We Have a Name

The fish quilt is now ready for a sleeve and I have given it a name, Fishy Fantasea, the theme is By the Seaside thats why I have use fantaSEA. The shells are from Turkey, I drilles holes myself, now I wand my own drill!!!! and beaded arround them with green, blue and peal beads.I do'nt do beading much but I like the results here and will try beading in other work now.Another thing I need to do is find the book the fish shapes are from to give credit to the quilter however since we moved house things have been, how can I put this, wild! cluttered! very disorganised! and thats just my studio!!!!! if I do'nt find it soon I will ask on a list I am on for the collective help and someone is sure to know perhaps the author herself.Please feel free to comment as I always find it helpful.Thank you for looking.
Take Care

Janette

What's going Where and When

I have made ready the two quilts for The Loch lomond Quilt Show so here they are. The top one is for  D.H. in his football team colours and is called, Away The Pars.    The second one is one I made as a sample for a class I teach called Wibbly Wobbly 9 Patch and this quilt is called Baby Love. These two quilts are made using two of my favourite blocks but with a twist which is what was asked for, traditional  but with a twist. I think I have thats worked out o.k. all I need to do now is learn how  to take better photos, with that in mind I would like to hear you're take on these quilts.
Thank you  for taking time to look and comment.
Take Care
Janette

The Fish

This is the final order I put hte fish in. As you can see they are TROPICAL fish and \I used a variety of fabrics and just had fun.They still need to be FMQ. at this stage, also a border and embellishing need to be added  but I think they are fun.

OOOOps I forgot to rotate this photo, but I hope you like the close up and can see some of the fabrics used.

February

The wind is gale force and it's raining, again, but this helps me because it gives me time, time to work on the entries for quilt shows. The idea of hand stitching all the half square triangles back to make a curve felt good at the time but has been hard work mostly due to my arthritic hands however I am close to the end now. The deadline for entries is March so I need to pick up speed, it still needs wadding/batting and quilting but the quilting is minimal due to the ammount of fabric used.Will I do this again, maybe but not for a spacific date as it has taken much longer then I thought it would.The other quilt for this show was ready just needed a name so I have decided on Baby Love, as its really more of a baby quilt, colours etc., and it has pink backing fabric so a bit girly.The black white and red is Pars, thats the nick name of DH football/soccer team and its the colours of the strip and also it's a gift or him. The other quilt is for a deadline in July so I have time however I am well on the way with that quilt as it's been so much fun.I will post a photo of it as work in progress, but I have worked on it since I took the photo's so the fish have bee free motoin quilted quite a bit of fmq. done on each one.These are fantasy fish but the inspiration comes from real fish we saw in Barbados while on holiday there, the tropical fish were so colourful as was the coral and even the sea weed so for my artist statement Barbados fish life will take centre stage.Feed back from you would be good, I have a thick skin so please be as honest as you like.Looking forward to hearing you're thoughts.
Take Care
Janette

Hello 2011.

Hi, This is my first post of 2011, new year, new ideas, new way to blog. This year I hope to be more profesional when blogging, by that I mean less personal stuff and more quilt related topics and to start the new year off I'm talking about juried show's and judged shows.
I have had my fair share of  "sorry" slips, but what really confuses me are the comment slips from judges, for example, one time I had three slips, two of the judges were pretty close on marking however the third was the total opposite of the other two, where one said "excellent" this judge said "needs work" so my resulting thought is, I will do what I llike to a standard I feel is good and if the judges like it, fine, if not thats also fine because I like it.
I have only ever enered one juried show and needless to say did not make the cut, nor did I get feed back which I found a bit negative however I have since read up on juries and see why they cannot give feed back to everyone they reject.
Right now I am working on two quilts for The Loch Lommond Quilt Show, both are traditional (thats what they want) and both are getting me working again after a year off. (due to moving house) However traditional work helps me to unblock creatively so this show is a great help to me.
What would you say to,  
Judged show's?
Juried show's?
Traditional quilts?
Unblocking creativitey?
Look forward to your answeres.
Janette

Hello from Rocky

Hi, This is my dog Rocky as you can see he is a Chahuahua (?spelling I get it wrong every time) anywa he thinks he's a much LARGER dog.He is also a sun worshiper and this is one of his sunning spots an the bend of the staircase.He will be 7 yrs old in Feb. and thinks he rules our house (he does!!) Hope you lke him.

Take Care

Janette

New Bag.

I was trying something new, well new for  me, a journal size piece of work to resemble a face. I tried to work in the same way as Pamela Allen, just cut and lay it down and see what comes out. So here it is bad hair day bag 1, it was fun to make but I had a few problems on the way.One such problem is covered by a little green heart! I also tried rounded corners but I'm not keen on this look so I will not do that on another bag. It was all free motion quilted and is lined with cotton. What do you think???