Spider/Spider Web Fabric Postcards

I go in streaks where I want to make fabric postcards and now is one of those times. I chose my line drawing fabric postcard pattern included in my Bridgette pattern and 5 Halloween colored fabrics to begin this project. I selected the fabrics in Halloween colors and not necessarily Halloween themed fabrics. Five fabrics in a variety of widths work nicely and the varied widths give a random look. Any fabric combinations will work-I chose Halloween this time and make 4-6 cards at a time. I cut them out on the diagonal to give movement and to accent a cheekbone line. I have two sides of the face in my designs and I like to place them together and they look like mirror images. I used black batik for the raw edged applique and black thread with a fancy stitch to join the top, bottom and Peltex stiffener. I usually use Fast2Fuse stiffener by Pellon but I could not find it online and I substituted Peltex and it actually worked nicer because it was heavier (less floppy.) I found the spiders at Joann Fabrics-they are not buttons but are flat on the back to glue to the front of the card. I created a spider web from variegated thread in the lower corner. I embellished with glitter nail polish on the eyelids and a dot of white matte fabric paint on the eye for the eye reflection. I intend to give two of these as door prizes in my "I Value That Quilt!" lecture I am giving twice at the Wisconsin Quilt Expo in Madison, WI on Friday Sept. 11, 2015. My pattern is available for sale from my website at www.laurieceesay.com. Maybe I will see you at the expo since it is a blast!! Their website is www.wiquiltexpo.com

Bastet

I shared a teaser photo of this quilt a few months ago. I made it for the 2015 Hoffman Challenge. I have had the quilt finished since February. I will mail it to the exhibit curator today and thought it was time to show the full quilt. The 2015 theme fabric was predominantly red, black and metallic gold with a little orange and green. If you looked closely at the print there were knitting motifs and small quilt blocks and the general shape of the designs were squares and rectangles-all angular shapes. I decided to create an Egyptian woman and researched ancient Egyptian goddesses. Isis was a common goddess but not a name I want to use anymore since the international terrorist group took that name. I chose Bastet because she was the ancient goddess of fire, cats, of the home and pregnant women. I have a black cat and wanted to incorporate a cat, black or whatever, in a quilt and this idea was coming to life.

 

As I was researching Egyptian clothing etc. I discovered they worn an excessive amount of gold ornamentation and their cats did too. Great since I was up to embellish this quilt to the max! I tapped into my "bridal store fabric stash" to get the look I wanted. I used black velvet (I'm humming that 1980s song in my head!) for the hair and black lame' for the underneath hair. I found the awesome white pleated fabric for the dress which I cut at different angles to get a 3D realistic look.

I used the 2015 Challenge fabric for the yoke of the dress, the headpiece, the drapey fabric on the lower left of the woman and the parts of the stool the cat is sitting on. I added Egyptian hieroglyphics I found on Pinterest on the top and bottom panels. I selected my name for the letters-I thought it was interesting the "C" and the "S" are almost the same. When I say my last name strangers think it starts with an "S" so I found that intriguing. I have hand and machine sewed several metallic gold trims to the yoke, the cat, the headpiece and  the seam allowances. The cat's necklace and the woman's earrings are from one set of earrings I found in February at Payless Shoes at Fox River Mall in Appleton WI which I took apart and separated. I used turquiose nail polish on the eyelids and white fabric paint for the eye reflection.

I also used gold metallic thread and many decorative stitches on my sewing machine to further add to the heavy ornamentation. The bracelet also has beads sewn onto it. There is a gold metallic flang on the vertical borders. I had a blast making this quilt and must wait until mid-August to find out if it made the cut to travel from Sept. 2015-Sept. 2016 to various quilt venues across the country. I will miss it when it is gone!!

Three Little Witches and an Auction Quilt for IQF-Houston

 I am lecturing at the Wisconsin Quilt Expo in Madison, WI this coming Friday Sept. 5, 2014. My lecture is called "I Value That Quilt!" and decided if time permitted I would make a few 4" x 6" fabric postcards as a gift to my volunteer and one for a lucky person attending my lecture. The third postcard is a surprise to someone! I drew up a design loosely based on a small version of my other witch designs. I had left over fabric from my Halloween 2013 Witch Quilt and some Cherrywood Hand Dyed Fabrics left over from The Wicked Challenge a month ago which I used for the green skin. The fabrics are all batiks and I embellished with three colors of nail polish and my signature white dot of paint in the eye area for reflection. I used a variegated Sulky rayon thread for stitching the dress, hat and outside edge-love, love, love this color combination of purple, red, dark blue and lime green!!

This little (12" x12") quilt is my donation for the International Quilt Festival in Houston at the end of October. I am so excited to be teaching there for the first time and the organization asks all teachers to donate a piece to their charitable cause. I picked the dots, stripes, rainbow color scheme, brown hair and glitter nail polish because those are my favorite things and I thought they represented me the best. I hand beaded the earrings and the necklace and used some nail polish on the lips, eyelids and hair, I need to get it to Houston by the third week of September.

I have an "epic" quilt that has been finished but I have to figure out how to add a watermark to the photographs. My techie skills are substandard so I have some educating to do!!

 

SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) 2014 Auction Piece

I have been a SAQA member for a few years and they do an art quilt auction beginning in September of each year to raise funds. They ask any of the members to donate an original art quilt piece 12" x12" and I created this piece I call "Human Harmony."

The deadline was extended from June 1st to June 15th and that gave me enough time to make something for the auction.

I started with the red batik with purple and gray gears. I felt like working with darker skin tones and blonde hair-as interesting combo but if it's good enough for RuPaul it's good enough for me!! I added the word harmony because I was being social/political in my mind while I was creating this and it spoke to be about human/racial harmony.

I embellished with two different yellow nail polishes for in the hair, one polish on the lips and another purple nail polish on the eyelids. I added rhinestones to simulate actual jewelry and a bit of white fabric paint on the eyes.

I'm glad they expended the deadline so I could commit to the SAQA auction project!

 

 

Portrait Quilt for Appleton East H.S. Class Reunion Door Prize

I have a class reunion this July in Appleton WI. I went to Appleton East H.S. and our school colors were blue and red because we were the Patriots. Back then the Americana color combination was not easy to come by but today it's everywhere. Anyway, the reunion is having door prizes and the coordinators are asking us to donate something so here is my contribution. I used my school colors and all fabrics in my stash. The batik stars and stripes is totally a great fabric as well the batik I used for the halter top!! I have used this pattern of mine before but have not added a border before. I also went into the border with the hair while doing the quilting.

I embellished with rhinestones for earrings and a necklace, two different nail polishes for the hair, a red glitter nail polish on the lips and a great blue chunky glitter nail polish for the eye shadow. I found a cute little button for the jeans closure.

The quilt is 18" x 24."

I added the year of my graduation to the bottom of the quilt in a subtle way. I wanted some reference to the reunion but not too much. You can do the math to figure out how old I am!

And last I never show my labels but I wanted to show this one. I do all my labels using the face stamp I picked up at Joann Fabrics and then I emphasize the eyes and lips using my Pigma Micron pens. I use them to write the info for the labels too.

I hope who ever gets my quilt enjoys it!!

Ann B: A Real Person Portrait

I have a website www.laurieceesay.com and I have had Ann Bridges from Appleton WI (my hometown) re-do my website last year. Ann is a former hair customer, neighbor and we found each other a while back on Facebook. Ann has a web design business called AMB Web Solutions and she helped me out when my original web designer retired.

Ann is very generous with adding pages/widgets to my website. I just added a page with my teaching schedule and another page with my patterns for sale.

So I wanted to pay her back by making a portrait quilt of her. I used her Facebook photos as references since I haven't actually seen Ann in several years. I was wondering what her favorite color was so I could use that as the color scheme of the quilt so I was sneaky and told her I was doing a survey on "what is your favorite color?" for my color classes. I did ask on Facebook and to the people I worked with etc. in a 24 hour period and the results were interesting.

Pink was her favorite color (mine too!) and I loosely use a pattern where I did myself in a whimsical portrait and Ann's glasses were the same shape as mine. I changed the face shape, smile and nose. She has fun hair too!! As I was creating this quilt Ann posted on Facebook while watching American Idol that Keith Urban and her had the same haircut!! I had to agree!

I embellished with nail polish on the lips, pink rhinestones in the background and some bronze fabric paint in the hair. No jewelry.

I mailed it to Ann this week and she received it yesterday and loved it!

I love surprising people with my art!!

 

The Woman With The Belted Dress x Two

This is a pattern I drew up and used for a several quilts a few years ago. I like the asymmetrical placement of the woman, the long hair and the halter dress. When I first designed it the woman was very thin. I thought "who looks like that?" and I added curves to the poor thing so she looked like a real woman! I added the belt because it was fun to accessorize and I can use more fabric!! That is the back story of this design.

Today I used this pattern to make these two wall hangings for two separate reasons. The quilt in the first photo is for a fundraiser in my community for the local free clinic. I want to contribute a donation to this worthy cause. The dress fabric is a hippy psychedelic fat quarter I picked up on my journeys and simply could not put it in another quilt where it seemed appropriate. But my lady could wear it as her dress! I have fallen in love with chevrons and this background fabric was a great contrast to the red hair and the dress. I added red glitter to the hair, glitter nail polish to the eyes and lips (makeup!) and rhinestones for jewelry. I did not add a flower to her hair because I felt there was enough activity with the patterns of the various fabrics and it would have looked too busy. I have to part with this quilt next week. :(

 

Quilt number two is for my local quilt guild's next challenge on using someone else's "ugly" fabric! I randomly picked the large paisley print. Not the worst fabric in the world but large! I liked the blue/orange combination and ran with that. I chose the paisley as the dress and had this great hand dyed orange velvet for the hair. I tried to downplay the paisley using value. I purposely selected a background that had low contrast to the paisley while boldly using orange for the hair, lips and belt. I embellished with an orange marker in the hair, rhinestones for jewelry and a felt flower button painted with blue nail polish with a bead in the center in the hair. The challenge isn't due until August but I was in the mood to work on it now. If any of my guild members see it before the reveal oh well!!

 

The two quilts look quite different to me based on fabric chose. I like the red haired woman quilt better because I prefer bright colors with lots of contrast  but I love the velvet hair too! Which one do yu prefer?