Beaded Bling for Quilts

Taught a beading class on Saturday—oh, yeah–I already told you that was happening a bunch of times, didn’t I? And, as usual, I did not take any pictures of the class. I didn’t even remember to ask someone else to take pictures for me! I do this all the time.

I do have a picture of a pile of stuff as we were starting to pack up!

Everyone brought a favorite fabric to work on and dove in as soon as they knew the first steps to take. It was stitch, stitch, stitch all afternoon and talking and laughing and just so much fun! I always have such a great time teaching–I hope my students have as much fun as I do!

Thanks to all of them for giving me a wonderful day!

Artsy/Craftsy ADHD

Artsy/Craftsy ADHD. Yep, that’s what I’ve diagnosed myself with. I’ve been on vacation and only brought some beading with me. No sewing, knitting, painting or other projects to keep my hands busy. And it’s been boring. That led me to realize that I function at home by jumping from one thing to another on a daily basis. While I wait for paint to dry, I quilt. When I’m not sure in which direction I want to quilt, I piece. When I’m tired of piecing, I knit or bead…there are always a variety of things going on in my studio. Being able to jump from one to another keeps me from ever being bored.

Not so much on vacation…

I was able to do a workshop for the Cabin Fever Quilt Guild this weekend. It felt so good to be working with fabric after more than a week away from my ADHD studio activities. The ladies were super and, as always, each project is totally unique. Also, as usual, I don’t try to report their names and connect them to their projects because I always goof up when I try to do that. I apologize if I missed anyone! I will just leave you with glimpses of their projects on their design walls. Hope you can enjoy with me the beauty of their choices and their work.

Good Times!

This was my Tuesday–such a fun day!

AJ has been AJ Fireman since he could say his name, so he had to have a fireman cake! And he was so excited to open presents again, so soon after Christmas.

Nothing is better than the smile of a happy child!

And Wednesday was a pretty great day, too. I had been unable to find a class sample–just could not remember what might have happened to it. Had to run to the quilt store for some thread and Kathy said, “Do you want to get that quilt sample from my office?” Well, I practically ran into her office and danced out! The missing had been found! Happy, happy…

I spent time with that spool of thread I bought also. I’m quilting tree branches again, but this piece is painted with a stencil. I’m finding that paint on fabric is not the horrible, stiff stuff that I’ve worked with before. Good paint really does make a difference.

And BONUS TIME—I finished the beading on this piece.

I decided to keep the beading as simple as the piece itself and found some beads that have a red lining and green outside. You won’t be able to see that in the photo, but they were perfect for the red and green tulip.

I’m actually having so much fun making these samples that the class is only a distant highlight. This is pure enjoyment for me. If you’re in the Tecumseh area on March 9, I’d love to introduce you to my addiction!!!

Fun week, good times!

Eeek–purple!

Purple is not my favorite color. Sometimes I am forced to use it because it actually does look good with many things. I have no idea why I bought this piece of purple fabric, but it’s great for a beading class sample!

The first step on this one is to make interesting flower centers. I’m going to encourage my students to buy a tube of “mixed” beads. That’s what I’m working with here and I love the variety I can use in each flower center.

Purple is not my thing, but there are lots of other colors to work with in both the fabric and the beads. Soooo, still having a great time making these small samples!

Uh-oh–teeny beads!

I’m continuing to make samples for my beading class, but I’m running into a little problem. I’m using teeny, tiny beads. My  intent was to have the students learn with larger beads, which are easier to handle and for many people easier to see. I’ll admit that at one time I thought I would never bead with beads this small, either.

The first two projects, which I showed you here and here are more in the way of eye catchers for advertising. The plan is for the rest of the samples to be small, easy and possible to do with a single color and size of bead. That’s apparently just not in my wheelhouse!

Oh, yes indeed, this could have been done in a single color and size of red beads, larger than the beads I’m using. But this just looks better.

I’m trying to convince myself that interesting samples are inspiring, not intimidating, and that they will make students want to learn how to do the beading. I’m hoping, anyway, ’cause single color, plain, big beads are just sounding too, too boring to me now!

We’ll see how the next one goes. It should lend itself more to a single color/size, but I’m thinking that the size could end up teeny again. Okay, just get out the strong magnifying glasses!

Thinking of Spring

The beading I am doing is on a piece of fabric that takes me right away from the snow outside my door. It’s soft and it’s pure spring.

Subtle is usually not in my repertoire. When I’m beading, in particular, it’s usually over-the-top-extravagant. However, with this piece I AM trying to use the beads for emphasis, not to overwhelm the whole design. It’s often hard to know when to stop, but I do have a goal in mind this time. I want to use it as a class sample, so I want it simple and I want the beading to enhance the print. I think it’s almost done now!

Feels like a new year…

I’m having some extra time this week since we are in a Christmas routine, not a regular routine. Getting out of the routine makes it feel like a brand new year already. It’s also enabled me to finish my little beading project that I fell in love with. Or is it finished? I’m never quite sure when to stop. I started out just wanting a few beads to use as a sample for a class.

The more I worked on it, the more I thought I could add. There were so many good places to put beads! Then I thought it would look better with some simple hand stitching. People are right when they say hand stitching adds something good to any piece. I liked it a lot better as I added the handwork.

At some point though, you just have to draw the line and call it done. But there is so much more room for beads, for hand stitching…

This part is pretty full, trying to be the focal point.

This part has room for lots more.

The whole thing is only 11″ square, and I had lots of time to work on it last week. That made me realize that it took that whole week to get it this far done and I was supposed to be working on a simple sample for a class. Whoa, Nellie!!! Time to put the brakes on and take a serious look at how long it takes to do beading.

All those samples that I got ready to work on when we’re on vacation…hmmm…maybe I shouldn’t wait ’till vacation to start working on them. It might take longer than I think, especially if I’m doing more on vacation than sitting around beading!!!

Maybe it’s just an excuse to start working on some just-for-fun projects instead of those things that I said yes to when I should have said no! Doing some ‘want to’ things instead of ‘have to’ things. That almost sounds like a new year’s resolution…

Life is short; follow your heart!

Wooo-hooo! More playing!

Time…precious time…and I got some! It was, of course, spent in the studio. I could have had a dedicated session on a project that has a deadline. But nooooooo–I’m dedicated to playing right now, and serious thought about a serious project just can’t find room in my brain.

So, here’s what I wasted devoted my time to…

The sun ray beading project is just destined to be my project that takes forever. I didn’t do any beading on it, but the edges were getting a little raggedy so I decided that I’d better finish them off. And no matter how many shots I took, following all those picture taking rules, or how many times I measured, it looks like the top is wider than the bottom. And it’s NOT. Not that it really matters here, but that little thing bugs me!

Facing the edge was my finish of choice, but it’s not a favorite choice. Once you get the facing on, you have to sew it down to the back, by hand. Yuck! That’s why I don’t do binding by hand…it seems like such a waste of time. But it is necessary sometimes to get the look you want.

Then I skipped over to the pink and gray batik project. Got borders on it and got some basic quilting done on it. There will be beading to come and I think some hand stitching of some kind. And…I got distracted!

Had to go to the fabric store for some thread…one little spool of thread. Well, wouldn’t you know it? They got in a new line of fabrics yesterday and I am in love with all of them! That rarely happens to me anymore and I certainly DO NOT NEED one piece more of fabric. Hmmm…It’s Christmas—time to ask for a big gift certificate. That’s a good justification, isn’t it?

But I did NEED to have one little fat quarter come home with me…can you see why?

(Well, everyone’s tastes are different!) And this is the little project for a beading class sample that I am going to do right now.

I don’t need any samples until February, so the plan was to take them on our trip to Florida later this winter. Unh-unh…this one is getting started today.

I think I may have sewing project ADD…but as long as I don’t have a taskmaster other than myself, it’s really okay. And I’m having fun, fun, fun! No holiday stress here, let me tell you. We’ll finish our shopping tomorrow (Right, Scarlett?). It’s not hard to buy some gift cards, and then I can come home and bead, bead, bead…fa la la la la, la la la la…

Beaded Ornaments

Aren’t these ornaments cute?

I taught a small class of 3 last night and I think there are now 3 more converts to bead obsession! When you find out how easy it is to add beads to quilts…well, you are ready to head to the nearest bead shop and stock up!

As usual, I forgot to get my camera out until the end of the night and Barb had already left, but Marilyn and Maryann worked right up until the very last minute.

And you know that I absolutely love teaching, so I had a wonderful evening! Guess I need to get busy and set up some more local classes so I can do more teaching and have more fun…it’s a tough chore, but I’m willing to do it!

And perhaps I should make a little trip to the bead store, just to make sure I keep up on my stash of beads!

Class of One–Fun!

My friend Sue came over today to learn how to do free form piecing. She was awesome! Sue is an experienced garment maker, knitter and quilter and wanted to add some new tricks to her sewing basket. All that experience made her a quick study and a joy to teach!

Look at the fabulous selection of fabric she brought to play with.

How could you go wrong using any of these?

The way I teach this style of working is to start with using a rotary cutter and ruler and straight lines. I like the stack-slice-and switch method for 2 reasons. It automatically mixes the colors you are using and it gets you a lot of pieces in a short amount of time! Fast and easy…that’s for me. Sue started out with these components.

We added curves—also very easy. Don’t believe anyone who tells you they aren’t! Then come on over and I’ll show you how to do it.

She learned overlapping piecing, which is a huge aid in final assembly. It’s the main method of many improv piecers, but it takes longer to do. We were after quick results today.

We move pieces to the design board as soon as they are sewn and try out different arrangements. We audition fabrics used in the piece already, as well as additional fabrics that we may wish to include in the design.

Sometimes lots more fabric is added and sometimes additional piecing and additional fabrics—rejected! That’s what happened to the three fabrics on the far right of this picture. The fabrics themselves were fine, but they really added nothing to the overall design, so Sue stopped before adding them.

Almost done with the assembly and just before the decision to eliminate the extra chunks of color. Sue had a great time learning how to do this and she was so quick to pick it up! An A+ student, for sure.

She got the quilt top done! She will decide on how to quilt it, whether or not it will get surface design embellishment like yarn, what edge finish to use…all the finishing details that will turn it into a fine piece of abstract art.

I absolutely love this design and think she did an awesome job. And she can now confidently create her own designs at any time!

Design finalized-assembled-trimmed and ready for quilting. Way to go, Sue!