This is the fourth year that I have participated in this fund raising activity. The collection of submitted quilts travels to several large quilt shows and then each of the quilts will be auctioned off on Ebay to raise money for the Alliance's programs to document, preserve and share quilts and their stories.
My plan was to celebrate the theme by showing 20 marbles tumbling out of a canning jar. When my quilt was pretty far along, I realized that I really needed to add a second marble jar to balance my design. So this is my little quilt, "MARBLES."
The theme can be interpreted rather broadly, so the fact that I have too many marbles does not pose a problem!
I used fused organza to create the semi-transparent canning jars. And fussy cut and embroidered the marbles from two of my background fabrics. I was pleased with the effect.
I was also part of another submission, a group effort called "Time for Tea." Several of us have been talking about making a slice quilt and this seemed the perfect opportunity. There were actually 6 of us involved. Cheryl offered to locate an image and give four of us a quarter of the image to creatively recreate. After considerable research for an appropriate image, Cheryl consulted her friend Dorry in Virginia. Dorry arranged some china (traditional 20th anniversary gift) and some hot cross buns (XX being the Roman numeral for 20) and took the photo. Cheryl then cut the photo into four vertical slices and presented Susan, Alice, Christina and me with a 5 x 20 inch portion without sharing the total image with any of us. The idea was for us to work independently and reproduce our slice the way we wanted, but to be mindful of the placement, as the slices needed to be able to be put together again for a recognizable finished product.
So this is what each of us were working from. I'm sorry I don't have the original photo, but you get the idea. A table set up outside on a deck with a checked table cloth, a mug and tea pot, and African violet, and a plate with hot cross buns.
And here is our little quilt!
It was great fun to be part of this whole process. We were encouraged to be creative in our interpretation of the table cloth, and I think it's very charming to see the variations that all seem to work together nicely. As Cheryl pointed out, it almost makes the plate look transparent.
Susan did the first slice and she happened to pick a table cloth fabric that had yellow in it without knowing that two other portions of the picture had that yellow theme. Alice did the second slice and it's amazing how nicely the leaves of the violet mesh. Susan's are a little flatter and Alice's have a bit more depth. Alice stuffed the appliquéd frosting and raisins on the hot cross buns and actually found that gradient brown fabric that give the buns their three dimensional look. I used fabric paint to create my checkerboard fabric and my challenge was to recreate the darling lemon pig mug that Dorry used in her photo. I was actually told I could change the shape of the mug or image on it, but that I should keep it yellow. Cheryl had several "lemon" fabrics and I was able to fussy cut a lemon and turn it into a pig and it comes pretty darn close to the original. Christina did the final slice. It's hard to tell from this photo, but she added a button to top off the tea pot and fancied up the table cloth with some decorative lacy stitching.
Cheryl connected the four pieces and did the quilting. Alice bound the quilt.
I hope you enjoyed seeing my "TWENTY" quilts!
