Preparing the appliqued pieces.Why are they called appliqued? Whether they are raw edged or turned under the pieces are laid one over the other – appliqued over the next piece. Now all the fabric pieces must be ironed. If you are doing a raw edge landscape, the edges can be left as is. If your edges are to be turned under then they must be prepared. To prepare a turned over and under appliqued piece we need to lay it on the paper pattern piece and iron over the edge of the

Today's lesson is about creating elements to add to the landscape. What are elements? Why do I call them elements and not embellishments? For me an embellishment is an abstract addition to a landscape , fluffy lace, layers of oraganza or chiffon and beads strewn over and stitched to the art work. An element is a sun or stars, a tree, a house, a windmill. a boat or an animal. An element is a piece that we add to the landscape which changes the vista. For example a boat creates

Today we are going to play around with getting different options by changing color scales or shades. Today I am going to be working in warm shades. My initial layout I interchanged the piece for another deeper wider piece. Building up layers using patterned fabric as well to create interest. It is visually balanced Added more layers and shades for more interest Not bad but now I want to take it up a notch Looking for something interesting in the pile of pattern pieces I added

Following on from yesterday we will now begin our layout.I had said to cut out a number of pieces in different colors from each pattern shape. These are building blocks for creating a landscape. The first thing I do is create color sets using all of the pattern shapes. I don't do this randomly, I could but I prefer for each set to be a landscape in itself. I have created a few examples. Ocean Skyline Winter sky and mountains Snowy sky and mountains Colors for a beach or a des

Tools - a domestic sewing machine with a straight stitch, pins and a magnet and sharp scissors. Materials - Polyester sewing thread and a selection of scrap fabrics. Colors - You can choose colors from nature, a neutral snowscape in greys, blues, creams and white. For a seascape, blues, greys, tans and sand. For a mountainscape many different shades of greens and for a desert scape, plums, oranges, rust, browns and dark yellows.. I show a number of different color choices

I love it when students come over and tell me what they are going to be doing in the lesson.I have a lesson plan in place before they come but some of them have their own very definite ideas. We discuss lesson plans for the following lessons but they go home and get other ideas. That tailored jacket that she had made a few weeks ago has been used a lot and she finds it very comfortable and versatile so she decided to create another. This time the base jacket was a linen that

I have been working on a new tutorial for a while. I call it An Interchangeable Landscape and different from my other tutorials I will be including some pattern pieces as well. Why do I call it interchangeable? By changing the pattern pieces and colors you can switch around landscapes in seconds from a seascape to a landscape to a snowscape or even to a desertscape. It can be rawed edged or seamed edge. The possibilites are endless. You create a selection of elements and can

I will be running a class teaching crumb quilting and chose to make my sample pieces using summer fabrics. The first step is to create many elements in a varied color mix. I love working with summer fabrics, always cheering and refreshing. I randomly join pieces from the huge pile. And then I prepare boxes of fabric panels using the crumb quilting technique so that I have patchwork fabric at the ready for a project. My first sample piece. I will be creating 2 sample pieces

I received a special request this week. Please make me a blue shaded, soft, warm scarf for this winter. In my winter box of fabrics I found some shirt corduroy in teal and blue as well as 2 shades of teal and blue flannel remnants. After cutting strips and rectangles I joined them together till I got a length of 170 cm x 35 cm. A single layered scarf. The finished scarf before ragging all the seams. After ragging and washing once. The scarf will become more ragged and softer

This week when she came over the original plan was to complete her wave landscape piece with the floral fabrics that she had chosen last time. She had already created one landscape piece with some of the florals adding orange and a rose pink to them I saw that she didn't really want to make another landscape, so after giving it some thought she decided to make quilted wave fabric with the strips that she had chosen and then construct a zippered pouch from the fabric. She chos

I have spent the last 2 weeks going through boxes and mounds or rather hills of fabric that I have collected over the years. Why do I have so much fabric? Granted, none of it was new. It was either gifted or sourced at charity stores. I think all recyclers can be hoarders. It is very important to sort ones equipment and notions and fabrics according to subjects and see whether one is keeping stuff that one does not need. I teach sewing and one of the things that I do is prov

When sorting fabrics yesterday I found a packet of scraps that I had put away for future use. I found some coordinating berry threads. I decided to make a fabric scarf. If I don't keep it for myself it can be gifted. The colors are really luscious.