Bee Kind

 

"Bee Kind," 11" x 11", handmade by Pam Geisel, May 2022

The hexagon shape is a common shape in quilt patterns, although in order to piece them together you have to do what is called an inset seam, which is when three fabric edges meet in a single junction when sewn together, with the angles different than 90 degrees. This is a tricky skill that I haven't really mastered but if I leave a little space between the hexagons and fuse them to a background, they look like a honeycomb. 

The shape of the whole piece is also a hexagon and I used my favorite facing method to bind it and it went easier than I expected, possibly easier than the usual 90 degree corners. 

In my other word quilts, the letters have mostly been on top of squares but in this one they are on the hexagon shapes. Like the other word quilts the letters have sheer squares of fabric on top of them to give them an added layer of visual texture.

With the exception of the backing fabric, the rest of the fabrics are hand dyed, with the letters "B E E" in warm colors (reds and orange) and the "K I N D" in cool colors (green blues, and purple).

Along the left side of the piece is a honey bee floating along. The body and the wings are all appliqued along the raw edges, the winds are made with a silver sheer fabric, and the antenna are couched yarn with knots on the ends.

The hexagons and letters are quilted with a yellow thread that crosses over the hexagon shapes three times creating diamond shapes. The bee's flight path is indicated with a dotted line hand quilted with black embroidery floss.

More about Bee Kind 

Be a Spark on Exhibit with Best of 2022 Travelling Show

My art quilt "Be a Spark" is in the Ohio Designer Craftsman's "Best of 2022" show. The traveling exhibit will be at the following locations:

Ohio Craft Museum
1665 W. Fifth Ave, Columbus, OH 43212
May 8-June 26
Opening reception Sun., May 8, 1-4 p

Kent State University, CVA (Center for the Visual Arts) Gallery
325 Terrace Dr. Kent, OH
August 25-September 29

The Persistence of Pluto

 

"The Persistence of Pluto," 20" x 23", handmade by Pam Geisel, April 2022

If you're like me, you learned that there are nine planets in our solar system. Some facts about Pluto:

• It was discovered in February 1930
• It was the first planet discovered by an American
• With the exception of Earth, all the planets are named after either a Greek or Roman god, and Pluto is named after the Greek god of the underworld (the cartoon dog was named later)
• It is one-fifth the diameter of Earth 
• It is about 3.6 billion miles from the sun and 1 billion miles from Neptune
• It takes 248 Earth years to complete one revolution around the sun
• In August 2006, the International Astronomical Union demoted it to a dwarf planet

Even though Pluto is no longer considered a full-fledged planet, it still persists, orbiting around the sun.

After working up the design for this quilt, the first step was to select the fabric. I'd recently organized all of my colored scraps so that made the process easier although I'd need nine colors and technically there are only seven colors in the rainbow, so I added a hot pink for Mars and a teal green for Neptune. I'd originally started with the traditional rainbow order of red for Mercury but at the last minute decided to start with the yellow for Mercury since it was the closest to the sun.

I thought I wanted a deep black for the background and looked at fabrics online but then decided to go with a deep purple, which luckily I had a large piece of purple batik in my stash. I basted this fabric to the batting and backing fabric and pinned the sun in place then started quilted 1/4" lines echoing the orbital paths around the sun.

Then I added the colored squares, diamonds, letters, and sheer fabrics and quilted on top of the already quilted lines, tucking Jupiter behind the letters but putting the other planets next to the letters, with the exception of Pluto, who's "O" is the planet, and Mercury, which didn't have room next to the letters so it's between the "C" and the "U".

When I thought of adding some stars to the background, I'd originally thought I'd use some gold sequin-like stars that I had but when I went to get them, I found these plastic rainbow colored star-shaped buttons. I'm not sure where they came from and can't imagine having a chance to use them again in the future, so I decided to use them for this project.

More about The Persistence of Pluto

Shooting Starfish - Project Quilting

 

Shooting Starfish, 6" x 6 x .5", made by Pam Geisel for Project Quilting, Season 13, Challenge 6: Flying Geese

Recap for "Flying Geese":

Your project must include a minimum of 5 pieced flying geese blocks.

There are exactly 5 flying geese blocks in this piece, although because the corner blocks are a very similar color to the background of the starfish fabric, the blocks aren't easy to distinguish. Also the top left block is wrapped around the corner of the canvas, so it's also somewhat hidden.

I also couched two different colors of yarn along the block edges, a gray blue and a lime green. Then I added two lime green star buttons.

I've had the starfish fabric for several years and every time I open the batik fabric box, it would smile politely at me. I was planning something different for this piece but when I opened the fabric box this time, it called out to me so I dropped the previous fabric plans and went with this one.

More about Shooting Starfish

Click on any of the photos to see larger images.

To read more about Project Quilting, go here.

To see other entries for this challenge, visit the Flying Geese page.

Ring Around the Rainbow - Project Quilting

 

"Ring Around the Rainbow," 6" x 6 x .5", made by Pam Geisel for Project Quilting, Season 13, Challenge 5: Rhythm and Repetition

Recap for "Rhythm and Repetition":

There must be something in your project intentionally repeated 3 or more times for visual effect.

For this week's project, I repeated the triangle shape seven times and the round shape (buttons) ten times (there are three buttons in the center).

The rainbow colored buttons are all semi-transparent. The largest button in the center is a shell button, the center one is opalescent, and the tiny center button is a semi-transparent white button.

The piece is wrapped around a small canvas frame.

More about Ring Around the Rainbow

Click on any of the photos to see larger images.

To read more about Project Quilting, go here.

To see other entries for this challenge, visit the Rhythm and Repetition page.

What I Stand On Is What I Stand For - Project Quilting

"What I Stand On Is What I Stand For," 17" x 21", made by Pam Geisel for Project Quilting, Season 13, Challenge 4: Mining for Diamonds

Recap for "Mining for Diamonds":

Use the diamond as your project inspiration. There are lots of ways to get there: combine triangles, split a rectangle, make inset seams, focus on the rhombus, use a quilt block that with the shape, or instead be inspired by the facets of a true stone.

Diamond gems are nice but mining for them can be controversial, and mining in general isn't always good for the planet, which inspired this piece and does include diamond shapes behind the letters (yes, I took the easy way out and used a square rotated on point).

I used all hand-dyed fabrics for this piece. The first thing I did was trace the reverse shape of the continents onto fusible webbing, fuse that to a piece of green fabric, cut it out, then sewed it to the blue oceans fabric with one piece of batting and no backing using a variegated blue green thread. I wanted the earth to push away from the background a bit so after that part was done I placed it on the backing fabric with some extra pieces of batting behind the earth then sewed it to the background only at the edges.

The letter blocks are layered fabric: a piece of square fabric on the bottom, a diamond shaped fabric, a fabric letter, with a piece of sheer fabric on top. The letters have fusible on the back (it makes them easier to cut) but the squares and diamonds don't as I wanted them to have a bit of dimension and not lay flat against the background.

Once the earth was in place I quilted a quilting line 1/4" from the edge of the earth and used that as a guide to place my letter blocks. I quilted the bottom part of the letter block on top of the quilting line I just sewed. Then I quilted the top of the blocks using the square as a guide. Next I quilted through the middle of the blocks using the points of the diamonds as a guide. Then I quilted the second and fourth lines trying to get them equally between the other lines.

I added a sparkly green cord around the earth and below the letters at the bottom and above the letters at the top and I hand sewed some blue bugle beads in the four corners and also on the left and right sides of the globe.

More about What I Stand On Is What I Stand For.

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Click on any of the photos to see larger images.

To read more about Project Quilting, go here.

To see other entries for this challenge, visit the Mining for Diamonds page.

 

 

Magic Wand - Project Quilting

 
"Magic Wand," 19" x 13", made by Pam Geisel for Project Quilting, Season 13, Challenge 3: Kitchen Influence

Recap for "Kitchen Influence":

Use food and cooking as your inspiration.

I had several ideas for this week's challenge but what I settled on was soap bubbles. You know, from washing dishes after cooking. We don't have a dishwasher, and we're fine with that. It's just the two of us and we wash the dishes after every meal, so washing them is usually a quick chore. And sometimes I enjoy washing dishes because of the soap bubbles.

First I picked a multicolored batik fabric that had some interesting color patterns in it. I used my circle template ruler to find the spots that I wanted to use then ironed some fusible in that spot and then cut the circles out. I love this circle template and I use it often.

As you can see, I picked spots all over this piece of fabric. I don't really like doing this as I feel it's wasteful of the fabric but occasionally I find it's worth it.

I made some bubble letters. When using fusible to make letters you want to trace them backwards. (If you can't read backwards or 'backwords', the letters spell out SHARE MAGIC.) So not a problem for the A, H, I, and M but it will make a difference with the other letters. I fused them on this fun batik print. I do like the swirly lines but I didn't want them to distract from the letters so I placed the letters to avoid the swirls. The little yellow dots on the blue background reminded me of fireflies.

I fused the letters to the circles then fused them to this background fabric, a piece of hand dyed fabric that was mostly blue but you could see some other colors in it. They look a little lonely so I decided to add a bubble wand and some sheer circles as additional bubbles. Fusing sheer fabric is difficult (and if you get it the iron too hot the sheer will melt) so I pinned them in place. There were a lot of pins in it so I didn't take a photo of this stage.

I used a shiny, variegated thread to quilt around the bubbles and some free motion quilting on the background between the bubbles.

I off set some sheer circles on top of the fabric circles so when I quilted the edge of the sheer it would catch part of the letters.

Here's a side view.

More about Magic Wand.

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Click on any of the photos to see larger images.

To read more about Project Quilting, go here.

To see other entries for this challenge, visit the Kitchen Influence page.