The Sky is blue, the Sea is Blue

Today I started auditioning fabrics for the background. Most of the colours are too dark, as I want a bleached beach look, so I am waiting for fabrics I have placed on order. However, I just wated to try out how it might start to look with more colour in the background. I don't think it will be a problem to apply large pieces of fabric and (thank goodness) the more fiddly and tedious parts are now done. I just have a little bit of detail to attend to around the girl's arm and some shadow details. I am pretty happy with how it is shaping up now!

I love to keep a quilt journal as I make a quilt. Here are a couple of pages from my journal for "The Sky is Blue, the Sea is Blue".

I like to use the A3 Visual Diaries the best. It is great to go over it and see how ideas developed. It's also an excellent place to keep information I need to keep. On one page I have pasted details of quilt show deadlines to remind me to get a move on!

After I washed out the Verona (soluble clear film) some areas were not stitched down well enough. I will simply baste these and attend to them once I start the more detailed, intense quilting on the final piece.

I love the look of the piece after washing out. I am especially pleased with the overall softness of the quilt. I didn't want the stiff result that comes when using fusible webbing. It is OK on stained glass, but not for this quilt. More soon...............

The Sky is Blue, the Sea is Blue

Today I made a little more progress on my own quilt. I stitched "Verona" over the boy, carefully removing about 100 pins as I went.

Then, the quilt came off the long arm machine, and into the bathroom.

Cold water, and gentle agitation for about 5 minutes removed all of the soluble Verona film.

A quick spin in the washing machine to remove excess moisture and then it is on the clothesline.

You can see that this will be a BIG quilt. (About 2.5m across and 2m high)

Here is a view of the back, showing some of the stitching. My other half said to me today: "How are you going to put the background in?" The answer is "I am not sure yet!" I think I will be able to attach large pieces of fabric - the background is quilt minimal. There will be some very intense quilting and some three dimensional "extras". Watch this space!

The Sky is Blue.....

Wow! At last I have found a little bit of time to work on a quilt that I started two years ago. It is large! Finished size is about 2-1/2 by 2 metres. The method I am using, is to create a sort of 'canvas' which is actually a simple calico quilt, with the design pencilled in. I attach the fabric pieces a bit at a time, building up the design. Here is where I am up to at present. You will notice that there are a lot of pins in the boy. That is because I am yet to overlay some "Verona" (clear water soluble film) over the top. When this is done, I will re-load the quilt back onto the quilting machine, and quilt the pieces in place. After this, I will soak the entire quilt to remove this layer, dry it, and start work on the background - at long last!