Creative Life Sampler

Abandon, 2026   There are moments in life that are major turning points in our experience and often they mark a shift in the way we think moving forward. When a friend of mine decided to retire after 45 years in banking, he felt a need to get rid of things that symbolized his professional career in order to start anew.  And that is how a box of men’s neckties arrived on my front doorstep. My friend had known of the series of quilts I’d created with my father’s ties and trusted I would put his collection to good use. This was an opportunity to revisit some of my early work in textile art. In fact, those first tie quilts represent a pivotal moment for me. My concept of this art form made a significant transition when I envisioned displaying the last in this series as a piece of art. Suddenly, the quilt went from a cozy bed accessory to a statement piece on the wall. Eventually, this inspired me to share my experiences in here.  (Check out this link for a look back in time:...

Beauty in Mishap Usually, I try to finish up projects to start the new year with a fresh slate, but I have several things in the works right now. I find myself in the position of working against a self-imposed deadline! (That can be a joy drain for sure.) And while these "works in progress" (WIPs) get juggled with end of the year activities and holiday celebrations, one of the things put on the back burner is keeping up-to-date with social media. So, I'm putting a pause on all this activity, as the clock ticks off the last hours of 2025, to present my final finish of 2025: Beauty in Mishap . This continues my improvisation with random scraps to create what I hope are interesting compositions. Lately, I'm really enjoying the theme of "contrast." Juxtaposing thin lines and large shapes, or open spaces with more populated areas of random forms and connecting lines, opens up opportunities to enhance the surface with quilting that reinforces the design.   The bo...

Midnight & Noon- sides "A" & "B" The two sides of this quilt could stand separately, but I think they are stronger together. The navy background top, (side "A"), was finished first. Since it has a vertical, portrait, orientation, I deliberately approached the composition of the second top with a different vision. For side "B," I chose to do the reverse, making the shapes dark with a light background and a horizontal orientation. When the two sides were complete they evoked very different feelings.  The forms on side "A" take on a sculptural quality. This side brings to mind walking down the street on a cool night and seeing a streetlight up ahead which spotlights an object. Within that cone of light the form is illuminated but the environment around it falls away into the darkness. We instinctively know that there's more there than we can see.  In contrast, side "B" looks more like a landscape with structures. Its ...

Midnight and Noon, 2025, side "A" The focus of my work lately has been on creating more dynamic compositions. Of course, this is rather a broad, open ended challenge. It might be easier if I were drawing from reality, we are so familiar with arranging images these days. But, I have chosen to strip out the details of known objects and work with shapes. Even narrowing down what will be in the composition, the question still stands; "Where do you get the shapes?" "What is the starting point?"  I use the scraps from earlier projects to construct shapes for two reasons. First, I enjoy the challenge of creating new forms that I haven't seen before but that still reference their origins, the work that came before. Second, using every bit of fabric is a quilting tradition. It is mindful of resources, minimizes waste, and honors the history of this art form. Midnight and Noon is a double sided quilt, hand appliquéd and hand quilted. I designed the cream on na...

  Balance of Light & Dark In this composition the image area has been roughly divided in half vertically. The dark contours on the right have been repeated in the light color and reoriented on the left, creating a tension between light and dark shapes. The quilting for this piece, continues my experimentation with textures to enhance the project’s design. Gentle arches and a subtle, directional flow in the background quilting provides some motion across the surface. For a contrast, the traditional treatment of echo quilting the shapes gives them a more solid, steady feeling, even as they are stacked and precariously rest on thin lines. So, we have a balance between light and dark, solid shapes and graceful line, movement and stability. Here is a detail of the quilting from the opposite side: Seeing the seed and running stitches in multiple colors against the solid fabric from the backside gives food for thought on possibilities for future projects.  Stay tuned to see mor...

This crib quilt was gifted recently to expecting parents who are well traveled and adventurous. Our family has enjoyed following their world travels for many years, so I couldn't think of a more appropriate pattern than "Trip Around the World," -  with a slight modern twist, of course. It was especially meaningful since the baby shower theme was "Adventure."  Usually this pattern would be centered and the concentric rows that create a diamond shape would extend to the edge. Here I have moved the shape off center and dropped out some of the rows. I was so pleased to find some blender fabrics in my stash that give the effect of a dissolving edge. Love the texture that emerged in the background. Even the quilting on this is the "Meandering" pattern. Most of my quilts are done by hand now, but given the wear and tear of a baby quilt, I chose to go back to my sewing machine. It has been a while since I've made a quilt by machine, start to finish. Found ...

Moment of Transformation Ah, the things you can make with leftovers! The starting point for this piece was the remaining cut away scraps from my last, much larger quilt:  Embers . It was done with a combination of appliqué and reverse appliqué. First the fabric scraps were laid out on the burgundy length of fabric: Appliqué stage After these contours were needle turned under and appliquéd in place, the piece was put on top of a second length of a lighter color. This lighter color would become the background:   The beginnings of reverse appliqué I have taken to using a thin crepe tape to experiment and think through the placement of lines I want to highlight, as can be seen in the lower left area of this photo. This has been so helpful as the tape can be moved around until the right shapes are found without damage to the fabric. Needless to say, now I have scraps in both the burgundy and "creamsickle" (reads more like peach to me.) But they must be put aside for now. I've ...

"Embers" was completed back in January and I'm just now getting around to sharing it! Better late than never, right? 😬 This project began in October 2024, as I was getting ready to take a trip east for the Schweinfurth exhibit in Auburn NY. ( https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2024/11/qaq-2025-opening.html ) I coupled some black scraps  with a wonderful, glowing inspiration fabric in this improvised composition.  It reminded me of walking through piles of leaves in the crisp, cool temperatures we were anticipating and vibrant fall foliage against dark, wet branches. I brought it along as a portable appliqué project. ("Always be productive,"- that's my motto.)    The  appliqué  work  continued  through Thanksgiving and moved into the quilting stage as temperatures dropped and winter settled on us. It was turning out to be a dry season for  Southern California . Then we rolled into January 2025 when the wildfires ignited chaos in our are...

  Unrestrained Energy This is my last finish of 2024.  The inspiration for this quilt was a wonderful spotted fabric I acquired a couple of years ago from a guild member who was getting rid of her stash. I don't know that it would have caught my attention in another environment but in the context of her collection it called to me. I really appreciated her color sense and quality fabric choices. This small fabric cut inspired me to incorporate it in an improvised composition. It began in a modest way, with the cut away scraps in a cream solid. We were going on an extended vacation and I wanted to take some work to keep busy. There were so many scraps that I split them between two patterned fabrics and basted them in place so I could stitch them down at liesure. The two resulting quilts are quite different from one another. The first of the two completed was Shifting Contour : (See this link for the original post :  https://creativelifesampler.blogspot.com/2024/10/a-follow-...

  Blue Improvised Silhouette I worked on this piece over the summer and finished it time to enter it in a juried show at the end of August. It didn't get in, . . . oh well. This is a good time to reveal this quilt. Its icy palette of blue and aqua is really appropriate for the winter season.   This year I've focused most of my creative energy on improvisational appliqu é. The remnant cut away blue scraps from an earlier  appliqu é project were rearranged on a solid white for this composition. I wanted to see if I could change the nature of the white fabric through dense stitching which would add a second color. The silhouette of the blue was rotated and outlined so white shapes emerge against the compressed subtle aqua texture. My hope was that the blue contour would appear to hover over the white contour and they would both pull forward visually to float over the delicately tinted background. View of this quilt back      

  And a Spot of Red Haven't had the time to post this quilt before, so here it is now,- "And a Spot of Red." Hand appliquéd and hand quilted, it measures 82 x 61 inches; much larger than I've worked in a long time.  In 2023 I found myself expanding my horizons, exploring opportunities to show my work at unfamiliar venues. This open attitude led to new encounters and new inspiration for me. Really that shouldn't be a surprise, but sometimes I'm amazed at how often I need to be reminded that exposing ourselves to different experiences and influences helps us grow and feeds our creative impulses. And it's so exciting when that happens. During one of these adventures, I was at a show and fell into a conversation with a fellow quilter, sharing perspectives, exchanging ideas. At one point she casually offered "You need to work bigger!" That was the encouragement I needed to finally get to work on an idea I'd been contemplating. I pulled out the sc...

Shifting Contour When last you heard of this quilt it had been saved from the scourge of fabric bleeding. But I never posted the whole quilt. So here it is.  I have called it Shifting Contour because, in my mind, the patterned fabric plays the role of the background on the left side of the piece. On the right side, the patterned fabric moves to the foreground and becomes a solid shape against the cream background. It is an experiment with the concept of negative space. This year our local guild has taken the lead from our parent organization, the Modern Quilt Guild, and focused on a specific topic each quarter. They covered categories which can be found in the annual QuiltCon quilt show: modern traditionalism, applique, negative space, and minimalism.  I found defining these terms has been really helpful, as sometimes it's difficult to identify why a certain quilt is in a category, in which category a quilt "belongs" when entering it, and even how to deliberately incorpo...

You know when you make a mistake and you end up thinking " Man, I really should have known better!"? I recently experienced that moment when I took my latest finish out of the wash, hung it to dry, and later found that the backing I used had bled through to the front of the quilt. Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if it had covered the entire quilt, but in this case I have a strip of a stronger color on one side of the back: Heartbreaking to think that after all that time and effort, the piece was ruined just because I forgot to turn to the cold/cold setting for the delicate cycle on the washing machine. But then it occurred to me to "put it out there." I posted the problem on Instagram and got back several suggestions. The most popular solution was Dawn dish soap. And I'm happy to report I've met with success!!! It did require some persistence though. First, I tried applying Dawn to the affected areas and then putting it through the wash with a bit of ...

Here we are closing out August and I find once again that writing has taken a back seat to creating! I have been working diligently to finish these two pieces this summer in order to meet a juried show deadline. I would love to share more about them but I will wait to see if either one is juried in before any big reveals. Suffice it to say that they are direct opposites in terms of color palette and they're both an expansion of my experiments with improvised appliqu é  work. To be honest, I didn't realize how long it had been since I'd written anything. I've been so focused on quilting. Now it feels like I've neglected a responsibility in not keeping up with posting. And that has given me something to ponder.  At this point, we all know that social media can be a big attention hog, whether you're consuming it or actively contributing to it. Blogging, Instagram, all these wonderful tools are great vehicles to share our work. But keeping them fueled for the viewer...

 Now that this crib quilt has been gifted to friends of our family, I can share it with everybody. This is the classic snowball quilt pattern which I've attempted to modernize a bit by dropping out some of the pattern and mixing up the lights and darks. The mom-to-be chose earth tones for the expected baby boy. Fortunately, I had this cozy flannel in my stash which served as the inspiration for this quilt. I think the very best thing about giving a quilt as a baby shower gift is when you get back a picture of the baby on it. That feeling could only be surpassed many years later if you have the privilege of seeing it in tatters because it was well loved through the years! Looking forward to welcoming this new little friend into the world. 

Back in February a "quilty" friend gifted me a fat quarter of a really pretty cotton. I happened to have a bit of down time, so I rummaged through the scrap bin and found some cutaway leftovers from an earlier appliqu é d project which picked up the orange in my inspiration fabric. I might not have put these two colors together on my own, but this improv piece seems to glow with the energy of the color combination.  My grandmother always used to say "One man's trash is another man's treasure." Don't think my friend would ever regard a single piece of fabric as "trash," but I do think she decided that this fabric no longer spoke to her. I'm grateful she passed it on. It pushed me to look for a way to incorporate this cool pattern into a new project.  That's got me thinking about releasing some of my fabric stash into the wild. Maybe I don't need to hold on to fabric that doesn't inspire me to look for a way to use it. Somebody el...

Textured Terrain  ( 50 x 64.5 inches) My latest quilt has been a long time in completing, but not for lack of trying! The color palette on this piece may seem familiar to regular readers. The shapes of this improv. quilt are the scraps that were cut away from previous projects. The composition grew organically when they were arranged to create new shapes on a hand dyed length of fabric that is a washy blend of orange, sepias, and reds, with a dash of black.  I acquired that piece of fabric, along with several others, from a talented quilter and colorist who decided to move on to other pursuits. This has been a source of inspiration as I look for ways to incorporate these fabrics in some of my work. She was also the source of a stash of embroidery thread, meticulously sorted. With her color selection in hand, I'm motivated to explore to new color combinations in future projects. So, when it came time to quilt this project, I had a wonderful rainbow of choices. Because there is ...

  Total for 2023: Nine hand appliqu é d/reverse appliqu é d and hand quilted pieces Well, it's been yonks since I've taken the time to write, but this is a good moment to be a bit reflective about the work that I created last year.  Assess the successes and learn from any mistake,- no, not "mistake," . . . diversion? redirection? 2023 started with a continuation of my focus on designing compositions with segments of the cropped letter "Q." This has proven to be a fertile theme to pursue. Ideas on how to manipulate the designs and options for their execution came faster than I could make them a reality.  But this line of exploration was not without its detractors. More than once someone suggested that maybe I should "try something else." This suggestion from well meaning supporters begs the question: "Why do we create?" To satisfy an audience or to give voice to our own individuality? It might have gotten in my head but for the fact that ...

  This is my latest finish! I continue to experiment with the segmented shapes of a letter for composition ideas. This time I drew inspiration from this batik: I liked the colors and the washy quality of this fabric. The lighter pink was pulled out for a greater contrast and a solid brown added to extend the design. Choosing the orientation was difficult for this piece. It seemed to have a heavy edge and a lighter edge because of the brown extension: The orientation on the left feels grounded with the brown on the bottom. It also emphasizes the pink shapes over the dark shapes. Ultimately, I decided that the orientation on the right shows off the dark shapes more and I challenged myself to hand quilt textures to unify the composition. What really had called to me was the pattern of "X's" in the batik. They vary in intensity and thickness so, in some areas, they fade into the background and an interesting pattern of crosses emerges. "X" became the theme for my ha...

Appliqué Improv. #3 Just finished another improvisational quilt, the third piece created with cut away shapes from earlier appliqué and reverse appliqué projects. In this case the khaki shapes were arranged on this lovely batik fabric of greens, golds, and purples and a matching purple was chosen to extend the design horizontally. The batik shapes have become the focus here and echo hand quilting has been used to emphasize the motion of the shapes. In contrast, the solid purple on the right has been simply treated with straight lines. Extensive seed stitching has been done in the khaki background and it continues to the left over a strip of the same purple.  It's interesting to see how this heavy stitching has changed that purple stripe. Seems like something to explore further: how can the visual impact of a color be altered by hand stitching alone?