Halloween Crazy Quilt is Done!

Hooray!

Here she is in all her Glory:

I finished all of the embellishment stitching late Wednesday night...OK, 

it really was still Wednesday, not quite Midnight!  Perfect timing for 

a Halloween Piece.  

On my last post, I mentioned my 'Zen Place' for doing all of the 

Embellishment stitching.  It is a different state of mind from needlepoint

 stitching.  I was worried about getting there.  

You are looking at a 'finished' needlepoint canvas, 

and instead of being done, 

you look and have to think, 

"OK, now to ADD!  What can I do to jazz up each and every faux 'seam'?" 

On March 9th, when I did the post about having all the background 

work done, 

I really was worried.

It is hard to decide where to start and what to do for the embellishing. 

 It took me a few days of worrying to tackle it.  I'd pick it up, look,

become overwhelmed and put it down.  Well, maybe if I organized all

of the bits and bobs, the panic would subside.

I gathered up beads, and sparkly threads, Swarovski Crystals, funky trims, 

ribbons, charms and buttons. 

Then, I decided that worrying about doing 23 seam treatments was really

overwhelming me.  "Kelly, darn it just pick a place and start!",

 I goaded myself.

   In the center, is the alternating Wheat & Bead sequence that I have used on 

the other 2 CQ pieces.  I knew it would work...so I began.  

Hooray!  The ice was broken!

 Then I decided to do the Stepped Wheat sequence, 

alternating the black & chartreuse silk perle, seen in lower left.  

 From experience, I knew that the Fan needed super skinny

treatments with lots of beads and bling, so I got busy on those!

Isn't it lovely?  Such Harmony!

I was really on a roll!  Once all of the fan is done, plus the first two,

suddenly 12 seams are tackled and the rest is much less daunting!

The fan edge is done with a SUPER COOL new trim & thread

combination from Access Commodities:

Silk Wrapped Purl & Silk Couching Thread.

Amazing Stuff!

A close-up of the Memory Wire Bead Twist.

The upper right corner has some simple twists with unique trims and threads.

And along came a Spider!

The Mish-Mash Ribbon Seam Treatment looks splendid in Halloween Colors!

 

And the Beaded & Be-Ribboned Tassel Trim is quite festive!

And more close-ups of other fun bits:

 Just look at the Sunflower center full of  messy beads and sequins!

 Delightful Tiny Buttons and a Vintage Bakelite bead with 

a plastic Rhinestone center...the epitome of tacky! 

 I just Love it!

 The wonderful cluster of Buttons with a Vintage Rhinestone 

Shank Button...Adorable!

 I was thinking about dangling Halloween Charms the whole

length of the Ribbon seam, but decided to stop after the

Jack-O-Lantern...was worried it might overwhelm!

(But, I can always change my mind!!!  Hum?) 

Now that the piece is done, time to write the Stitch Guide!

ARGH!!! Talk about overwhelming!

Ah well, until next time.

Happy Stitching, All! 

Crazy LOVE, Halloween Style

More Background sections stitched!

The Paisley in shades of Very Velvet!

The upper left wedge with the Alternating Scotch and Eyelet is

sooooooo harmonious!

As you will be able to tell from the following pics, I was in the mood to 

tackle the Chartreuse and Perriwinkle sections.  Those colors spoke to me

after completing the first few sections.

Two Upper Center sections...tilted here!

Two more Fan sections done...

Bottom Right corner

Don't you just LOVE the Chartreuse and Perriwinkle

next to each other?  I DO!

The Criss Cross Hungarian Stitch will get filler beads in the open spaces.

I am leaning toward a faceted black...I mean...this is Crazy and Halloween!

 I fell in Love with the Half Scotch Pinwheel in Black!

So much that I had to stitch it again!  This time in Perriwinkle so that the 

directional-ity of the stitch would be more evident!

Any of you who have stitched my Spring and Christmas Crazy Quilts 

will know that repeating stitches within the same piece is a theme with me!

  It is so fascinating to me how the same stitch can look so different. 

 The variety of threads and color palettes available are just

wonderful, and lend themselves to such fanciful needle play!

Of the 23 Total background sections, 

11 are done, 2 more are figured out and well along.

Leaving 10 more to go!  I am ready to tackle Oranges and Olives next!

Until next post: Happy Stitching, everyone!

PS.  I am playing the 2014 Stitching Games over at

www.Stitcherie.com 

Some of you may have read about them in the most recent

Needlepoint Now magazine.

I decided to stitch Ratzy Witch...one of the Halloweenies:

Here are the first few areas completed:

The Life and Work of an Artist

How many of you have ever lived with, worked with, or loved an Artist?  

You may have already figured this out, but we see the world a bit differently than other folks.  I think we are wired up in our brains in a completely different fashion.  Believe it or not, we don't exactly realize this, until something happens which makes us take a step back and look.    

What in the world is Kelly talking about you may be asking yourself?

Ever since 2004, I have been completely, passionately, immersed in Needlepoint as my Art-Form.  I was happily committed to my Craft.  Whenever I would get a hankering to work on something else, (quilting, felting, rug-hooking, scrap-booking, punch needle, miniatures, doll-making to name but a few) I could do a small project, but quickly re-align myself back to Needlepoint. 

 So last April, I was happily stitching away on my Scaredy Crow:

When out of left field, Boom!, came the overwhelming urge to get back to my fabric designing.  Some of you may know that my first career, BK(Before Kiddos), was in Textile and Wallpaper design for the Home Dec Industry.  I took some of my copyrighted painted designs from back in the late 80's, scanned them, started playing around with them in Photoshop, found a consignment printer, and started churning out textiles again.  

Here is a photo of the Halloween Textile Group:

And here are some of the Gorgeous Halloween Pears Finished with those fabrics on the back:

The Pears were stitched by Ilene Levine, my Office Manager.

and Finished by Funda Scully in Fort Worth, TX.

 Here are two photos of Christmas Textile Groups:

Then I started Hankering to make a quilt from some of the Textiles I had printed up.  The problem was that I had never done piecework quilting before.

Applique and Trapunto and Crazy- YES, Piecework- NO!

I took a beginning block class at my local JoAnne's Fabrics and then I was off to the races:

          

 

So, I learned a few tricks at the class, bought a few tools of the trade, and had enough knowledge to keep my head above water.  I decided on two styles of Album Blocks that I saw in a Civil War Quilt Book.  I also decided to make the Blocks from little 8" square fabric swatches, rather than yardage...so in a way, that makes it a Stash Quilt!  There are 49 Blocks on the top which are 9" squares, plus Borders.

This is the Quilt Top:

It still needs it's borders.  I finished the top on October 19th, although I had started the Blocks back in August.  The Border fabrics just arrived, so maybe this weekend?

Once I get the borders attached,the top can go out for quilting!  Hooray!

Then, of course, since I was already off on a quilting tangent, why not dive off and do

some of my Paper Mache' Figurines?  There were two weeks to kill, waiting for my yardage for the quilt borders, so Why Not?

Here are the fruits of that labor:

Three sweet Christmas Angels.

 
Four Folk Art Santas:
 

A couple of my Primitive Halloween Gourd Characters:

 

All of the Mache' Characters are up for sale on etsy:

https://www.etsy.com/shop/KellyClarkStudio?ref=si_shop

So, to bring us to a close.  I am finally winding down on these tangents...it has been a bit of a frenetic, schizophrenic journey in a way.  And it was impossible to stay on course with any needlepoint stitching while I was in the swirling Vortex of my insane textile-quilting-character work.  In fact, I literally could not stitch.  My brain was being pulled by this unseen force to work in the other mediums.  There is no part of what I felt that was rational.

It felt more like an Obsession.  

But I can feel that it has released me a bit...

Over the weekend,  I  pulled out some stitching and was able to work a bit on Scaredy Crow and hope to finish him very soon.  No New Projects until I clear up about 7 needlepoint pieces from my UN-finished project pile!  More about that next time!