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Sassy Women in Tavares

By Ellen Lindner on January 23, 2023 in Uncategorized

I just taught two classes in Tavares, FL, and we all had a blast!

It didn’t take me long to figure out that this group was a little different from most. In the first class one of the students had just had major dental work. So, she was wearing a proper name tag, but also this:

Oh, the poor thing! But, wasn’t it sweet of her friend to make her this extra tag?

This group meets WEEKLY. As a result, they all know one another well and have a wonderful camaraderie. So, maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised, during the IMPROV class, when I caught one of them using a paper cup to draw her circle “by eye.” And even after I caught her she kept using it! As I was playfully reprimanding her, someone pointed out this student:

Yes, that’s a compass. WHAT was up here?!?

And, before I could recover from that shock, the students pointed out what another student brought:

Really? For an IMPROV class???

It was all quite comical. What a sassy, fun bunch of women! Thankfully, they did loosen up and I can’t wait to show you their excellent work.

Ellen Lindner

“Twigs” Complete

By Ellen Lindner on January 9, 2023 in Uncategorized

For the first time I worked on two quilts at the same time, finishing them up very close together. Here’s the latest, Twigs.

Twigs

I’m very happy with it. And here’s a detail shot.

The dark twigs were done in the dyeing stage. The white ones were added after piecing, with acrylic paint. As you can see, I used the same stencil for both.

See more details, including purchase information.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. After neglecting it for quite some time, I’m finally hemming and altering clothes. At only 5′ tall, I do a lot of that!

“Fragrant Canopy” Complete

By Ellen Lindner on January 1, 2023 in Uncategorized

I’m SO happy with my latest quilt, Fragrant Canopy.

Fragrant Canopy, an art quilt by Ellen Lindner. AdventureQuilter.com

It started as one piece of fabric which I dyed/printed. That fabric makes up the left two-thirds of the completed quilt.

I had great fun working on the details, especially adding some black hand stitching.

Fragrant Canopy - detail, an art quilt by Ellen Lindner. AdventureQuilter.com

I love everything about this quilt! Not only the results, but also the process and the things I learned.

See larger images and purchase information.

Ellen Lindner

Need More Measuring Spoons?

By Ellen Lindner on January 1, 2023 in Uncategorized

I’ve been cooking a lot more lately, and have been frustrated by my limited quantity of measuring spoons. Although we have several sets, it seemed that the one I needed was always dirty. So, I suggested to my husband that he give me a set as a stocking stuffer.

As I unwrapped gifts on Christmas morning, I opened one that was rather heavy for its small size. Inside I found this.

A full measure of blessings. Ellen Lindner blog, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

That’s right: he had given me FOUR sets of measuring spoons! That cracked everyone up.

There was another gift that I kept reaching for but my husband kept telling me to save it for last. Finally, I got to open it and what did I find?

A full measure of blessings. Ellen Lindner blog, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

You guessed it, another FOUR sets! We all had another good laugh.

Eventually, we starting unwrapping gifts from our stockings and I opened this.

A full measure of blessings. Ellen Lindner blog, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

And a little deeper down, this.

A full measure of blessings. Ellen Lindner blog, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

That’s right, I had TEN new sets of measuring spoons! Hubby definitely gets the award for most creative this year!

Later, I got to thinking about all the blessings those measuring spoons represent. Home, food, family, time, and health. I’m so thankful for all of these.

I hope you will also have many blessings in the coming year. A full measure.
And that you will recognize the blessings as just that. An over flowing measure.

Maybe you’ll find that you even need more measuring spoons.

Wishing you a wonderful new year over flowing with health and happiness.

Ellen Lindner

Let the Sun Shine In Part Two

By Ellen Lindner on December 26, 2022 in Uncategorized

Here are some more great quilts from “Let the Sun Shine In.”

I love the strong contrasts Jayne Gaskins has used in her piece, Sunlight in the City.

Karen Tauber’s quilt, Bargello with Coneflower featured a similar subject and colors.

This was another favorite, Sunset, by Jenny Perry.

Check out the stitching and texture.

Lovely!

This piece, by Susan Price, makes use of cyanotype. In this case, the technique produces the white and strong blue foliage motifs. She calls this quilt, By the Light of the Sun.

Karen Ponichil’s quilt of the sun, Soleil, matched the exhibit theme perfectly.

There were other interesting quilts in the Virginia Quilt Museum and I’ll show you some of those in the next post.

Ellen Lindner

“Let the Sun Shine In” Exhibit

By Ellen Lindner on December 21, 2022 in Uncategorized

I recently enjoyed a visit to Harrisonburg, VA, to see the “Let the Sun Shine In” exhibit. The artists in this exhibit are all members of Studio Art Quilt Associates, and I am one of them. Here I am with my piece, Florida Native #2. It was made with commercial fabrics and one that I created with breakdown printing. The vein shadows were created with black tulle.

That’s Mary Ritter’s Tea Time hanging behind my shoulder.

I estimate about 30 quilts were in the exhibit, and they were all displayed well.

Let the Sun Shine In, quilt exhibit. Ellen Lindner, Adventurequilter.com/blog

Partial list of makers, L-R: unknown (1,) Mary Ritter, Ellen Lindner, Jayne Gaskins, unknown. I’m sorry that I didn’t note all the makers of these quilts. If you see yours, please let me know and I’ll add the info.

This piece, by Paula Dean, had a great sense of light. It’s called Brighter Days…Just Around the Corner.

Paula used a wonderful array of techniques to create texture. This was very compelling and it drew you in for closer scrutiny.

Jenny Perry used strong colors to make her striking piece, Lac Le Jeaune Sunrise.

I’ll show you more images in the next post.

By the way, this exhibit runs just a few more days – through December 23rd, 2022.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. See my quilt in-progress.

A Little Bit of Black

By Ellen Lindner on December 13, 2022 in Uncategorized

A little bit of black can often add just the right touch to a quilt. And in the case of this piece, I NEEDED to add more black to go with what was already there.

I liked the idea of playing up the sharp little lines on the left. But, how to best accomplish that? I tried stitching with a double pass, using 30 weight thread.

It showed up well on my sample so I drew out a pattern and started stitching on the quilt.

But, it didn’t show up that well on the quilt. Up close it was fine, but it pretty much disappeared from a distance. What else could I try? Maybe hand couching?

Here it is, with about half machine stitching and half overlaid with couching. It shows up much better, right?

Here’s a detail shot, again in-progress. What a difference!

I was loving this effect and couldn’t wait to finish it up!

Ellen Lindner
P.S. BTW, I used 6 strands of embroidery floss as the laid thread and regular black sewing thread as the working thread.
P.P.S. See other quilts with hand couching: Wishes on the Wind, post about couching, Back Yard Beauty.

Composition by Trial and Error

By Ellen Lindner on December 9, 2022 in Uncategorized

As I continued auditioning fabrics for my latest quilt, I was thinking mostly about value contrast. (Light and dark.)

This is where I left off. I could see that it needed some darker values to add some punch.

What about some dark green on the right? Yes. I thought it would work.

Plus, I auditioned the idea of a skinny vertical strip of black. Can you see it above?

Rather than piecing the green fabrics in horizontal pieces, I decided to mirror the angle of the highest set of stripes in the feature fabric. didn’t want a strong line where the top of the green ended and pink started. I looked for fabrics that would help me provide a transition.

Yes, that worked. Here, you’re seeing mostly cut and pieced fabrics. As you can see, I kept the skinny vertical black strip.

Then, I decided the dark green was a little too one-sided. I decided to add a green strip on the left.

I was very happy with it at this point.

As I worked on the left green strip I began to think about how I might add some more TINY bits of black. I thought I needed them to help tie together the other black (the skinny strip and in the pink fabric top right.)

How would you add a little black? And where? I’ll show you my answer in the next post.

Ellen Lindner

Dyed Whole Cloth

By Ellen Lindner on December 6, 2022 in Uncategorized

I’ve been working on incorporating a variety of motifs and colors into one piece of dyed fabric and I finally got one I really love.

I rotated it 90 degrees and put it up on the design wall. Now what?

I had a lot of fabrics with the right colors, so I pulled them all out and pinned them up on the design wall. Lots of options here!

(This is my typical process, followed by lots of editing.)

Perhaps this green-on-green piece would be a nice counter point. Not bad.

Next, 2 questions:
1 – Could the first fabric hold its own? Would it need some more contrast? It looked pretty awesome by itself.
2 – Regardless of the answer to the first question, should I alter the original fabric? Maybe move the chevrons around?

I decided that I should add some contrasting fabrics to the original one. Something dark and maybe green. Back to the green shapes. I liked inserting them between the chevrons.

But, maybe the chevrons shouldn’t all start at the top. What about this? I was missing the darker green. And maybe the far right chevrons are too far to the right? Lots more trial and error needed.

At this point I was folding fabrics and pinning them in place. No firm decisions or cutting yet. Soon, though! Check the next post for more progress.

Ellen Lindner

Dyeing Successes

By Ellen Lindner on November 27, 2022 in Uncategorized

In my last post I showed you several fabrics that changed dramatically when washed and dried. Thankfully, that’s not the norm. I thought you’d like some assurance that things DO usually turn out as I want them. A few examples:

Fat black and brown lines on white (which stayed white, I’m happy to say.) I like this pattern and think I’ll do more similar pieces.

This piece had a rather anemic, mostly-white background, which I didn’t like. However, there were some small teal patterns in the background and I decided I wanted the bulk of the background to be a solid version of that. Hooray for color matching!

This nearly solid red-orange requires a lot of restraint! With all the colors and tools at my disposal, it’s REALLY tempting to add more pattern and color! But, I occasionally manage to create such fabrics. Thank goodness, because they’re very much needed.

What kind of dyeing successes (or challenges) have you encountered?

Ellen Lindner

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