Quilting the Lotus

 

An interesting day. I am quilting and embroidering lotus flowers on my quilt. Meanwhile my cousin, Dianne, is posting a gorgeous picture of lotus flowers online, wondering where the photo had been taken. Obviously, we are both in need of a beautiful and tranquil retreat.

This is a lotus that I have just completed on my “Peace, Love, & Haight Ashbury” quilt. I included the motif because it is a symbol of the Eastern philosophies that were strongly infusing American culture at the time..

This is a close-up that shows how I have embroidered in a chain stitch alongside my quilting lines to give the flower more definition.

I am getting ready to make one and one half more lotus flowers on the other side of the quilt. First I found two round objects—a saucer and a CD—to trace around with chalk.

This view shows the half lotus off to the right side. I am trying to keep the quilt abstract.

Next I sketched in the initial row of eight petals with a combination of chalk and disappearing marker, depending on whether I was drawing on light or dark fabric. Then I added the smaller second row of petals behind it, keeping within the frame of the larger circle.

I will first quilt along these lines with a walking foot, then add the embroidery afterwards. In the best of all worlds, it is definitely best to do all of the quilting first, and then the embroidery. But as I said before, this little quilt seems to be morphing as it goes along.

Featured Artist—Me?

 

Well, it’s in print, so it must be official now. I am going to be the Featured Artist at the Cotton Patch Quilters of Kern County biennial quilt show on February 8 & 9, 2014.

This is a closer look at the announcement:

I have known about this for quite some time but deferred to the show committee to make the first announcement. What a surprise! There are so many talented quilters in our guild of approximately 300 members, and many of them have been around since our guild was established in 1980. Surely many of them would come before me.  

Janice Jackson, our show chairman, totally took me off guard when she approached me at a Sewful Sisters friendship group meeting last December and asked me to accept the honor. Of course, I said, “Yes!” The next question was whether I would bring Yogini, meaning my quilt, “Yogini and the Candy Dish”. Like she’s a person. Yup, I could see where that was going…But, of course, I would bring Yogini. And maybe some donuts, too.

I hope you can come and visit with us for a bit, too. The Cotton Patch Quilters always throw a wonderful show.