A Coordinated Group of Knit And Felted Things

 I'm sharing this group of red, aqua and teal felted vessels with one of my Olympic quilts that didn't make the deadline.

Another Finished Quilt For 2022

 

This is another one of my time lapse quilts. I think I started it at least 20 years ago.

I enjoyed finishing it. At 26 x 33 inches it is one of the largest of the quilts that used up leftover small pieces of batting. It is also an Olympic quilt that didn't make the deadline.

It is my 10th quilt finish for 2022.

These 3 Quilts Each Received An Olympic Medal

 

Each of these quilts earned a medal in my personal Olympic competitions.

One received GOLD, one SILVER and one BRONZE

Can you guess what each one received?

These 3 designs are ones that people often confuse with each other. I made them all from the same fabrics to explain the differences.

The top left is Sunshine And Shadows. The bottom left is Trip Around The World. The right quilt is Boston Commons.

Olympic Quilts In Progress

 

I am currently working on all three of these Olympic quilts at the same time. 

Two have already been quilted and the other is layered ready to quilt.

Finishing after they are quilted often takes more time than quilting them.

Glitz Quilt On The Home Stretch

 Another Olympic quilt is on the home stretch.

It's quite different than anything I've done before.

Olympic Quilt Using Hand Dyes With An Artist Printed Large Floral

 

I had a piece of my Shibori fabric and was able to combine it with this large floral I was gifted from an Artist.

I had to add a real ugly piece from my hand dyes, and when used in the borders it was no longer ugly.

I made this as my Olympic project a few years ago.

Silk Olympic Quilt In Progress

 

I am working on my Olympic quilts but wanted to share a little teaser before this one is finished.

There is nothing like silk to take color beautifully.

I'm on the home stretch for this one.

Olympic Quilts Become Pillows

This started out to be a quilt, but I realized it didn't have what it takes to be made into a quilt, but it did make a great Art pillow.

When it was turned into a perfectly stuffed pillow it became a Gold Medalist.

This Art pillow used some unique fabrics I created by dying, pressing and slashing.



Olympic Quilt 5 came out of the ice dyed reject pile and was quilted in a grid to make the save.  

3 Pillows, 3 Gold Medals, all created with fabrics I pieced, painted, or otherwise changed. 

They all were part of my Florida Olympics a few years ago.

A Challenging Quilt For Previous Olympics In The Past

 

This is one of the most challenging Olympic quilts I have made.

I came up with a way to do a six-pointed star simply.

I worked on and completed this at Hilton Head, South Carolina

Trip Around The World Quilt

 I've also finished this Trip Around The World quilt.

I've used the same fabrics and colors I used for Sunshine and Shadows and Boston Commons.

Another Olympic Quilt Finish

 Boston Commons is my most recent quilt finish.

I used the same colors and fabrics as I did in Sunshine And Shadows.

A Previous Olympic Quilt

 This was a quilt I made in Florida for a previous Olympics.

Jessica and Kevin selected this Gold Medal quilt to add to their collection.

More Qualifying Quilts For My Personal Quilt Olympics

 These are 2 more of the quilts that qualified for my personal Olympics.

They are the two largest.

I hope they will medal for me.

All My Olympic Quilts

This is Olympic Quilt 1. It is a Gold Medal quilt. It set the bar high for what was to follow. Figuring out how to quilt this one was a challenge and I started, did what I knew I needed to do to start it, stepped back and took my time until it told me what to do next. I loved the dialogue the quilt spoke with me.

Olympic Quilt 2 also is a Gold Medal Quilt. The spiral quilting plays well with the linear lines of the quilt itself.

I was not so sure that Olympic Quilt 3 would make Gold.

When it was turned into a perfectly stuffed pillow it too became a Gold Medalist.

Olympic Quilt 4 was also trying to be a contender for Gold.

It also made the Gold status when it too became a pillow. The quilting was done horizontally to contrast with the leno weave of the silk fabric.

Olympic Quilt 5 came out of the reject pile and was quilted in a grid to make the save.

The “pillow save” also created another Gold Medalist.

Three gold medalists which work together, or as I like to call them 3 ART pillows.
My friend Debbie wanted to see all of the Gold Medal quilts and try to find the commonality between them. There definitely is a commonality, but it is not obvious unless you have been following my work for a long time.
Let me know what you see as the commonality.
(I also did Olympic dyeing and Olympic scarves)

Olympic Quilt 2 Is Finished

I am thrilled with the results of this piece. From the choice of fabrics to begin, to the use of an “ugly” to complete the border, to the quilting and to the close to perfect facings and casings on the back it has been an exciting journey thanks to the energy I get from watching the Winter Olympics.
I hope you can see how the spiral quilting plays so well with the linear design of the piecing.
I don’t preplan my work and each step is a new discovery as I listen to what the quilt is trying to tell me and experiment with new ideas.
I scored another GOLD Medal!

Olympic Quilt 5 Finished

This is the quilt before I turned it into a pillow. The top fabric is a piece of velvet I dyed and then textured with a rubber stamp and an iron.
The bottom fabric is a piece of leno weave silk noil I used to test how black dyes would work on silks.
The small focal point is a slashed sample I did to test the layering for the jacket I was making. 
It takes time to figure out how to work with each one of these small pieces. I did vertical quilting on the leno fabric and knew better than to do anything to the velvet or I would loose the texture I created.

I used a rough silk that looks like linen for the back of the pillow. I stuffed it firmly with a great quality polyester fiberfill. It will hold it shape and not slide down on the leather furniture.
I call these kind of pillows art pillows and they will be treated with respect. I may move them from room to room as time goes on.

My Olympic Quilts

There is nothing in the quilt designs that may make you reference the Olympics.
To me an Olympic quilt is one that takes a major effort and I most likely worked on it for more than one Olympic year’s competition.
Here are a few of them.

This is a work in progress worked on during a somewhat recent Olympics. Seeing it in this photo makes me want to get it out and finish it. It will be a large wall quilt. I can see now why my friend Mary was so excited when she saw this one.

This was quilted during an Olympics. The quilting was the biggest challenge creating this. The thread kept breaking. I only realized after it was finished I was using a blue jeans weight of thread.

I believe I worked on One Woman’s Dream for at least two Olympic competitions. It was a challenge to design in this unusual shape. My dream for this quilt with 6 pointed stars was to have it hang in many different religious denomination places of worship.