Dilys The Quilt: BLOG 439

Sunday 31 March 2019

BLOG 439

Blog 439

Happy Mother’s Day! I have been invited to a family BBQ and I will certainly enjoy the company of those attending. I feel privileged to be a mother; it’s one of the best experiences in my life.

I have made some progress with the colourful panel over the last few days. I removed it carefully from the release paper and placed it onto cotton low-loft wadding. As all the fabrics are backed with Bondaweb, I was able to stick the panel in place with an iron and this meant that I didn’t need any pins. The colourful patches were put together to create a background fabric so, before doing any applique over the top, I decided to add texture with stitch, using rayon threads. The texturing adds interest but it also helps to secure the individual pieces of fabric, a necessary step in this process (the alternative is to cover the lot with tulle but I don’t like that effect). I used different fee motion patterns over the surface.

Panel on wadding

Free motion quilting

Rayon threads

Detail 1

Detail 2

Completed background

The next decision was how to use the prepared background. In my book ‘Dual Image Applique’ I used silhouettes to create wall hangings (image below). I have always liked the strong contrast created when placing a dark fabric against a colourful background. Although I have long since got rid of many of my original patterns, I drafted a frame in which to work and drew up a similar image to fit the size of the panel. Here is the design process from framework to pencil image to creating ‘holes’ which will be cut out to the final pattern. The ‘holes’ are the areas that will be cut out to reveal the background fabric.