Dreamer

D is for dreamer.

I have special connections with one of my great grandmothers. I share her middle name "Ann." I share her year of birth, 100 years after her. I share her year of marriage, 100 years after her. I share her hobby of quilting.

This is the last quilt Emelia Ann made in the 1930s. I haven't done my homework on the designer, but it may have been Ann Orr. The 1-inch squares and the pink strips (what looks like a border of sorts) are hand appliqued.

I dream of what it was like for her not having:

~ a quilt shop in her village

~ quilting books, magazines, and patterns

~ pens with disappearing ink

~ an electric sewing machine

~ an electric iron

~ rotary-cutting tools

~ glitzy thread

~ seam rippers

~ fusible web

I can only dream of how different our lives as quilters are from one another. I dream of living the life that she lived.


Emelia's quilt, it's art!

Collector of fiber

C is for collector of fiber.

While in high school, my first job was at a fabric shop. I've been collecting fabric and fiber-related stuff ever since. Besides collecting it, I also like to sun print, dye, and marble fabric.

When I travel in the summer, I take along pretreated fabric to sun print. 

Clockwise from top left are sun-printed plants, a flower, doilies, chilies, and wild mushrooms. I have also sun-printed meadow grasses, ferns, and weeds. Yes, weeds!

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The process of dyeing fabric looked difficult, messy, and scary. That is until 1995 when Vimala McClure wrote "Pack a Peck of Pickled Pieces" for American Quilter magazine. Her method of using pint-sized canning jars and three colors of dyes to make 24 fat quarters of different colors is easy, easy, easy, and fun! Vimala also published a book on this technique, Fabric Dyeing for Beginners.

Marbling is a technique that you're never certain what a piece will look like until the fabric is pulled off the paint. Experience has taught me when I should just quit fiddling with the design and place the fabric in the paint already. In the samples, you'll see I usually don't use white fabric.


To play with these techniques, it's zany!

Beader (and biker babe)

B is for beader 

Most of my bead work is jewelry I design.

It's especially fun to take cheap watches and replace their bands with beaded ones. My first watch face promptly broke—so much for frugality!—and the bands were not removable. To remedy this, I now make each band from two sections: one with a few rows beaded to the face and the other with the remaining length. I still use cheap watches because beads can be recycled!

B is also for biker babe.

At age 19, I bought a Honda 175 dirt bike. Riding trails really taught me how to ride. There's rocks and tree stumps to get around and mud and water crossings to get through. I fell down a lot, which is not something one wants to do on the highway!

But, I always wanted a Harley. Always. After apprenticing with dirt bikes, I graduated to a HOG. Yippee!!!!

Because I am a writer who is also a biker, a couple of weeks ago I was asked to write a magazine article about a biker babe from Florida. What fun I'm having with that!!! (May 2011 update: The article about quilter/biker/belly dancer Suzann Semonovick, aka Grannie Suzannie, is in the June 2011 issue of The Quilt Life magazine.)


It's awesome!

Artist or crafter?

A is for artist

Sometimes I'm an artist, and sometimes I'm a crafter. If something I've made would never be tossed in the trash, it's art. If it could end up in a "file 13" container, it's craft.

"Heart of the Country" is my original design. The Log Cabin blocks are 6 inches square, and the panel is a "cheater." To make some of the fabrics "read" light, I placed them wrong side out. After all, fabrics do have two sides! It is machine pieced and quilted.

The quilt is a keeper. So, to me, it's art.

"Violet" is the second doll I made. The pattern is "Doll With a Colorful Soul" by Denver art doll designer Leslie Molen (www.zootie.com).

She has sat in my studio for a few years, and her fabric has faded. And I hate her hands. Sorry, Violet, but you are a candidate for the trash can. So, to me, she's craft.






What's art to you may be craft to me!