Quilt Visions

My sister Diane and I had a wonderful long weekend in sunny California last week! We drove up the coast from San Diego to see the Oceanside Museum of Art, and some of the quilts from Quilt National 2011. Then we drove back along the ocean, stopping to see the beaches-the waves, surfers, and sea lions. Saturday night we went to the opening of Quilt Visions: Brainstorms. It was fun to see the other quilts, and meet other quilt artists. It was the first time the show was at the Quilt Visions Museum. I was thrilled to have my quilt included, and to be at the opening reception. In between, we saw lots of art: The Contemporary Museum of Art, The Museum of Art and the San Diego Watercolor Society international exhibit.

Orange

I made a pile of quilt tops I have made recently as I experiment with shape and colors. Now I am trying different ideas with machine quilting, as I go through the pile, and finish off each one! This one is 23" H x 20  "W.

ColorForm 25

I know you are thinking-I've seen that one before! I had made a quilt-ColorForm 7 which later was sold, but I have always loved the colors. So I decided to see if I had any colors that matched. This quilt is slightly different, and measures 20"H x 22"W. Now I realize I have been having fun with some ideas I have had, and have a pile of quilts that need machine quilting.Sometimes I hate to stop and finish the whole quilt, but the downside is that they need to get done eventually.

Two at once

A group of quilts traveling in the Quilt National exhibit will be at the Oceanside Museum of Art. My quilt, Lost and Found: Blue will be in this exhibit, with a reception October 13, 2012, from 5-7pm. I would love to be there, but I will be able to see it the next weekend, when I travel to San Diego for the opening reception of Quilt Visions 2012: Brainstorms.

End of summer

I spent a lot of time this summer at our family cabin in Minnesota, on the shore of Lake Superior. I have gone there all my life, and one of my favorite things to do is look at rocks. There are some great beaches where the rocks are smooth, from years of crashing waves from the big lake. One year I collected rocks for our pond at home, another year we used some to make lamps. Some of my favorite ones are just sitting on a shelf! This year we looked for small, flat ones,and my husband drilled holes in them so I could make necklaces; here is my first one! Lately I have applied to several quilt shows, but I have finished with that now, I have cleaned up my studio. Today I am thinking of those waves, and they are translating into something new on my design wall. I am back to repeating patterns, but not in any rush-no deadlines, no shows to think about. Maybe it will work out, maybe not, but I am going to take time to see how shapes and colors fit together.

ColorForm 21

I have been working on more of these smaller ColorForm quilts lately. As you can see, I love orange! Using just a few colors and shapes can be challenging, but interesting in these quilts. As the summer continues to be busy, it is nice to work on something challenging, yet small enough to handle in a short amount of time. One more quilt waits for machine quilting before summer ends.

Summer

These two quilts are almost done-they need bindings. The top is ColorForm 20-16"H x 24"W, and the other is ColorForm 19-15"H x 21 "W. In all the activities of summer, I have been working on bigger quilts to enter in shows with deadlines coming up in the fall, and took time to make more of these ColorForm quilts. I have sold quite a few of these over the last year, and wanted to use some fabric I have recently dyed. I have 2 more to machine quilt,and 2 other quilts a little bigger to finish. It is not so agonizing to machine quilt these little ones!