It's Paper Week...

It's become necessary to declare "paper week", or "quilt week", or "mixed media week" in the sewing room. That's because every interest requires its own set of supplies and it would not be good to have paints out when I'm quilting (unless, of course, it's an art quilt in process!). To say nothing of the myriad bits and pieces of paper, fabric, and trims that threaten to overtake the space nearly every day. I signed up for Toni Burt's online class called Wrapped in Vintage. The project I chose to work on is a mix of paper, sketch, stencils, and paint on a fabric journal cover. So the paper scraps flew as I put together this collage cover with a pretty girl on it.

This is the back cover. One nice feature of Toni's method is that she seals the covers with Dorland Wax Medium which gives the piece a lovely leather-like finish. You almost can't stop picking the journal up just for the feel. She provides thorough instructions in her class videos.

Remember this pair of fabric journals made in a fold-up pocket style and designed to hold (and tame) loose pages and bits not to be bound into a book? I showed them here earlier this year. The Fiber group invited me to do a demo on how to made them. Later, a few of the members brought their pocket memory journals to a show-and-tell.

Merri McKenzie, one of the members, made her lively version shown here. I love her colors and the use of rick rack.

This is the reverse side. Lots of pockets to serve as a repository for more art work. Her imaginative and colorful approach made for a fun journal.

Here's the cover when the journal is all folded closed. I love her style.

And for yet another pocket, I found a free tutorial on Roben-Marie Smith's blog for making this paper mixed-media art pocket. It began as a brown paper bag that got painted,stamped, stitched, glued, and layered. I decided to use it as a gift holder for a friend's birthday. I'm also taking another of Roben-Marie's online classes for making a pop-up fringe journal that starts with a file folder. Next week, it's back to "quilt week" as I have some challenge quilt projects to get underway. My sewing/craft room is most definitely my happy place!

This Quilt Was Fun...

What do you do with accumulated fabric scraps? I cut them into strips and then found Bonnie Hunter's easy tutorial for making Scrappy Trips quilts. After sorting the strips, I kept them in the sewing room and stitched them up in between other projects. Soon there was a nice pile of the blocks, but still no plan for putting them together. But then I pulled this panel from my fabric stash- it's Madonna Lily by Frond Design Studios. The colors in the blocks and in the panel seemed made for each other, and this joyful quilt titled "Our Lady" just invented itself. It took some engineering and there are some missteps in its construction, but overall I'm pretty happy with it. We even have the right wall to hang it on.

The imagery is just beautiful, as you can see in this close-up photo. Frond Design Studios has some very unique fabric and panels available in quilt shops. I found this one while visiting Quilter's Store Sedona a few years ago, and it's been waiting for its turn in a project ever since. The longarm machine quilting was completed by Debra Johnston. Her challenge was to decide how to quilt the center panel and blend in the quilting for the pieced blocks. She used gold thread and swirling designs in the block, contrasted with more straight-line quilting for the image. She did well I think!

This year, while visiting Sedona, I found this four-block "Inner Faith" panel by Robert Kaufman Fabrics at the shop. I'm not sure how I'll use this one, but am thinking the red block may become the label on the back of "Our Lady". So many quilt ideas, so little time! The ideas flow way faster than the execution of them. But we'll see where these wind up.