Happy Autum Days are here again!

Hard to believe, but it's October already!!!! It has been a very busy, fun and productive crazy quilt year for me!!!

Became great friends with Cindy Wattenbarger when she commissioned me to make her a version of my "Never Forget" patriotic piece. I added a few charms that made it personal for her.

 

The back fabric gave me the idea to title it "Long May She Wave." It was a very fun piece to do.

Pat Winter had made a post on Crazy Quilt Divas Facebook, that if we put a block together, she would do the embellishing. 

Obviously, the theme is all about Dragonflies!!!!

September is our local county fair month! And I decided to see how many quilts I could get in the show.

By choosing different categories, from hand embroidered to crazy quilt with hand stitching, I was able to enter 6 recent quilts. I was completely blown away when all 6 took a First Place ribbon, with one also getting a Creativity Award.

"Yellowstone Memories", judges comments: Very nice, love materials used; remarkable design. Fabrics were purchased at West Yellowstone Fabric and Yarn in West Yellowstone.

"I raise a Hallelujah", judges comments, love the embroidery, and needle work.

"His Winter Star", judges comments: stitching is nice; creative and imaginative; feels a little too busy, hard to figure out what the theme is.  Really????

"Our First Christmas without our three", judges comments: Beautiful Project!

"Suffer His Little Children", judges comments: Such Variety! Lovely Wall Hanging and stitching very nice! This one had a business card attached from a local business that fell in love with it and wants to diisplay in their business. Which we will do in November.

"I will see a victory, because the Battle Belongs to You, Lord", judges comments: Love the design;Nice blanket stitches on pictures; theme and use of pics great; like the way you tacked it down; end corners could be tacked down by hand. (they were!) This one recieved two awards!!! Also recieved a $25 gift certificate to shop at Patrick's Crafts and sewing store in Clarkston, Washington!!!

Even Sandy recieved a ribbon...an old damaged frog, we were going to throw away. He decided to recycle it by painting it...Ain't he cute!!!

That brings my ribbons up to a count of 19!!! You can see the others from past years on my Flickr site!!!

Recently I have fallen in love with watching videos by Rashberry Stitches on her Facebook site. She is so creative with her creations. I admired her work and consequently she saw mine, so we decided to make a swap. I created a Under The Sea project for her in her color choices.

I wanted one of her scenes in tourquoise and lavender, the colors of my sewing rooms.

Check out her videos!

At the end of this month I am teaching a Crazy Quilt Class again!!!

As always, thanks for visiting...lots more in the works for next year already!!!

Happy Stitching,

BJ Sandusky

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July 29, 2022

WHO DOESN'T LOVE "UNDER THE SEA" PROJECTS?

As I finished my Yellowstone Memories, when it's backed I will do a blog on it next, I was dreaming of doing another Under the Sea Project!

For those that don't know me or are new to my journey, I took my second class from Judith Baker Montano in June 2013, called Under the Sea! And boy was I hooked!!!

This was the piece we started in class, and then I finished at home.

Then I was featured as "cover girl" on Crazy Quilt Quarterly 2015 by Pamela Kellogg and she requested a UTS project.

I later framed it this way.

That same year, I contributed to the CQ Gathering Calender 2015 with this piece:

Then my hubby wanted me to do one for him, so I did this one: 

Which I call Underwater Fantasia, it is framed in glass and won an award at an art gallery in Pocatello.

Then in 2019, I contributed to another Calender with this one:

The mermaid in this one was painted by Annette Graves.

So I guess you might think, I would be tired to this medium or where else can I go with it...

Well the ideas are endless!!!

I have studied all the UTS projects done by everyone in Crazy Quilt Divas and International in the Albums. I was astounded at the many variations found there. As I collected some fabrics I soon realized that I couldn't do just one block! I have come up with four: a blue block, a green block, brown and purple blocks!!!

I put together my blue block, I chose one fabric for the top half, but cut in pieces to crazy quilt together. This is 13" by 16". I use a heavier muslin than the normal light weight,  one called industrial weight, from JoAnn's. I find it holds the piece as it gets heavy. I also sew around the border to give me my ending point, but also to hold the piece together, which seems to keep it from bunching up. 

So as I play with threads, laces (Nicki Seavey Ravioli Dreams) trims, yarns, etc. 

I started out with a cut out from Laura Burch Fabric for the three sea horses. I then added some yarns for seaweed. Lace fish and seahorse were from Nicki. Batik fabrics are great ones to use for UTS projects, here you can see the one on the left has seahorses on it. 

By the second day, I have added more yards and threads, stitches, laces, etc. The shibori and velvet are bunched as you stitch them in place and add embellishments in the folds.

On the last day, I also bunched the silks from two different blouses, along with the fancy fabric, bottom right corner. 

So thanks for visiting. I already have 3 more blocks ready to start embellishing, and I will do a post here after each one. 
I hope you click on follow me, you get an email from blogger when I do a new post. 

Stay tune for more on this project.

Happy Stitching!!!

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 March 23, 2022

Hard to believe I haven't done a post since last July...but then that means I have been busy stitching and have several projects to share with you today!!!

Where to start? Last summer, in doing garage sales I met a wonderful who has become a special friend.  When I gave her my card, she asked if I had ever been to Kasha Quilts. Well, since I hadn't heard of the place, we made a date for the trip to a museum in Genesee. https://visitidaho.org/things-to-do/museums-galleries/kascha-quilts/ 

Meeting Karen Hagen was a wonderful experience, as not only does she have a great personality, but she is a very accomplished quilter! Not only has she made traditional quilts, but also many art quilts along with crazy quilts. You can visit her at her Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/Kascha-Quilts-107625174400248/

With over 450 quilts of her own making...it is very hard to pick out favorites. Of course, I fell in love with her crazy quilts. Here's one she made, and has worn in the past.

One of her Under the Sea quilts is just spectacular.

But one I really fell in love with, is her crazy quilts with clowns...all done in velvets! It's a very heavy quilt naturally. It's cleverly done with the shape of the clowns making the pieces match to others.

Here, is Karen showing us the pieces of the quilt.

 

Well, then I made a gift for my friend, Lynn for introducing me to Karen who then introduced me to the Palouse Quilters Guild and I was invited to do a show and tell.

I made this pillow for Karen,  the picture in the center is one done by Annette Eldon Graves, https://www.facebook.com/annette.graves. She is not only a wonderful crazy quilter herself, but a wonderful artist. 

This is the back of the pillow. I named the piece, Enjoy the Journey.

Then I made a hanging piece as a thank you gift for Karen, using her picture of her quilt, and played off all of those colors and theme. I titled it, "Where are the Clowns?"

In October, I bought a picture from Zen to Zany, https://www.etsy.com/listing/508564311/visit-their-world-item-110-prints-and?ref=shop_home_active_5

I also received the peacock from Nicki Seavey and just had to use it! 

I call this one Look For His Signs!!!

Then in November, I bought a T Shirt, and I loved the quote so much, that I photographed the picture on the shirt, and printed it out on fabric to make a wall hanging. 

Then in church one morning, we sang the song "I Raise a Hallelujah in the presence of my enemies".

So it just seemed like the words to the song matched the theme that was developing in my mind.

I found charms to match the words, along with charms of musical notes!

Then in November and December I realized I had no wall hanging for the Holidays. Even though I have a crazy quilt under my tree, I wanted something for the entry way.

So I made one for Christmas.

Since there are three kittens on the quilt, Sonny, Mikey and Goldie. And this being our first Christmas with no pets, I decided to make it their tribute!

And then I wanted one that could be hanging on the wall into January for what is usually our snow month!

I call this one His Winter Star!

Then in February, I felt a subject tugging at my heart. Though I have not raised any children, that doesn't mean I don't feel very strongly how our children have been treated in this travesty that we have been in worldwide. 

You don't have to believe like I do, but I have studied and seen the 120 medical studies that have said for over 20 years, that masks do not block viruses. Even surgeons know they wear them to stop sneezing into an open wound. But it is beyond me why anyone who would put masks on children. The main way they learn the world around them is by learning to read faces. 

So I made this quilt, called "Suffer His Little Children." After all, God is the one who creates and blesses families with children. And He has much to say about them in the Bible.

This is the top half. The labels in brown were too dominate in white, so I dyed them with coffee!!!

This is the middle.

This is the bottom half.

This quilt is 20" by 30".

Well that catches you up to what I have been into for the last several months. But have no fear, there is already a new project on my table!!

Have a great year, thanks for visiting. 

And as always, Happy Stitching!!!

BJ Sandusky

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