Hope Blooms

Hope Blooms 2015 Rana O'Connor

A small tribute to a long time colleague in the world of foster/adoptive care. We worked together for many years on a collaborative team designed to raise awareness of the need for foster/adoptive parents and to support families who work with Maine's treatment foster care agencies and the Office of Child and Family Services.

Jo recently retired. I hoped to recover a banner we once created for a fundraiser with the statement, "Hope Blooms in Foster Care." The banner was long gone, though, so I set about to make Jo her very own memento.

Pulling scraps of fabric for the petals, I found a green swirled fabric in my stash for the flower center and applique letters. The girl with balloons came from fabric we used in a more recent banner. The muslin background seemed plain, but a set of alphabet stamps came to the rescue, and I stamped h-o-p-e randomly across the field. Thread paint for the petals and quilting in the flower center and background complete this roughly 15" square wall hanging.

After years of tireless advocacy on the part of Maine's children and foster/adoptive families, I wish Jo many years of happiness ahead. Cheers!

One Done!

One more student quilt from the Voila class! Lisa completed her quilt with binding to match the brown and green polka-dot flower centers and first time free-motion quilting throughout the green background. Although she nearly changed her mind on the orange petals, they make a bright, sunny quilt. Way to go! She sent along this photo with her comment, which says it all--"love it, love it, love it!!!" 

Lisa's finished quilt

Random Mention

I opened my e-newsletter from Maine Fiberarts today and got a nice surprise! A detail photo from my quilt, "Being Alive is the Magic" was featured in the header. I know the photos are random, but it was still great fun to see it! If you have not had the opportunity to check out Maine Fiberarts, you must take a minute to do so:
http://www.mainefiberarts.org/

Should you find yourself in Topsham, be sure to stop by their building at 13 Main Street. They always have a fiber art exhibit on display, and you can pick up a copy of the Maine Fiberarts Tour Map while you are there.

Quilt gallery and quilts for sale at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

VOTE Online for Bali Bloom

I entered an online quilt contest! The theme this week is quilts with flowers. Of course I thought of Bali Bloom, with that one big pink hibiscus flower and sparkly beads. Take a minute between Friday morning and midnite Sunday to head over to the Quilting Gallery and vote for your favorite flower quilt. It is all in fun.

On another front, the Art Quilts Maine travelling quilt show, Inspiration Transformation opened at Devanny Doak and Garrett Booksellers this week with some great publicity. There were stories in the Sun Journal and the Daily Bulldog, and an article is in the works for Publishers Weekly Children's Bookshelf, an online newsletter about the children's book business. You may recall the 16 quilts in this travelling show were inspired by favorite children's books. It is awesome to be a part of this talented group of artists.   

Quilt gallery and quilts for sale at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

Let the beading begin!

Bali Bloom could have been complete, but it didn't feel quite done, so it is on with the beading! I have spent several evenings beading the center, and all the yellow anthers--almost done with that segment. My plan is to create a path of pink/purple/green beads along the edge of each petal, where it overlaps the next petal, and scatter the beads out into the background, bringing a little light to the dark green/brown background fabrics. I got some help today from a young visitor, who ably popped beads on my needle as I needed them. I could use a helper like that all the time! The pink/purple pathways are pretty ambitious, but I think it will add the sparkle I am looking for.

Meanwhile, I need to find some Bubble Jet Set so I can get to work on the angel quilt--starting from a photograph of the McAuley Angel (an angel statue in front of the Sisters of Mercy residence). I plan to paint, then print on fabric, and see where I go from there. The Bubble Jet Set is to prepare the fabric so I can print my painted angel directly onto the fabric. I am thinking of creating a background using the 'scraptures' technique I used for the floral bouquet quilts, (see post 2/19/09 Invitation!) then appliqueing the angel on top. No idea if it will work, but it will be fun to find out!

See more of my quilt photos at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

Nothing new on the home quilting front, but wanted to update you on the quilters' group. We finished and presented a quilt to a co-worker in honor of her marriage and blended family--we used a flip-and-sew technique on the 'roses' to create a Family Bouquet, with photos in the center of several roses.

We meet this week to start Art Bras--we'll be creating bras for auction in support of Breast Cancer. We have split into two teams and we plan to create "American Beauties" with silk rose petals and "Betty Boops" using the bra as a base for Betty's face. We'll see--if we get them done I'll post a photo. Meanwhile, click the link for a visual--much easier to see one than to explain it!

See more of my quilt photos at: webshots

Progress!

Finally, a day without work or many other interruptions, so back to thread painting! I promised to post photos last time, so here are a few shots from the end of the day. I finished thread painting the flower--the center ended up much heavier with thread than the petals, which surprised me--I thought the petals were pretty intense! While I was painting little circles of yellow rayon thread on the yellow anthers, I wondered if I wasn't going overboard--what if I decide to add french knots or beads later? Will I be able to get a needle through all the thread? Time will tell.

Kate brought me a beautiful fabric she thought might make good leaf veins. Unerring eye for color! It created beautiful, subtle veins--and of course, now the leaves will need thread painting as well to keep those slender
veins from falling off. Hopefully next
time I get to work I will be able to move on to the trepidatious trapunto! Can't wait to try it, but patience, patience.

What do you think? add veins to the dark green shadowy leaves as well? Will Kate bring me the perfect vein color? Check back in a bit!

See more of my quilt photos at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

Talking Shop

A couple of quilting buddies stopped over for lunch and some quilt talk. We discussed the Bali Bloom quilt--currently being thread painted, both to begin blending the various fabrics in each petal and to secure the many strips. The thread is a variegated pink, running from almost purple to pale pink, but it barely shows on the variety of fabrics. Would a more contrasting thread have added more drama to the quilt? What do you think?

Next will come trapunto--adding a layer of light batting behind each petal and stitching into it to create depth and dimension. Following that, the quilt can be sandwiched and quilted, then bound.

Some questions out there--Add lighter green veins to the leaves with delicate strips of fabric or stick with thread to make leaf veins? Some of those leaves are pretty large, so fabric veins could work. Square off the edges or leave them curvy and au natural? Or, as one friend suggested--2 sides straight, 2 sides curvy? Plenty of time to mull over the choices while I thread paint petals--the goal of each hour or so block of quilt time these days is to complete one petal. Coming along!

I'll post a photo next time--maybe you'll be able to discern the thread paint. If you scroll down to the March 27 post, you can see a before thread paint photo.

See more of my quilt photos at: http://community.webshots.com/user/roconnorquilts

Bali Hibiscus

I have been thinking about this quilt for a long time. I had a single, oversize flower in mind. Then a friend e-mailed photos from a trip to Bali, and this hibiscus was amongst them. From the photo I created a drawing showing highlights and shadows, which I enlarged to 36 x 44 inches. Then I went shopping for a range of pink fabrics. Since the photo was taken in Bali, I chose to use nearly all Bali Batik fabrics in the quilt. When completed, the individual petals are about two feet in diameter and somewhat fragile as they travel from ironing board to design wall to be pinned in place. Each petal is made up of 20 to 25 shapes, each cut individually and pieced together like a puzzle. The resulting petals are taking on their own life, which, while maybe not recognizably like the photo, are pleasing. I really love the scallop shape of each petal, and don't know that I would have made the connection if they were purple, say, or orange. A deep brown Batik with a subtle leaf pattern forms the ground, and several shades of green will create a crown of leaves. I am looking forward to the thread painting part--bought a special spool of variegated thread in many shades of pink to help blend the colors.

Invitation!

My Maine FiberArts membership has opened doors again. Previously I was asked to demonstrate quilting at the York museum, and organized a group of friends to bring quilts and a frame so we could demonstrate a quilting bee. It was great fun as we got to dress up in period costumes and sit under a shade tree welcoming visitors.

Now I have been invited to submit three pieces to the first show of the Pearson Legacy Gallery at 13 Dow Road, Deer Isle, for an exhibit titled "Forever in Bloom." Artists may submit work in any medium as long as the subject is flowers. Mine, naturally, are quilts.


The exhibit opens with a Bloomin’ Bash reception on Thursday, March 12, 2009 and runs through Sunday, March 29th (Friday-Sunday and by appointment).

'Vase' is one of my pieces. Completed in 2009, 'Vase' is a scrapture, a technique created by Frances Emery and described in American Quilter Magazine (Spring, 2006). Tiny scraps of fabric and fabric motifs are layered over a base to create a watercolor effect.

If you have any questions about the exhibition or the gallery, please contact Carolyn Hecker at cahecker@midmaine.com.