The image above shows the design that I drew out in EQ6, ready to be made into an applique pattern. I decided to use invisible machine applique for this project as the pieces were large enough for the edges to be turned under, so I printed freezer paper templates and contstructed the bird before adding it to the background.

 It was quite similar to make to a hornbill but the biggest challenge was getting the colouring and markings on the beak. I searched through my piles of fabric and found two different batiks which blended blues and yellows. I then added the details using fabric pens. I also added a little touch of colour where the yellow feathers join the black.

For the background I chose a lovely hand dyed fabric by Frieda Anderson that I bought at the Festival of Quilts last year. Sometimes I find it hard it’s hard to cut into these special fabrics, but in the end I have to tell myself that I bought them to be used and they really do help to give  a special touch to the finished design.

The finished wall hanging, quilted with a variegated cotton thread in the background and a solid coloured thread for the borders.

A more detailed photo of the finished wall hanging.

Other people chose to feature green fabrics in their work and I was one of those, as it’s my favourite colour and I enjoy working with greens. For my project I created a foundation pieced background of ‘crazy’ blocks which I printed out from EQ6. I then used invisible machine appliqué to add a jungle plant, spilling out into the borders. In the latter stages I was racing against the clock to get the challenge finished by the end of the month but I just managed.

Quilting with variegated and solid coloured cotton threads completes the design. Initially I started to quilt a trailing leaf design in the borders but then had to unpick what I’d done as I felt that it didn’t look right and drew too much attention away from the main design.

The pattern drawn out in EQ6

With the pattern made, my next decision was how I was going to create the design. ? My preference would have been to do it by hand or to use invisible machine appliqué, but because I had chosen to make it quite small, 12 inches by 15 inches, some of the pieces were really tiny. It might just have been possible to do it by hand, but in the end I opted to use fusible webbing and raw edge appliqué, embellished with machine thread painting.  

making the first butterfly wing

Fabrics and threads play such an important part in a design and for this one I had a lovely piece of hand dyed fabric which I had bought from Foltvilág Patchwork Studio at The Festival of Quilts which I knew straight away would be perfect for the background.  I didn’t even buy it with this project in mind as I’m always drawn to greens as I use them in so many of my pieces but I’m so glad I did as looking through the rest of my stash I would have had a struggle to find something that was as good. For the butterfly wings and flower I used mostly commercial batiks although again for the actual base of the wing I used another hand dyed fabric from the quilt festival which had good gradations from brown to black which again were just perfect for what I wanted.

assembling the butterfly wings and flower

It took me several days to put the whole thing together and the cats didn’t help today by lounging all over my cutting table, or propping themselves up against the sewing machine.

Millie keeping an eye on things

Yesterday afternoon I finally finished assembling all the pieces of the design and then my next decision was how to embellish it. Whether to do the thread painting before I added the batting or after?  In the end I decided to do the thread painting first, with a stabilizer underneath as I am more familiar with that method. This method also has several advantages. The piece can be trimmed and squared up after the stitching and also it gives me a bit longer to think while I’m stitching, about what fabrics I’ll use for the outer borders.

The completed design ready for thread painting and embellishment

I imported the photo into EQ6 and then because of the complexity of the design I decided I would draw out the pattern in two parts, first concentrating on the hornbill and then creating another layout focusing on the background palm fronds. I did this and then once the background was drawn I copied and pasted the hornbill into the background.

To create the wall hanging I started off with some fabric that I had hand painted for the sky and invisible machine appliqué to construct the design. Normally I use freezer paper templates which I iron to the wrong side of the fabric and then remove after the construction is completed but for this design as there were so many small pieces I didn’t want to have to cut the back to remove the paper. I used a different method where I still use freezer paper templates but iron the paper to the front side of the fabric and then turn the edges under to wrong side using the tip of an iron and spray starch painted onto the seam allowance. The spray starch helps to hold the seam allowance in place.

I printed out the full size pattern from EQ6 and then traced the outlines onto a stabilizer which I pinned in place under my ’sky’ fabric. The fabric was light enough for me to be able to see the lines through so that I could place my pieces accurately.

I used a lot of fine pins to hold the appliqué pieces in place for stitching. I used invisible thread with a fine thread in the bobbin and a very fine needle (#60/8) and started stitching the pieces in place a few at a time as I built up the design on the background.

I had a lovely striped batik fabric which proved to be just perfect for creating the varied colouring of the palm fronds.

The fronds at the lower edge of the picture were so small and had such sharp points that I decided to fuse them in and use raw edge appliqué. To quilt I used invisible thread and outlined all the fronds and the bird, with stippling in the background areas and meander quilting with variegated cotton thread in the borders.

The finished design.

The picture above shows the design as drawn out in EQ6. I then went through my pile of pale fabrics to chose the colours I needed to make the frangipani petals and stems.

Batik fabrics for the petals and stems along with my original photo. I printed the design out in reverse onto freezer paper and then used this to make templates for the design. I ironed the freezer paper templates onto the wrong side of the fabrics and then using a scant quarter inch seam I turned the edges over to the wrong side and stuck in place using a glue stick.

The picture above shows the pieces with edges turned under and glued in place then positioned over a full sized print out of the design to get correct placement. I used invisible machine applique to stitch the design together, assembling the small pieces before stitching the whole flower to the background. I auditioned a number of different fabrics for the background and borders and finally came up with a combination that I liked. The fabric for the borders was a batik I’d ordered over the Internet a few years ago and hadn’t used as it wasn’t quite what I’d been expecting at the time.

The completed design.

Close up of the flower.

I was happy with the way this turned out so decided to make another wall hanging using similar fabrics for the flower but a hand painted back ground which I had made recently.

I haven’t done any fabric painting for a while but I was prompted to do it as I had to paint a ’sunset sky’ for another wall hanging that I was making and while I had all the paints out I thought I might as well do a few others.

Close up of the frangipani on blue background. I achieved the mottled look by using a sponge to paint the background.

Detail of the quilting in the border. I used a lovely variegated polyester thread  I had which went just perfectly with the mottled batik fabric.

To get a good pose to make into an applique design ideally the legs should all be splayed out away from the body as it makes it easier to sew and make a pattern. For this design I chose a photo of a gecko with a nice curved tail. I imported the photo into EQ6 and drew out the design as an applique pattern, which I then drew out onto freezer paper ready to transfer to my fabric.

I chose a spotted batik fabric for the gecko and a pale batik for the background. The design is transferred to the fabric using a white fabric pen, I cut out roughly round the design and pin it onto the background ready to start needleturn applique. I prefer to sew these designs by hand using a fine needle and silk thread so that I can get all the shaping around the gecko toes. The gecko pinned and ready to start sewing.

Two years ago, I was intending to go outside one evening and take some photos to make a new design and I got a big shock. I went out of the kitchen door and there in front of me was a large snake which I imediately recognized as a python because of its distinctive markings. Luckily I had my camera in my hand so was able to take some shots straight away. It didn’t seem too bothered by me and I’m not worried about snakes (only terrified of spiders) so I was able to get quite close and get some good photos of it on the ground.

It then moved off past the car and then effortlessly coiled itself up the post of the washing line where it then settled quite comfortably. It didn’t look as if it was going to move off in a hurry so I went and got my SLR camera so that I could take some better shots. It was a wonderful experience being so close to this beautiful creature and I regret that here in Brunei so many people panic the moment they see a snake and want it killed. A large number of the snakes here are not harmful to man and most if left alone would rather escape than attack.

I hope this beautiful snake is still out there somewhere.

I redrew the design in EQ6 so that I could make an applique pattern.The original design was square but because of the shape of the flower and the long stems and leaves I thought an elongated block would look better.

The next task was to choose the fabrics to make the flower and leaves. Origianlly I got out all my various orange fabrics, but I also had a  striped batik with shades of brown, orange and yellow and I was surprised to find this was the best match for the flower.

Choosing the fabrics for the leaves and background, a nice selection of greens.

When I first drew out the design I liked the idea of the flower against a dark background but because I chose a slightly dull shade of orange for the flower this didn’t look right. After spending a long time going through my various fabrics I came up with two possible combinations, either a graduated green or a bright blue green batik.

The blue has a nice contemporary feel, but I wondered if perhaps it was a little too bright.

I liked the green better, so decided to use this one for the background. The fabric was graduated from dark green at the bottom to a yellow green at the top. I didn’t want the bright yellow green but then because of the size of the background piece the lower part of the design was a bit dark and I felt that the leaves became lost. In the photograph above I have the graduation running across the fabric instead of up and down and I suppose I could have done that but I decided to look again for another fabric. I found a beautiful blue grey batik which I have had for quite a long time and I felt immediately that this one was right.

Here the design is just pinned in place but reading for stitching using invisible machine applique.

Since then I have been busy making some more gecko cushions and then today I started drawing out a  pattern for a new cat design which I have been commissioned to do.

This is the picture of the cat and then the design drawn out in EQ6 and ready to be stitched.

While I was taking photos of this bird we heard hornbills in the trees on the other side of the garden near the beach. Pied hornbills are quite plentiful here in Kuala Belait where we live, but we don’t get them very often in our garden so I was very happy to see this pair especially as I had my camera and zoom lens at the ready. The female stayed in amongst the trees so I wasn’t able to get any pictures but the male posed obligingly on an exposed branch.

I was inspired by the photos I took and for a while now I have been thinking about designing a new hornbill wall hanging so later I imported one of my photos into EQ6 and planned out a new design.

This is the new design for my hornbill wall hanging which I hope to start stitching in the next few days.

Design inspired by traditional Iban artwork

I am doing a class through Quilt University at the moment called EQ6 Advanced Layouts with teacher Fran Gonzalez and although so far the course focuses more on traditional style patchwork and quilting designs than art quilting I thought it would be a good one to do as I use the Electric Quilt software a lot for my quilt designs. So far I haven’t been disappointed, and in the second lesson this week we worked on creating a medallion quilt and adding multiple borders. I did the class work and then inspired by the creative work that some of the other students were doing I spent some time last night doing something myself. I took a design inspired by the traditional local Iban designs which I had drawn out some time ago to use for an applique design,but never done anything with (mainly because I couldn’t decide what colour combinations to use for it)

I broke apart elements from this design and then using the EQ6 wreathmaker I recombined them into several separate blocks and then put them together to create a simple medallion style quilt. I kept the desin and borders simple because I think I might actually have a go at making this one.

Iban style medallion quilt