Reprise

Even as I ponder "line" for my EBMC, I continue to work with it.

A few weeks ago, a friend of mine saw a piece she liked when I posted my 3-pieces-a-day in the Facebook Artists' Challenge.  Entitled "Prairie Autumn", and inspired by a photograph taken by my late husband on an autumn drive well over a decade ago, I'd made 2 of these and both of them had been sold.  Would I make her one?

Of course!

Now...because I don't buy fabric in bulk (!), I really had to dig around to find comparable bits and bobs...but managed this morning to lay down the foundation.

Photo and foundation

Yep: sky, trees, prairie, fencing.  The lines are pretty clear...

Then I added machine quilting:

Every stitch is a line

After I quilted the sky, I added the building and the fencing:

Just a wee bit of hand-stitch on the roof and grass, and it will be ready for the mat.

What are you up to this weekend?  As you stitch, you might check out what's happening over at Nina Marie Sayre's Off the Wall Friday, to which I'm linking this post.  :-)

Have a great one!  Till next week...

Thinking Along the Line(s)

I've been seeing 'line(s)' everywhere this week.

• In my e-mail I got something from or about Deidre Adams (can't find it now, of course!) and her "Facade" series;
• On the way in to work at The Shop I see the lines of snow melting against the hills...fence lines...the inevitable power poles and lines...;
• On my periodic jogs around this wee hamlet, the roads are corrugated strips of melt-slicked gravel, mud and slush...

And so on.  :-)

Meanwhile, I'm working away at hand-stitching the lines I see in the small piece of snow-dyed fabric that is becoming my contribution to the "Spotlight Silent Auction" fundraiser at the SAQA conference in Portland.  It's nearly finished now...

LTFS: Roses I - WIP (c) 2015

Oh...

And yes, EB got back to me.  Blocking out my design is next, so stay tuned! 

Meanwhile, let's hop over to The Needle and Thread Network for WIP Wednesday -- and see what other Canadian stitchers are up to, eh?  :-)

Walking the Line

I've been a bit slow off the mark with the EB Master Class this month.  You guessed it: the topic is "Line".  When EB announced it, I knew exactly which of my finished pieces I wanted to use as a starting point...but then stalled at how to work on it without copying myself!

The work was based on this photo:

By a road near Northbow Lodge
December 2008

Here's the piece I made:

Sentinels (C) 2013

And here's how I began to manipulate it for each of three possible design ideas:

First, I turned the photo of the piece into a 'contour drawing' with my photo editing program:

I traced this onto a piece of 8 1/2 x 11 tracing paper -- just the main lines I could see -- using a Sharpie (R) marker.  I copied this tracing paper image onto plain paper, and enlarged it slightly.  From the enlarged drawing I isolated a section and enlarged that:

"Idea 1"

Second, I found a detail photo of the original piece:

I converted it to 8-bit grey-scale.  I know...not much difference!  ;-)   It was the snow, after all!

From there I converted it into a "contour drawing", isolated a section of that and enlarged it:

"Idea 2"

And then another:

"Idea 3"

I think all three have potential for recreation in fabric and thread, to differing degrees.  I've sent the three 'Ideas' off to EB and await her feedback.

On other fronts, I've been hand-stitching a piece intended for the Spotlight Silent Auction fund-raiser at the SAQA conference in Portland (I have to have it sent off within 10 days), and finished the March block for the "Zen" Block-of-the Month.  The latter was once again an experience that was not particularly relaxing...the flimsy background fabric (provided with the pattern) argued with the less flimsy dark and medium prints, and only a good spritz with "Best Press" made the block lie nicely when it was finished.

Silent auction piece - WIP
Auditioning stitch placement

March "Zen" BOM: "Coxey's Camp"

On the knitting front, my entry for the March challenge in the "Socks From Stash" Ravelry group is going well...I am nearing the toe on the first sock...and the wedding prayer shawl is proceeding apace: by the end of today I'll have finished 7.5 of 25 pattern repeats (each is 24 rows), keeping me on track for the end of May...

Now I think I'll link this up with Nina Marie's Friday post (because I still can!) and take a nap...!