Archive | March, 2024

Pasta Making in Italy!

By Ellen Lindner on March 30, 2024 in Uncategorized

I’m just back from a fabulous trip to Italy. My favorite activity was a pasta making class, in Florence.

The kitchen was well appointed and we were greeted by beautiful fresh ingredients.

First, we each made a batch of pasta. It was very easy. Different natural ingredients were used to flavor and color each one. (But, mostly just to color them.) Some flavorings included spinach, beet, turmeric, and even charcoal. After some kneading we wrapped each pasta ball and left them to rest.

Then, we got busy making 3 different sauces. The teacher (in black below) had excellent English skills and kept everything relaxed and fun. We were each assigned a step in the prep of a dish.

The pesto recipe was a complete surprise! We used young celery leaves, an orange, and the usual parmesan and EVOO. I’m not a big pesto fan, but this was delicious!

Next, it was time to shape our dough: the fun part. We used our “sturdy” dough, made with semolina and water to make cavatini. Apparently fancier/bigger shapes require this type of dough.

Shaping the cavatini was so much fun! It was like magic. You just pull a little blob of pasta across and ridged board and “voila,” cavatini! See me trying it below. Isn’t it cool? (No sound on video.)

Here are some of the finished ones.

We used our second dough, made with 00 flour and an egg, to get thin pasta by running it through the pasta maker. That was fun, too, and surprisingly easy.

After getting a thin sheet of dough a “guitar” is used to cut and separate strands into fettucine. You just lay the sheet of dough on top and press it through the strings with your fingers.

Hubby demonstrates:

Having previously made a mixture of ricotta, white asparagus, and shallots, we used little spoonfuls to make ravioli. Hubby is showing one off below.

Finally, it was time to eat. All three dishes were delicious!

Cavatini with pesto.

Ravioli with white asparagus filling. (Mostly consumed at this point.)

Fettucine with tomatoes, scallions, and pork.

What a feast! And what fun. I’ve already tried a make-your-own-recipe pesto since getting home. Should I try cavatini?

Ellen Lindner
P.S. This is the class we took, if you’re interested. I highly recommend it.

Empty Spools: Lucy, Ellindale, and Phyliss

By Ellen Lindner on March 12, 2024 in Uncategorized

Here’s another report on my awesome Design Your Own Nature Quilt students, at Empty Spools.

Lucy was a delight. Like Katie, her only quilting experience was with simple piecing. The design concepts and construction techniques were completely new to her and she was very willing to learn them. Her inspiration photo was one she had taken herself. We talked about simplifying things by omitting a few trees and IMPLYING the distant foliage. Busy prints did the trick.

Since she added a dark border, Lucy added a narrow blue inner border on both the left and right. This kept the border and the left tree from merging together. The photo below shows the colors better. Can you tell that it’s quilted and faced? AND, it has the hanging sleeve already attached.

You can tell from her face that Lucy was very happy with her quilt!

Ellindale sent me a photo of a monarch butterfly, asking if it would work as a good inspiration photo. I said yes, but that I thought she should add one or more additional butterflies. She found a copyright free image of a butterfly with folded wings and added it to her sketch. She constructed the butterflies separately, so she’d be able to audition placement later. That really paid off, because she eventually turned the entire composition 90 degrees and came up with this.

She made a lot of progress in class, completing the quilting on the background (with added stems, butterfly antennae, and legs.)

Late on the 4th day, Ellindale started playing around with a poppy photo and very quickly came up with this. Isn’t it striking? The photo only had 2 flowers, but she wisely added a third. She also enlarged the flowers quite a bit, which filled the space very nicely. Another great example of being INSPIRED by the photo, rather than controlled by it.

Phyliss had a photo that really spoke of a particular place. Where do you find prickly pear cacti and blue doors? That’s right, the American southwest. But, again, Phyliss altered some things from the photo.

She left out some of the cactus paddles and suggested the door with just a colorful shape. Also, Phyliss brought some lacy textured fabrics from home that she used for “flowers” (insects) and other details.

She added some detailed quilting and soon had a completed quilt. Like some of the others, she got hers faced and added a hanging sleeve before the end of class.

I’m so proud of what these ladies accomplished!

Ellen Lindner
P.S. I’ll be teaching the same class next year at Empty Spools, March 7-12, 2025. I’d love to have you in class!

Empty Spools: Alex, Terry, and Katie

By Ellen Lindner on March 10, 2024 in Uncategorized

My week teaching Design Your Own Nature Quilt at Empty Spools Seminar was excellent and my students were fantastic! They brought their creative courage and tried lots of new things – with amazing results.

This was Alex’s board for the classroom walk-through. She did the little plant on the left first. She played down the contrast in the rocky foreground and increased the contrast with the leaves. Alex also enhanced the plant’s “body language” and removed some distracting details. As you can see, she had it all pinned and ready to quilt.

Next, Alex switched gears to the Joshua Tree photo. I thought it was more complex than she would enjoy, but I was wrong! She enjoyed hunting for the perfect fabrics and cutting all the little “pom-poms.” She has more to add when she gets home, but she quilted the foreground in class. (By the way, I had never seen a Joshua tree before and thought her photo was actually a drawing when I first saw it. My students were very good at educating me about them.)

Alex was also quick to help. She solved my Power Point issue and gave Lucy a great lesson on cleaning her machine. ALL the students had a great sense of camaraderie and cheered each other on. I loved it!

Terry was experienced at creating landscapes and it showed. Her first piece is the large one at the top of her board. She switched gears when she realized she had the perfect fabric at home. (Isn’t that always the way?) Check out her gray/black mountain in the top left of her composition. It’s a perfect example of letting the fabric do the work. Terry needed a black and white striation. She found it on the back of a printed fabric with palm fronds. Good eye!

I forget the name of Terry’s orange flower: some sort of lily. She did a great job of capturing the delicate petals. And just look how much the dark background has improved the composition! The additional contrast it provides really lets the flower SHINE! Terry plans to use a border and let the top part of her flower extend into it. I think that will be very effective. And she has some leaves to add, too.

Katie definitely brought her CAN DO attitude. Her experience was limited to simple piecing, so this was all new territory for her! She trusted the process, though, and forged ahead. There were times when she thought it was terrible, but she trusted my direction and eventually ended up with something she loved. Me too!

Here’s her inspiration photo. We talked about her favorite parts and how she could apply our class motto, “Be inspired by your photo, not controlled by it.” She decided to focus on busy flowers, the strong blue sky, and the arcing stems.

And this is what she got. I’d say she definitely hit the mark. AND this is completely quilted, faced, and has a hanging sleeve attached!!!

As I told my students, “they made me look good.” And we had so much fun, too!

There’s more to come. Keep and eye out.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. See more student work.

100% Pure Florida Exhibit

By Ellen Lindner on March 9, 2024 in Uncategorized

I have quilts in THREE shows right now and I almost forgot to tell you about the latest one. It’s 100% Pure Florida, in Melbourne, FL.

My piece, Exuberance, is on display in a prominent spot.

100% Pure Exhibit, Melbourne, FL. Ellen Lindner, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

This is a mixed media show, as you can see. Didn’t they do a nice job of combining these pieces? I love having my work in mixed media shows, since it’s a way to show off quilts as art to a new audience.

Here are some other exhibit pieces that I particularly like. Sunrise Sisterhood, by Lisa Roberts.

100% Pure Exhibit, Melbourne, FL. Ellen Lindner, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

From the Heart, by Lynn Morgan.

100% Pure Exhibit, Melbourne, FL. Ellen Lindner, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

String Theory #6, by Diane Stapleton.

100% Pure Exhibit, Melbourne, FL. Ellen Lindner, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

The show runs through March 30th. It’s worth a visit if you’re in the area.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. The other two shows are Dirty Dozen Fiber Artists, at Osceola Arts, in Kissimmee, FL (near Disney) and Cover Story: 3 Perspectives on Contemporary Quilt Making, at Museum of Florida Art and Culture, in Avon Park, FL

Empty Spools: Carol, Larsja, and Barb

By Ellen Lindner on March 7, 2024 in Uncategorized

I’m just back from teaching Design Your Own Nature Quilt at Empty Spools Seminar, in Pacific Grove, CA. It was fabulous!!! The beach side setting was lovely, complete with historical architecture, wind-swept trees, and the sound of the surf.

But, of course, the real excitement was occurring in the classrooms. I had nine fantastic students who followed the supply list and packed their artistic courage. They worked outside their comfort zones and created very dynamic quilts. Each student brought one or more inspiration photos from which she designed her quilt. We often reminded one another of the class motto, “Be inspired by your photo, not controlled by it.” Wait till you see what they did.

Carol had a dramatic photo of a red flower. Single color flowers are often tricky, but Carol was able to work loosely, which helped immensely.

For her second quilt, (yes, several students made TWO,) Carol chose an image of what we think are box fish. In her inspiration photo the two fish were on a black background. As you can see, she improved upon that quite dramatically, and energized the composition with more fish.

Scaling up from the sketch to the quilt is a little bit of a hurdle at first. Carol spent time making mock up fish shapes to help her get it right.

Students used cardboard L shapes to help them decide on cropping.

One day the students toured around the classrooms to see the various projects. Most of my photos will be the display boards from that event.

Larsja had a great tulip photo to start with. She wisely omitted several flowers and leaves to better show off the remaining ones. And to make the background (negative space) more interesting. And then check out that border! Don’t you love the “drawn” black tulips?

Larsja really wanted to make just one quilt so she could get is mostly done. Sure enough, it’s almost completely quilted.

Like Carol, Larsja did a collage exercise with magazine pages. I’ll show you those images more clearly in a later post.

Barb used a photo of a Bird of Paradise blossom as her starting point. It was actually a double blossom, which made the distinction between petals hard to make out. Like Larsja, she omitted quite a few blossoms and did the same with the leaves. (She just scribbled over them on her photo.) She also cropped her inspiration photo quite a bit. (It’s folded on her board.)