Productive Studio Day

I took yesterday as a studio day. With Presidents day and my daughter off from school, I was able to get to work on MY schedule. I got the new silkscreen taped, and developed a design that will work as a freezer paper stencil with it, and finished the latest quilt except for the edges.

The bottom is shaped, and so it will need a faced edging. It has improv piecing, and is quilted with the Deco Bob Thread, I like this thread alot, very thin so it can disappear, but with a little sheen so if you choose a contrast color it has a nice spark. Plus, I quilted the entire top with a single bobbin!! So nice to not have to stop and change out the bobbin so often. Once the quilting was done, I used padded raw edge applique to add the plankton, which had been hand stitched. I will post a photo when I get the finishing done. I have two curtain jobs to finish at work, so the quilt is relegated to evenings until I get to next weekend. Too bad because I got a good momentum going.

The Evil Queen

Yesterday I was trying to get rid of a headache and found that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was on one of the family channels. I hadn't seen it in ages, and it was a really clear print. The Evil Queen is a fantastic bad guy. She isn't ugly at first, and that is part who she is, but the inner ugly comes through and she gets exactly what she deserves in the end. Her death is not actually shown, but there is no doubt about the outcome. The life lessons in traditional fairy tales ( this one is based on a Grimm's tale ) is actually lost when they are watered down to keep them from being scary. Being scary is exactly the point. If the bad guy isn't bad, how can we take satisfaction in the triumph that is the happy ending? It is so sad that the recent stories reworked by Disney are so polite and nice. The whole point of these tales is lost, and sometimes the story itself is nearly unrecognizable. Even my daughter was impressed with the Evil Queen. ( She is never given an actual name ) A good adversary makes for a good story, a wimpy one just doesn't work. Just my opinion, I'll take the Evil Queen any day.

Finished

So I actually did finish my daughter's quilt in time to get it on her bed for her birthday - put it on her bed while she was getting her teeth brushed for bedtime, but she was under it on her birthday. If I can get her to let me, I'll borrow it back and take a photo. In the meantime it has snowed lots more, and I couldn't get out my driveway yesterday to get to the Shoppe - but when I got here today there were no footprints so I would not have had any customers anyway. So what did I do to cure the terrible jitters I got waiting for the plows? I finished another quilt. ( that makes two totally done this year already ) This one is smaller, about 18 x 24 inches, but it had been sitting on my design wall taunting me in a half finished state for over a month.

Lilly of the Valley. .

The semi string pieced blocks are embellished with decorative machine embroidery, the Lilly is drawn on muslin with water soluble pastel and pencil and hand embroidered, then raw edge appliqued in place by machine. It is a little bit brighter than the image shows, but I am happy with it. It feels very Spring, and that is a wonderful and hopeful way to feel with all the snow around. My usual February craving for good bright colors is right on cue. Let me know what you think.