Adding Embroidery Stitches to a Fiber Art Piece

Embellishments can add a wonderful additional layer of artistry on a quilt, and one option is to use embroidery stitches. They pop off the top giving texture, and three dimensionality (is that a word?). You don’t need to know a bunch of different embroidery stitches.  In fact, a straight line (running stitch or back stitch) goes a long way.

For the Circle of Life piece I used embroidery stitches on the foliage, bird claws, and tree branch. I think those stitches really improved an otherwise “ok” area. Here are some photos of the embroidery on this piece:

claws

tree french knots 

plant stems

The other nice thing about embroidery stitching is its' portability. You can do it while watching TV, or at a friend's house. 

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Variety in Quilting Stitches

I've noticed that some quilt artists use a lot of straight lines or echo quilting in the background. I love the way that looks. It is restful and focuses attention on the subject. I wish I could do that more. For better or worse, I like to use a variety of quilting stitches in my background areas on my art quilts. This is partly because I get bored doing the same stitch over and over again, but also because for me it's more interesting to look at. 

For the Circle of Life piece, I took advantage of the print on the background and stitched around the squares in the checkerboard area. I really liked the way that looked when it was done. It made them pop out, especially the orange colored squares. In other areas I did echo quilting, wavy lines, curlicues, circles, and whatever came to my mind. On the tree trunk I put some leaf shapes. Here are some photos of the quilting:

checkerboard 

circles and curlicues

echo in diamond areas

horizontal lines in sun

foliage and tree trunk area

The quilting spacing was fairly close, which I am liking more and more these day.   Thanks for visiting my blog!

Circle of Life - Foliage

Circle of Life

Today’s post is about the foliage that I added to the lower left and right of this piece. This section was fairly simple. Leaf shapes were cut from some purchased print fabric that had palm leaves on it. I also cut similar shapes from the dark red used for the tree trunk and sun, and leaf shapes were cut from the polka dot fabric used for the birds. I arranged in a way that looked pleasing to my eye. To add some further interest I added rick-rack leaf shapes and then embroidered some plant growth to the area. Here are some up close looks at the foliage:

Before Quilting

Before Quilting

After Quilting

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Love Birds Make the World Go 'Round

I've been working on a project that I would love to show on my blog, but I can’t reveal it yet! Darn! So in the meantime, I’m going to post about a couple things I made last year.

Today’s post is about a small quilt that I made for a challenge entitled “Circles”. This challenge was for the Textures Fiber Arts group. The size requirement was 14” x 14”.  I have several small things in my “UFO” box, so I took a look there for something that would fit the theme. This is what I found:

Hearts All Aglow

This is a small quilt that I made for an exchange. It was called “Hearts All Aglow”. This quilt was sent away to another person, but I liked it and wanted to make another similar quilt for me to keep. The basis for this quilt was a watercolor painting that I had done several years ago of lovebirds on a branch with tree leaves hanging down around them.  I had already cut out the “lovebird parts” for the quilt I wanted to make and keep. That fabric happened to have circles on it, and that seemed like a good start for me for a “Circles” themed challenge. 

This is the finished project:

Circle of Life

I called it “Circle of Life” because love is what makes the world go round, right? It is a little different from the “Hearts All Aglow” piece that I sent away, but it has my sweet little lovebirds on a branch.

I will show some of the steps I used to make it in upcoming posts. 

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