One year ago today, I had to say goodbye to the best quilting buddy I could have ever wanted. My cat, Onyx, had been my constant companion for over thirteen years and I have missed having her around.
When the weather was warm, her favorite place to sit was looking at my flower garden through the screen of our front door. Unfortunately, I never thought to take a picture of her sitting there while she was alive. So, this summer, I decided to make a wall quilt that depicted the scene.
After sketching out my idea, I hand painted fabric dye onto a piece of white fabric. The gold color on the fabric below is a dye blocker to keep some areas from dyeing.
Next, I quilted the fabric, stitching out the sun, clouds, tree, flowers and brick garden edging.
Using Inktense Dye pencils, I then colored in the leaves, tree trunk, flowers and bricks.
I then secured some nylon mesh over the “door” section of the scene using MistyFuse Ultraviolet. I selected this type of fusible web because it is very sheer and is treated to prevent discoloration and aging when exposed to UV light. I used a strip of shiny organza to create the “sidelights” of the scene, cutting out the diamonds where our sidelights have clear glass.
The leading of the sidelights was created using a tight zigzag stitch.
To replicate the umbrella basket next to the door, I used 1/8″ leather strips woven into the shape of a basket and hand stitched onto the quilt. The umbrellas were hand dyed silk fabrics stitched onto wires that were attached to a heavy wire. The heavy wire was bent and the end covered with polymer clay to create handles. These umbrellas actually open like real umbrellas.
To replicate the ceramic vase near our front door, I embroidered a design onto another piece of hand dyed silk fabric, shaped it into a vase form and hand stitched the vase onto the quilt. The Eucalyptus branches were made by hand painting fabric dye onto Lutrador Mixed Media Fabric. The painted fabric was folded over, glued to copper wire, cut into small circles and twisted into branches to go inside the vase.
I used more polymer clay to make the hinges and knob for the door.
Onyx was made from hand dyed heavy wool fabric, washed to cause felting and stitched onto the quilt. Her eyes were made using fused glass.
I am very happy with the result. I may not have Onyx to keep me company when sewing, but I do have a reminder of her on my wall.
And, while we are now a pet-free home, we have had several other furry friends in our household. So, this fall I decided to add them to the wall as well. Using some photos taken of these pets, I created paper pieced 6″ x 6″ tiles of Striker (German Shorthair Pointer), Squigglez (Orange Tabby), Comet (Orange Tabby) and Duke (Yorkshire Terrier).
Mounted above and below the Onyx quilt, the pets finish off the décor of one wall in my sewing room very nicely.
Taking this pile of fabric out of the closet and placing it on my sewing desk was “heaven” to my cat. She kept wanting to lay down on top of the fabrics. To make the rug, instead of using a Jelly Roll, I sorted my fabrics into a rainbow gradient and cut my own 2.5″ strips. I used a total of 22 different fabrics. Rather than doing a standard jelly roll rug pattern, I wanted each fabric to make one complete circle around the quilt. This meant I needed to complete each round before added the fabric for the next round to the project. I also pieced my fabric with straight seams rather than cutting at an angle (I hate to waste fabric).
I found a handy folding tool that I used to make the project go faster.
Each time I stopped at the Humane Society, I would spend some time in the cat room playing with the kittens. After six weeks, I had fallen for one of the kittens that was really affectionate. I decided I would adopt her. However, this was early October and I was told that the Humane Society policy was not to adopt out black cats the weeks before Halloween (apparently there are some people that have done evil and cruel things to black cats at that time of the year). Sadly, I left without her but I would return and visit her several times a week. My plan was to adopt her after Halloween to take her home. Luckily about a week before Halloween, the staff decided that I was not going to harm her and allowed me to adopt her earlier than I had anticipated.
Lately, I have been doing a lot of hand stitching – applique, embroidery and quilt binding. When hand stitching, I like to have a place to rest my your feet higher than the floor in order to make myself more comfortable. Unfortunately this was something that I did not have in my new craft room.
Wanting to add one, I starting looking around the room to see where I could store the footrest when it was not being used. The size of a place to stash the footrest would be the limiting factor for the size of the footrest itself. With the room maximized for storage, I was not finding a good spot to keep one. So, I put off purchasing one.
Now I have a colorful and comfortable foot rest. When not in use it fits nicely into the original storage spot without taking up any space in my room.
more.
Erickson's Heirlooms 