County Quilt

Memorial Day weekend a member of the Nebraska State Quilt Guild called to see if I would make a block representing my county to eventually be on permanent display with blocks from Nebraska's other 93 counties at the Nebraska State Fair. Sure, I didn't have anything else pressing to do and how hard could a simple 12" block be? Well, a week later when she sent the specs on the 'block' I found it was to be 28" square! A rather large block but much easier to work with. Next to come up with something that represented Dixon County where I live. The only historical importance I found was we are the only county in Nebraska to lay claim to having had a volcano. But, it wasn't really a volcano just a chemical reaction from iron pyrite and the limestone bluffs along the river. How would I show steam coming from a river bank anyhow? But, we do have the Missouri River as our northern border and there are some pretty spectacular views from those bluffs. So I chose to show the view one might see looking from the oak tree covered bluffs meeting surrounding farm fields and both eventually stopping at the Missouri River below. Across the river is the flat flood plains and farm ground of South Dakota. The area also teams with wildlife. I've included our state bird, the Western Meadowlark, and mother and fawn White-tailed Deer.

I'll keep it until after I do my trunk show for a guild in Iowa on July 20th and then send it off to be framed by wrapping 2 inches of the quilt around a wooden frame. This is the reason for no binding on this quilt.

High on Fungi

The latest challenge for my on-line Fast Friday Fabric Challenge group was to choose a fungi, depict it abstractly or stylish, and choose either a complimentary or split complimentary color scheme. I am usually one who does very realistic art quilts so this time I stepped out of my comfort zone and went completely abstract with my fungi. I chose to do a split-complimentary color scheme and used purple, yellow-orange, and yellow-greens. I decided to look at a typical fungi from beneath. I broke the head into various waves alternating them with the folds seen under the mushroom with spores. I quilted in either a circular design on the center and outer rings to swirls on the middle purple ring. To simulate some spores on the orange and green I added some beads. When completed I couched different yarns along each wave for a more funky effect. I used a simple decorative stitch over the orange/green seams beading on top of them. The binding 'fell' from a shelf and I decided to use it since although black it contained the colors of purple, orange and green. This was left over from a larger quilt I'd made last winter. The quilt was pieced together using freezer paper and registration marks. No fusible was used in this piece. The quilt measures 15 1/2" x 18".