the cloth on the ground is from my backyard!

It was a really fun day learning new techniques.

Playing with Colors

This is my newest piece that I have been working on 

which I'm not totally sure where it is going. 

 I was encouraged on Friday to leave the strings…

The Ladies are in France!!

My two ladies have made it to France and are now in a show with 135 other sentinelles that have been embellished by either stitching, beads, embroidered and other creative techniques.  

To learn more about this show and the artist who designed these ladies, 

go to this blog:  http://origidij.blogspot.com.  

To see pictures of the show including my two ladies, go to Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Berry-Patchwork-Shop/315693768495491 

(Berry Patch Shop). 

My two pieces are in the picture below -  the upper right hand corner (black border and pink lady) and center to the left of the blue lady (green border with orange lady).

Kate Themel Workshop

Kate Themal Workshop

Saturday, February 15th and Saturday, February 22nd, 2014

Branford SARAH

Kate showing how she stitches each flower.  She took photos of the flowers (left-side).  

These were completed work for show-and-tell for us.

This is mine…unstitched!!

The fabric was purchased from Carol R. Eaton.

A few of us working on our projects.

We got to spend two wonderful Saturdays with Kate Themel who taught us her technique in making beautiful pieces with thread and fabric.  I got to learn about a floating foot for my sewing machine and quilting gloves.  Kate was truly amazing and look forward to finishing my projects!!

Kate Themel's website:  http://www.katethemel.com

Local Color Quilt Show

Local Color

Guilford Art Center

Opening Reception

Friday, February 7, 2014

Kate Themel & Diane Wright - Managing Curators

Local Color traveling quilt show is now at the Guilford Art Center.  This traveling exhibition of fiber art created by members of Studio Art Quilt Associates (SAQA) in the Connetcticut Region.  The show opened on February 7th and will end on March 16th.  

This show depicts the landscapes, landmarks and history of Connecticut.  There is a large variety of techniques, colors and methods to all of these quilts.  Several of the pieces are made by