Tag: Timna Tarr

Virtual Tour of Nancy Crow’s “Riff” Quilts

Interesting Information and Quilts: April 2, 2021

Virtual Tour of Nancy Crow’s “Riff” Quilts

I forget now how this information about this exhibit and history of Nancy Crow’s “Riff” quilts came into my social media, but I was immediately drawn to these quilts for several reasons. One is that while I knew Nancy Crow was an early creator of the turn quilting took toward art quilts and innovative “riffs” on traditional quilting back in the day, I had not connected her work to either what we now see often in “modern” quilting or to more recent quilters like Maria Shell, the Alaskan quilter who won a major prize at this year’s Modern Quilt Guild show, Quilt Con. Or, to Tara Faughnan, who is the featured designer in Sewtopia’s online class The Color Collective. Or, to Timna Tarr. And I’m sure there are many more current quilters Nancy Crow has influenced—including all the students working with these clever teachers.

Crow’s “Riff” quilts were on display at the International Quilt Museum in Lincoln, Nebraska, until the end of March 2021.

Crow’s originating idea was started with remembering some railroad tracks from her childhood. Then she went deep with her explorations of those images, and her progression is seen in the way these “Riff” quilts were hung.

Maria Shell has been a student with Nancy Crow. Here is the quilt that made her a top winner at the 2021 Modern Quilt Guild’s Quilt-Con show this year: “Mosh Pit @the Golden” quilt. So you can see where Nancy Crow’s work has influenced and inspired other quilters.

And here’s a link to Maria Shell’s blog where she talks about creating “Mosh Pit”:

https://talesofastitcher.com/2018/02/17/mosh-pit-quilt-riot-stitched-anarchy/

Enjoy!

“My Bars” Quilt

Turkey Tracks: January 26, 2021

“My Bars” Quilt

I’ve been working on this quilt for some time now. It was inspired by Tara Faughnan’s “Bars” quilt, which I fell in love with at first sight. But Timna Tarr and Maria Schell have also been making similar quilts in this vein, but with different organizational color theories—solid fabric quilts drenched with color.

Tara’s “Bars” quilt was highlighted—along with her color theory—on a recent episode of Alex Anderson’s The Quilt Show. And, Tara has online classes for her color theory, using this quilt.

I really like Tara’s color theory, and I think the use of it made this quilt “pop.” I quilted it with a variety of size 8 perle cotton colors I had on hand—with a Tulip Sashiko “thin” needle. I really like the Tulip needles for hand sewing—they don’t bend out of shape when going through quilt layers—and are good about sliding through the layers. I have ordered more in different sizes. I used interlocking big circles as I thought the straight lines in the quilt would benefit from curves.

Of course, this project has been a great way to use up some of the solid stash I have acquired via three years now of The Color Collective projects.

One of the really fun things that has happened during the current Covid isolation has been the digging through my stash to find backings. I’ve been trying to find a use for this Kaffe Fasset print for over 15 years now. And it is PERFECT for the backing on this quilt.

I hung “My Bars” in my quilt room yesterday morning after taking down a quilt and moving “Let There Be Light” to that spot.

My Sugaridoo (solid version) is drying out on the longarm as almost near the end of quilting it, I discovered A FOLD IN THE BATTING about 10 rows up!!! So, I had to take it off the long arm, pick out the rows, and spritz the quilting holes with water to close them up. I got it back on the longarm yesterday so will likely finish it today. I am hoping to get it trimmed and to install the binding so I have some hand-sewing for night tv watching.

This is NOT the first time this has happened, so I need to devise a better method to proceed for the future. I float the quilt top over the batting, which also floats, and I measure and sew down the sides as I go. Perhaps picking up the top and taking a look at the batting along the way would be wise. I was smoothing with my fingers and feeling along the way, but I did miss this fold as it developed. Ugh!!

Here’s a close-up.

And here’s a pic of my best buddy and boyfriend cuddling next to my legs last night:

Turkey Tracks: “Lone Star Done and Hung”

October 20, 2019

”Lone Star Done and Hung”

I wrote this post back on September 25th, when I finished the Lone Star that I thought worked best outside my quilt room.

Then I fell in love…

Here’s what I wrote in September:

“Yes!

This version works exactly as I wanted on the wall outside my quilt room.

That luscious background color is Kona’s “Nightfall.”  I’ve fallen in love with it.

I had to patch nail holes and do some touch up painting on this wall.  Didn’t it come out nicely?

 

HEre’s the view into my quilt room.

THEN, I finished quilting the patchwork version that I just thought would be fun.  And, I fell in love with it.

Here’s what exists now, in mid-October:

 

 

And here’s the quilt room now with the other Lone Star moved in and the little piece I did in a Timna Tarr workshop relocated—on the far left.

Now I’m happy!

And I’ve moved on to finish up working on the Radiating Log Cabin blocks I had wanted to make from Season 1 of the Color Collective—more on that to come.

AND, I’m itching to start Season 2.  Look at the quilt Tara Faughnan made from the first block of Season 2:

It’s another freezer paper method!  I loved learning that method in Season 1.

Turkey Tracks: How Many Ongoing Project Are There?

Turkey Tracks:  March 4, 2019

How Many Ongoing Projects Are There?

Some of stopped sewing long enough to count up ongoing projects we’ve started.

1.

I was in pretty good shape until I got involved in Sewtopia’s Color Collective project with blocks and solids designed by Tara Faughnan.  (Amy Newbold owns and runs Sewtopia.)  For heaven’s sake, google “Tara Faughnan quilts” and you will be blown away, as I was.  She works in saturated color and solids.  (Tarafaughnan.com)

The first month’s block was the circle; the second, the cross.  I combined them as clearly I got obsessed and couldn’t stop making them.  Note the two projects at the top of the design wall.

This top is done now, and I absolutely love it.  I’ve found, in my stash, a backing I like a lot, and I will buy a binding.  I’m thinking of doing some hand qulting with size 8 pearl cotton.  Here is the top all together.  It glows.

2.

Above the big project on the right is a row of 14-inch blocks, made using scraps from the solid projects and from my solid stash. I saw this block used in a quilt made by Then Came June called “Checkered Garden Quilt” and using Alison Glass bright fabrics in the Road Trip line.  I fell in love with it.  (Here is a picture: https://thencamejune.com/products/road-trip-checkered-garden-quilt.)  This block has been called “part Trip Around the World,” part “Granny” block.

Here’s the next block cut out and ready to go and waiting in the adjacent bedroom—sitting atop my Traveling Quilt.

3.

Above left is the start of the “Slopes” quilt by Amanda Jean Nybery of Crazy Mom Quilts.  The book is NO SCRAP LEFT BEHIND.  I am cutting the dark Cotton+Steel fabrics—a few a day—for this quilt.  I’m using leftover 1 1/2-inch blocks combined with leftover solid pieces for the row of “little” pieces near the top of the quilt.  I might do more than one of these rows.  Who knows?  Not me.

4.

I have a bird quilt project going and have made three of the big blocks and one of Jen Kingwell’s “The Avenue” of trees blocks.  I’ve been saving bird fabric for several years, but I’m choosing only the artist-types for this quilt.   I want to use in an improv style.

The 9-inch tree block is bigger visually than I thought for some reason.  Inspired by Tori Manzi’s recent tree blocks on our Mt Battie “Bee Inspired” project, I’ll probably group these in lines and make them in seasonal colors.  This one would be “spring.”

The I’m thinking this will look like a MUCH BIGGER version of this little quilt I made in a Timna Tarr workshop.

5.

My Sunday Morning Quilt is done and getting its binding.  Cheryl Arkison is the designer, and it’s in the book she did with Amanda Jean Nyberg called SUNDAY MORNING QUILTS.  The thread color I ordered arrived.  My go-to grey just didn’t work well on the backing.  This quilt is the “cool” to the “warm” herringbone quilt I finished not long ago, designed by Victoria Findlay Wolf and in her delicious book MODERN QUILT MAGIC.  See previous blog posts for that quilt.  Both of these quilts are LUCIOUS!  And both are totally Cotton+Steel low volume fabrics.

 

6.  My “Wild and Goosey” quilt is once again on the back burner.  Bonnie Hunter designed the block.  I have all the sashing cut, and the design I want to do for it all planned.  I’m sure I’ll need more of the little blocks though.

7.

Right now I am working on the “parts department” improv quilt.  See the earlier post on this quilt project.

8.

There is the EPP “36-Ring Circus” project.  This one is slow as there is a big learning curve.  That’s ok.

9.  There are more pillows from a method shown by Anna Graham of Noodlehead projects (HANDMADE STYLE) in the works.  This project is one of two from Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild.

10 and 11.

There are TWO blocks to make as part of the Color Collective class.  The fabric for the first one is all washed and ready to go.

12.

Here are the FIRST blocks for the Mt Battie Modern Quilt Guild’s challenge “Bee Inspired.”  These blocks were made for Donna Strawser, whose prompt was “Mid-Coast Maine.”  You can see the individual blocks better on the Mt. Battie Facebook page or on Instagram.  Thirteen quilters each made one of these blocks for Donna, and she made one for herself, so 14 blocks.  Mine is the white winter birch trees at dawn.  Tori Manzi made the four trees at the bottom, by season.  They really need to be seen lined up together, a you can on FB or IG.  Donna will now set these blocks into a quilt and will bring it back to show us at some point.  I will need to make a block for our next Bee Inspired event in April:  “Dark and Light” for Vicki Fletcher.

I really, really loved this block I made and might do another version for one of the pillows:

13.  I am gathering bits for a Rice Bowl bag or two.  See earlier post, but the designer is kzstevens and the pattern is in her Etsy store.

14.  I want to make a little sewing folder like friend Megan Bruns showed me the other day.

So…

That list is not actually too bad.  In any case, I’m having so much fun, even though I’m not getting as much time as usual, due to the needs of my boyfriend, AC Slater, who will be 1 year next month.  He’s a crazy man and has me visiting the dog park daily, as the snow and ice are pretty risky on the wood paths.

Turkey Tracks: Friends’ Projects

Turkey Tracks:  January 31, 2019

Friends’ Projects

Becca has finished her traveling quilt top:  “The More I wonder, the More I love,” from as I recall Becca saying, THE COLOR PURPLE.  WOW!  Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild is going to show our Traveling Quilts to Coastal Quilters in February.  The Traveling Quilts were a two-year project where eight women worked on each quilt, and each finished quilt is amazing and wonderful.  Our next group project is “Bee Inspired” and EVERYONE in the group is participating.  You can read about that project on the Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild Facebook page.  The first blocks will be coming in at the Mt. Battie February meeting.

Becca, here, is backed by her developing selvage spider web quilt and is quilting her “Long Time Gone” quilt—a Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild project last year—designed by Jen Kingwell.

Lynn Vermeulen is making this strip-pieced quilt from solids, from a Timna Tarr quilt with which she fell in love.  If you have not looked at Timna’s gallery online, it’s a treat.  I love her use of saturated COLOR.

Karen Martin is workin gon the rail fence riff in batiks.  Yummy.

Karen gave me this gorgeous little pouch, and Lynn game me a glass she ETCHED (oh my) with Sip and Sew.

Tori Manzi, as always, has so many inspiring projects.  The top right is a Modern Quilt Guild mini-quilt swap, which will be finished and sent off soon.  The recipient wanted hand-dyed pink fabrics.  The foundation-pieced color-wheel circles are going to be so interesting.  And the pear block is as well.

This quilt is a gift for someone who is fond of the tv show “The Who.”  (I think I have that right.)  There is no end to Tori’s creativity.

Such fun projects!

Turkey Tracks: April 2018 Quilty Update

Turkey Tracks:  May 2, 2018

April 2018 Quilty Update

“Winter:  Dawn Trees” is now sewn together and is being quilted–with a grid pattern on my domestic Janome 8900.  This quilt is my design, inspired by Amy Friend’s workshop and book, IMPROV PAPER PIECING.  I drew the three different blocks on EQ7 (now EQ8) and had that system print out the patterns.  I started with ALL tree blocks lined up in a traditional pattern of rows and rows–until after the workshop.  Then I put them into a more “modern” arrangement.  I really like the quilt and will post pics when it is totally finished, which won’t be long now.

Thanks Amy!!

Here is an EQ8 picture of what the quilt would have looked like if I had not added the fractured dawn light block and just lined up the trees.  Pretty, but not as interesting I think.

The main part of top of “Valse Brilliant” is done.  I’m now picking out the English Paper Piecing papers–at night while watching tv.  It’s a slow process, of course.  VB, as those of us doing it in Coastal Quilters Maine call it, comes from Willyene Hammerstein’s book MILLIFIORE QUILTS.  (I did not do WH’s border treatment.)  My “rules”–setting rules comes from workshops with Timna Tarr–were simple:  brights and text in every block.

I’m going to put some wide charcoal Essex Linen (blend) borders.  Right now, this quilt is not big enough, really, to be lap size.  The border fabric is washed, but NOT ironed yet.

Here are my monthly blocks for our Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild challenge to make Jen Kingwell’s “Long Time Gone” quilt.  It’s an improv type quilt.  I am using all Cotton+Steel.  Roxanne Wells gave me the idea of using the more formal quarter log cabin style to get stripes, and I like how that came out.  The courthouse step blocks started out being blue, green, and pink/red done in ombre, light to dark.  Then I decided I liked them mixed up better, so put all the darks together, all the mediums, and all the lights.

Here are my May blocks.  Yes!!  I am ahead now and have all of May to catch up with other projects.

Here’s what all my blocks look like now.  I’m really liking how they are going together.

And here is a reminder of what Long Time Gone looks like:

Turkey Tracks: The Mt. Battie Modern Traveling Quilts in November

November 21, 2017

The Mt. Battie Modern Traveling Quilts in November

We had POURING cold rain the night of our meeting last Thursday.  Some of those from away elected, wisely, to stay home.

For those who made it to the meeting, these traveling quilts continue to excite us!

On the right  is Vicki Fletcher’s addition to Lynn Vermeulen’s quilt.  The pinks and blues are playing nicely with existing bright colors.  And this addition is opening up room for the quilt to grow, as four or five members have yet to work on it.  Vicki stretched herself by making these curved blocks as she tried making blocks she had never made.

Tori Manzi made a Timna Tarr map of Linda Satkowski’s neighborhood.  (We attended Timna Tarr’s map  workshop at our last Coastal Quilters’ meeting.  See Timna’s map quilts in the gallery at timnatarr.com)

Here’s how the map fits into this quilt.

Here’s G. Bruns’ quilt.  This quilt is in pieces, so we spent some time trying to see where we might begin to connect the blocks.  Linda Satkowski connected the top right pieces by adding the red trees between them.  And she added the hexie flower and the bright green/blue blocks.  I have this quilt now, so who knows what will happen to it next.  My mind is turning over ideas as I work on other projects right now.

I did not get a good picture of Vicki’s quilt.  It’s getting large now.  Lynn Vermeulen added the stars over the forest and cabin

Aren’t these great stars!!!

Becca Babb-Brott added the “never stop looking up” to Nancy Wright’s “star” quilt.  And, the selvage star on the right.  Joann more added the “made fabric” star in blues–a la Victoria Findlay Wolfe.  I hope some of you have iPads and will look at these stars close up.  I promise to get close ups next go round.  This quilt is certain to get more celestial blocks.

My quilt arrived at the Mt. Battie Sit and Sew the next day.  It was so fun to see it as I have not seen it for some time now.  Nancy Wright added the big moon, and G. Bruns added the big feather.

Love this feather and the way the Carolyn Friedlander background fabric works.  And the teacups that Margaret Elaine Jinno made for me–one each for my sons and daughter-in-laws.

Nancy used a collection of fabrics she had to make this moon–Blue Park designed by Karen Lewis Textiles.  I love the curved pieces in this circle.

JoAnn Moore made this star for someone’s quilt–and I have lost track of whose.  It will be put in the right box, and I’ll point it out next time we see the quilts.

JoAnn Moore worked on Margaret Elaine’s “village” quilt.  We placed some of the buildings around Vicki’s square for fun.  JoAnn finished the school’s and flagpole at the Sit and Sew on Friday.  You can see them below.

So, we are having fun.  And now we all have projects to work on for the next two months.  We will see the quilts again in January.

Turkey Tracks: And Then There Were Two: Quilty Update

Turkey Tracks:  September 19, 2017

And Then There Were Two:  Quilty Update

 

I haven’t been able to work on this project–which came out of an Amy Friend workshop earlier in the year–because I was trying to catch up on other started projects.  I’m kind of driven that way, actually, and I allowed myself to start too many projects–which made me cross.  Amy showed us how to design our own blocks, and this is mine.  I am so happy to have had time to make another block last week.  They are 16 inches and foundation pieced, so each one takes a bit of time.  I am using all Cotton+Steel fabrics on the charcoal solid background.  You can start to see the funky shape a bit now.  I am loving these blocks!

By the way, Amy has her first designed fabrics out now.  You might want to go to her blog (During Quiet Time) to see the fabrics, which she designed to be used in foundation pieced projects as that is her first love AND to see what she is making with these fabrics.

I have Bonnie Hunter’s 2016 Mystery Quilt, En Provence, on the long arm, but have been distracted with–among other projects–picking some clothing patterns, making my “cutting out” patterns, buying some fabric, and–oh my goodness–making the first one, a tunic in linen.  More pictures coming on these projects soon.  Meanwhile, En Provence, has at least two runs done and the binding made.  I’m using a pale lavender thread which is awesome with this quilt and its backing.

I FINISHED MY KATJA MAREK MILLEFIORE QUILT.  It’s been a year long project to paper piece it, and I LOVE how it came out.  More pictures coming when it is quilted and bound.  It will go on the long arm next, and I finally figured out how I want to quilt it.

Now I am doing Willyne Hammerstein’s paper pieced quilt called “Valse Brillante,” from her book MILLEFIORI QUILTS.  And then there were…SEVEN blocks.  These guys are a bit more tedious to make, but aren’t they fun?  I am liking this project.

My rules are text, brights, and some solid fabrics.  We learned about making “rules” to follow from Timna Tarr when she came to Coastal Quilters (Maine) last year for a workshop.  When I glue blocks, I make two of each block with the brights and text fabrics reversed:  one small, one large of each.

 

Friend Becca Babb-Brott lucked into taking a two-day Gee Bend quilters class at Maine’s recent Fiber College.  Of my friends, Becca is the one who loves improv quilting the most I think.  So this class was right up her funway path.  Here’s what she has done so far.  Note the use of solids.  These pieces will be connected, and they are actually wider than they appear here now.  Note the jean pocket on the lower piece.  She plans to add another pocket.  Using old denim is something the Gee Bend quilters do/did a lot.  They used what they had.  The Gee Bend quilters advocate working out the width of your piece and them building more to the top and bottom.  It will be interesting to see where this one goes.

 

Gee Bend comes back every other year, and we are already plotting going when they return.

If you don’t know the Gee Bend history, take a minute to google them.  Their quilts are unique and are both old and modern and not quite describable.  They defy “rules.”

 

Turkey Tracks: February Quilty Update

Turkey Tracks:  February 14, 2017

February Quilty Update

I love winter because I have lots of uninterrupted time to sew.  Plus, I love snow.

I am ticking along with all the various projects and having fun seeing them come together.

Here’s Katja Marek’s EPP millifiore quilt in progress.  I have almost finished a large section at the bottom left  and will be adding it soon.  It’s in shades of blue.  And the addition of the blue will make the left edge complete.

Yes, this quilt is very funky, and I have no idea how it will look when it’s done, but…  I am having fun.

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You can see the piles of completed blocks of the Farmer’s Wife–each a column–above the millifiore.

That top was finished last night.

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I liked the zig-zag setting, but it requires cutting four of the blocks in half on the short rows!!!  I thought the quilt too long and skinny, so added two columns and used the five extra blocks I had on the upper left (2) and lower right (3).

I got a little OCD–ok, a lot OCD–about setting up blocks for one of Willyne Hammerstein’s quilts, “Valse Brilliante.”  Hammerstein is Austrian, and her colors are very European.  I’m doing my version in brights and neutrals, and each block will have some text fabric in it.  I got a bundle of “pearl bracelet” fabrics that are bright and colorful, so I ironed them all, and I can’t bear to put them away again until I’ve finished.  There are also some bright Japanese daisy prints I like–as you can see below.  It actually takes a while to set up one of these blocks, but now that I’ve used up all the red wonderclips, I’ve slowed down.  I try to sew EPP with matching thead as much as is possible.

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I have these fabrics left to cut and glue:

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Some of us here in Camden, Maine have formed the Mt. Battie Modern Quilt Guild, which is in addition to our venerable Coastal Quilters, which is a chapter in the Pine Tree Quilt Guild.

I am so drawn to the “modern” fabrics and the graphic nature of the modern quilts.  And, there is a strand that is modern/traditional, or some such title.   So, we are going to have even more quilty goodness.

We are going to do a “traveling” quilt and will turn in our initial pieces on March 2nd.  I have made this piece as my offering and look forward to seeing how it comes back to me.  I’m not thinking this piece will be a center medallion that gets developed.  And I will go back in with pearl cotton when the quilt is layered to embellish such as the exclamation point at the end of the “Love.”  The “blue moon” and the back side of the sliver moon were cut with one of those rotary circle cutters–which I learned from our workshop with Timna Tarr.

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My alphabet was modeled on the one I found in Mary Lou Weidman and Melanie Bautista McFarland’s OUT OF THE BOX WITH EASY BLOCKS.

We had a major snowstorm starting Monday night and ending Tuesday night–a blizzard.  There was a near complete “white out” and lots of high wind.  I have about 2 feet of MORE snow on the ground now.  As the storm abated, I made my way down the steep drive to my mailbox and retrieved the first Cotton+Steel fabric club package from Pink Castle fabrics.  Isn’t it pretty?

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I’m already thinking about making the next set of Tula Pink’s 100 City blocks.  Some of us are doing 8 blocks a month.  (You can see an earlier post on that challenge.)

I hope your winter is wonderful!

Enjoy it.  Slow down.  Hibernate.  Spring with all of its energy will be here in due course.

Turkey Tracks: September 2016 Update

Turkey Tracks:  October 1, 2016

September 2016 Update

What a glorious summer I have had!

And the fun continues as my life continues to be rich with experiences.

The sailing trip on the J&E Riggin was terrific, as I posted earlier.

Quilter Timna Tarr comes next weekend for a Coastal Quilters trunk show and workshop on making “improvisational” quilts.  She has a terrific gallery on her web site.  Take a look?

On October 17th, some Coastal Quilters of Camden, Maine, will make another retreat at the Franciscan Guest House in Kennebunkport, Maine.  Attending will be my Bellevue High School, Bellevue, Nebraska, classmate, Penny Rogers Camm, who is making her VERY FIRST QUILT.  Messages have been flying between us about layouts and how to sew blocks together and so forth.  Her quilt is so, so pretty.  We will pick out borders, etc., when she comes week after next.

I picked what will probably be this season’s LAST flower bouquet the other day.

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Next year I want MORE cosmos and zinnas in my garden.  And I need to go out and cut the gorgeous hydrangeas to bring in side the house for winter decorations.

Friend Megan Bruns is in Texas with her family this week.  She took all the rosettes from her Millifiori quilt (see former blog posts for details), and her mother helped her decide how to put them together.  This picture is the last I received.  Megan used all Anna Maria Horner fabrics in this quilt.  Of course there will be borders and so forth yet to do.

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Horch roofers have been here for the past two days.  The new roof is so pretty.  Pictures of it later as the yard and house is full of men, flying roof pieces, and equipment.  I would take my life in my hands to go out there.  Besides, it is cloudy and overcast, so I’ll get pictures later.  I am loving the soft color of the roof though.

We still have had no appreciable rain.  I continue to worry about my well running dry.  I have stopped watering deeply outside.  The growing season is running down anyway.  I do not think we will get much fall color this year as drought-struck trees are just dropping brown leaves to, hopefully, save themselves.