Teaching? Am I ready?

I have been tentatively contacted about teaching a short workshop about how to use different threads in free motion quilting and I believe I am ready to take the plunge.  I have been saying that I'm not ready to teach yet as I am really committed to creating my fiber art, but when this possible opportunity was presented to me I felt like it was something I could really do and am ready to do.  I have done extensive quilting on many of my quilts and used numerous types of thread in the process.  I know what kind of needles I like, what I do when I have tension issues, how I handle skipped stitches, and how I plan/determine motifs for quilting.  I can share what I know in a short workshop that may be very helpful to people who are just starting to venture into quilting their own work, particularly small pieces.  Even if they are making placemats, tablerunners, or pillows, this is a topic that could be helpful to many and just maybe I could make a difference.  I'd like to see more beginners learning how to do their own quilting instead of sending everything they make to a long arm quilter to complete for them.  

If I hope to make any money at this endeavor, I really need to start teaching, writing, and sharing whatever knowledge I might have.  Up until now I haven't really thought that I had anything unique or original to share, but I have been doing a lot of free motion quilting and working on perfecting it for myself.  So maybe I have enough knowledge and have worked out enough problems that I would be able to help others to improve their free motion quilting.  

Now that this seed has been planted in my head, I have begun thinking about what other workshops I might offer, like how to plan out your free motion quilting or fit designs into specific spaces.  How to use the quilting to draw the eye across the quilt or to highlight or mute certain areas of a piece.  How to use doodling on paper to help come up with new quilting patterns and practice the rhythm and motion of certain quilting designs.  How to vary quilting designs in order to have variety in a piece and maintain some unity or cohesiveness.  How to create an abstract piece that is balanced, interesting, and completely original.  How to use embellishments such as beads, yarns, paint, stamps, etc. to enhance and create interest in a quilt.

Any of those interest YOU?   We'll see if this current opportunity with the local quilt group pans out or not.  If there is enough interest I'm very willing to give it a go.  If not, maybe I can try setting up a class through the local fabric shop since she has been looking for people to teach classes.  

There seems to be no end to the ideas for quilts in my head these days.  I have been able to create one piece after another with very little down time in between.  Some have been more successful than others, but most of them are acceptable pieces and several of them have sold in recent months.  My only problem is not having enough time to just create without the other obligations of life getting in the way.  Even the business aspects of my activity take more time than I would like---entering shows, pursuing gallery exhibitions, keeping track of expenses, keeping an updated and accurate inventory, etc.etc.etc..!  

I don't have any new quilt pics to put out here just yet, but here a couple of pictures I took the other day when there was some wonderful early morning sunlight and frost patterns in the yard and garden.  Enjoy!

Thanksgiving and Christmas

So, I'm finally getting back to my blog after a "brief" intermission.  On Thanksgiving Day my mother was put on a Life Flight plane and flown from Missoula, Montana to Houston, Texas for emergency surgery to repair her aorta. My dad went with her, my brother went on Thanksgiving day, and I followed the next day.  The surgery to replace a section of her aortic arch went very well (had a world-reknown topnotch surgeon!) and there were only a couple of days of high level stress!  Aside from some minor issues with med reactions, she has been steadily recovering, is back home now, and is doing very well.  There were a few stressful days for my parents when they weren't sure whether they would be able to get on a plane to fly home because her picture I.D. was wandering around somewhere in the UPS "overnight express" system--and my mom was more than ready to get out of the hospital and back to Montana!.  Luckily they had enough documentation to get through security and made it home.

I got home just in time to hang some of my work at The Beaded Pony here in Stevensville and to be there for the opening reception on First Friday.  There were a good number of people through to view my work, and I even sold a piece which was very exciting.  It was one of my favorite pieces called "Copper Leaves Dancing" and I know the buyer will enjoy it in their home as I have enjoyed it in mine!  I really appreciate the opportunity to show my work even if there aren't many/any sales, but it is nice to sell something once in a while!  I also sold a small piece at the Stevensville Art & Sculpture Society (SASS) holiday art show, and the ornament I made for the Art City gallery in Stevensville recently sold.     

There is a new gallery in Stevensville called "River's Mist" on Main Street and I have contacted the owner and will be showing my work there as a featured artist for the month of May, 2010.  This is a really lovely gallery with a great mix of quality artwork, and I am pleased that the owner has agreed to display my work.  I look forward to creating some new pieces to show in this great space.

I just finished the piece that I showed pictures of in my September 13 post (in progress) and it turned out really nice.  I like the quilting and beading, but am still trying to convince myself that it is enough.  It is always a debate with myself as to whether or not I am done embellishing a piece or if it needs something more.  I haven't put the sleeve or label on yet so there's still time!!   When I have the pieced photographed I will post the finished work.

I also finished a couple of pieces for my recent TARTS (Textile Arts) class on using fusible web as surface design on quilts.  One pieces uses foil on the web to create webby-looking metallic color and I did some 3-dimensional design  on this piece.  Originally I was going to cut up the quilted piece to make some ornaments out of it, but ended up twisting strips and attaching them to the base so they arc up over the piece.  Hard to explain, but I will get a picture of it and post it here.  It is in black, white, and purple.  The other piece uses Pearl Ex Powder to color Misty Fuse (just shake a 1/2 tsp in a baggie with the piece of Misty Fuse) and then I adhered it and quilted it to a quilt.  The powder I had was a bronzey/coppery color and very pretty over the black fabric that I put it on.  I quilted a feather medallion centerpiece on it and it creates a very pretty relief and has a nice sheen to it.  Once again, when I get a good picture of it I will post it for you! 

I apologize for not having any pictures at this time, but I will get them soon!  I'm sure you are all as busy as I am this time of year, and having a seven year old there are much more fun things to do this time of year than messing around with digital photos on the computer!  

My son and I have been having a good time making beaded snowflakes.  I took him to The Beaded Pony for one of their short workshops and he learned how to create them.  We bought some extra wire forms and have been busy making many different patterns and designs.  It is fun to see what different beads do and how different combinations look.  There are as many possibilities for bead design as there are real snowflake patterns!   We have talked ourselves into parting with some of them for gifts, but are keeping our most favorites of course.  They will be this year's addition to our Christmas ornaments.  I have made something new for the tree every year since Michael was born, and in recent years he has helped.  

I wish you the very, merriest Christmas and a truly Happy New Year!  May you be blessed with good health, happiness, and financial security.  Create, imagine, or dream every day.  It is good for your soul.  It has done mine wonders!!

Dates for Holiday Shows

I thought better put some dates on here for my "holiday" venues so that all you local friends can try to see my pieces on display---and maybe considering buying something?  Art quilts make great gifts!

November 20 (Friday) - Outdoorsmen Church (12208 Pulp Mill Rd, West of Missoula) - Lady's Harvest Festival- 6:30pm 

November 22 (Sunday) - Art City Gallery, Main Street, Hamilton - Holiday Open House 2pm-5 or 6pm -   Several of my pieces will remain on display at the gallery.

December 4 (Friday) - First Friday:  Stevensville Art & Sculpture Society  Holiday Art Show - Stevensville Hotel

December 4 (Friday) - The Beaded Pony, Main Street, Stevensville - Solo Exhibition - Evening Reception -  Exhibit will be on display through December.

ENJOY!

Halloween/Entries/PIQF

I recently heard from another juried fiber art gallery show that I attempted to enter, and as has been the norm, I did not get in. I had sent in three pieces to be considered and I guess they were not competitive enough. This particular show received over 250 entries and accepted 50, so I am definitely not alone. And it probably won't be the last time I don't get in to an art show!

I am still waiting to hear from the Art Meets Science exhibition as to whether any of those entries are accepted. I should hear in the next few days. The time waiting is always a bit painful--particularly when it ends in a "decline" notification! This is a SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates) sponsored show so only SAQA members are allowed to enter, but there are a great many of those!

I am still working on small pieces for an attempt at some holiday sales. I have been showing them wherever I go and because of that I just sold two of them to friends. It is definitely worth showing pieces off to anyone willing to look! That means I need to make some more so I have small ones to hang in two shows in the next two weeks. Here are a couple of "in process" photos of one of the small pieces I hope to sell:

Halloween was fun with my 7-year old this year. He wanted to be a Ninja and I talked him out of that by suggesting one of his favorite movie stars----Groucho Marx! I made a big brown cigar, some felt eyebrows and mustache, and found some wire frame glasses at the thrift shop. I put him in a white shirt, black pants, a large suit jacket, and a skinny tie. He looked really cute and funny, but he was rather disappointed that none of the kids knew who he was! His teacher knew immediately and told him a story about her parents taking her baby sister to a baseball game and being asked by Groucho Marx to let him hold her and she ended up watching the game with him. Michael was impressed. Even most of the parents are too young to know who he was (I'm one of those older moms!). I heard a couple of them agreeing that he must be the guy from the Monopoly game (I think they were referring to the banker). When I took him to a community event on Halloween most of the adults running the games and many of the people with their kids or grandkids knew who he was and loved the costume. He just wanted to take it off----the eyebrows itched! He has to put it on one more time so I can take pictures since I keep forgetting to get out the camera when he has it on!

A friend of my mom's went to the Pacific International Quilt Festival (PIQF) in California where I recently had two quilts exhibited. She sent me some pictures of my pieces hanging there. I was very disappointed to see that they were both hanging at the bottom of the panels they were on, near the floor. It is my experience that when pieces are hung underneath other pieces and near the floor they are virtually invisible to most passersby and get very little attention. They just do not get good light and are below eye level so people don't notice them. It is really too bad as they both have wonderful beading and quilting on them that if they were hung at eye level would catch the light and show well. I did receive a very nice e-mail from a woman I didn't know from Seattle who also went to the show and did manage to notice my pieces and really enjoyed them. She then checked out my website and blog and was very complimentary about my work. I thought it was very nice of her to take the time to share that with me and I really appreciated that she took the time to e-mail me. The judges' comments on both of my pieces were also very complimentary and I was very appreciative of those as well. One of these days they'll be good enough to actually win an award at one of these shows!

I need to get a binding stitched on my latest piece so I can move to the next one!

Creating Small Works to Sell for the Holiday Shows

Long time no write!  I just had to share the pictures above that I took of an early morning October sunrise.  It was truly awe-inspiring.

I have been busy creating and trying to get some small art works done for the holiday venues I have lined up. I will be showing my work at a gallery in Hamilton, Montana called Art City beginning with their holiday show at the end of November. I will have some pieces at our local Stevensville Art and Sculpture Society (SASS) holiday show on the first Friday in December, and I will show (sell?) some pieces at our church's holiday fair on November 20. In order to actually make some sales at the events I think I need to make some smaller, simpler pieces that I can price a bit lower than my usual work. I am finding it difficult not to spend too much time on these small pieces or putting on too many pricey beads which might bring up the cost, but I'm giving it the old college try. I am enjoying just putting together wonderful fabrics and covering them with intricate quilting. Hopefully someone else will find them worthy of hanging on their wall or giving as a gift. Wish me luck!

Here are a few small pieces I made this week:

I recently put in an entry to a show entitled "Art Meets Science" sponsored by SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates). I submitted three pieces I felt had strong scientific themes to them, and now I am waiting to hear whether or not any of them will be accepted. This is another traveling show and starts out in Birgminham, England at the Festival of Quilts and hits some other really good shows as well. I would really love to get into this one. One of the pieces has a centerpiece that is painted using a blue glue resist and was created to look like blood cells, although the coloration is green and blue (artistic license!). It is called "Sangre Azul" which means "Blue Blood" in Spanish. The term "Blue Blood" refers to the light skinned aristocratic Spaniards (as opposed to the dark-skinned Moors), and how the blood appears blue under their light skin. I wasn't able to verbalize this in my artist's statement as it doesn't connect the piece to science necessarily (and I could only use 25 words), but I thought it was interesting.

Tomorrow we are having a brunch for my parents who recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. My sister and I both love to cook for parties like this and usually get rather carried away, but I tried to keep control of myself this time. I will be putting a ham in the crockpot in the middle of the night, but other than that the preparation has been and will be fairly easy. I am doing a couple of new recipes, so that is always risky, but I usually have pretty good luck in selecting good recipes. And if not, the Boca Negra (Black Mouth), which is an (almost) flourless chocolate cake with white chocolate cream, will leave everyone with a giddy, happy feeling! It's the best! (I've made it several times and it always comes out reallllllly good!)

My pieces came back from the Pacific International Quilt Festival (PIQF) this week and the comments from the judges were very complimentary. I didn't win any awards, but they didn't have any negative comments either. I had a very nice e-mail from a woman from Seattle who went to the show and admired my pieces there. She proceeded to check out my website and blog and then let me know how much she enjoyed them. That positive feedback sure was nice. All the pictures I have seen posted on the web from PIQF don’t' show any work that is like mine with lots of beading (including fringe), although that is sometimes difficult to see in pictures. I'm going to try to enter these two pieces in some of the art quilt shows coming up this next year.

I took my son in today to get the nasal mist of the H1N1 vaccine and was able to get it for myself as well. Since it is free and I would feel awful if he got sick and I didn't do this, it was well worth the effort. A family from our church has a very sick boy with this flu, and I would never want to go through the agony they are dealing with. I think there is way too much "scare" about this flu, but when it comes to my son, I lean towards "better safe than sorry"!

This week I'm planning to get several new small pieces completed. I'm hoping that my husband gets his deer that he is hunting for, but not until at least Thursday so I have the beginning of the week to hibernate in my studio!

New Website and Work-in-Progress

 Please visit my new website at www.heidizielinski.com and let me know if you have any difficulties with it or have any suggestions. My husband created it for me and this is his first foray into website design.  We are working the kinks out and trying to perfect the details.  We wanted to get it out there as soon as possible, so hopefully it is maneuverable and attractive.   

Below is a piece as it was a week ago on my design wall with just some fabric choices and a rough idea of shapes and placement.

Now here is the piece as it is right now after I have cut and machine appliqued all the fabric in place and am in the process of determining bead placement. It is not yet quilted, but definitely looks better than the previous pic (doesn't it??!!).  Sorry about the dark picture, it is in my sewing room on the floor as that is how I have to audition the beads on it.  I'm thinking about quilting most of it in black threads (metallic, sliver, rayon, etc.).   

I just found out that two of my pieces were accepted into the Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara, California which is near San Francisco.   It is my understanding that this show usually has a lot of innovative quilts so I guess mine will fit in well.  The two that will be going are "Twilight" and "From Winter We Emerge" which are both pieces with lots of beading, and they are two of my favorite ones.  Please wish them a safe journey as I am still gun shy after losing my small auction donation quilt in the US mail (although these will be shipped UPS!)

The Yellowstone Quilt Fest in Cody, Wyoming happened over the weekend, so the SAQA Fibrations exhibit  (that my piece entitled "In A Heartbeat" is traveling with) was probably taken down .  That show will now travel to the Rocky Mountain Quilt Museum in Colorado for a longer exhibit there.  I am anxiously awaiting pictures from the show in Cody to see how the quilts were exhibited and what the other 47 pieces in the show are like!

I took a few of my smaller (translate:  lower priced) pieces into a small co-op gallery in Hamilton, Montana to see if they would be interested in displaying some of them.  I haven't heard back from them yet as the artist/members need to look at them and then they will let me know.  At the end of this month my mom and I will be traveling up to Kalispell, Montana for their quilt show and stopping in Big Fork to visit a gallery there and show them my work.  Last time I spoke with them they didn't have room for another artist, so I'll just try again.   Hoping that showing them my pieces in person will endear them to my work and they won't be able to resist!

A friend of mine gave me a small mixed media piece using some silk fibers and asked me to create a quilt around it so that it could be used as a demo for our next TARTS (textile arts) program.  The piece turned out really nice and we both like it.  Below is a picture of the center mixed media piece that my friend made, minus the red beads which I added.  The completed quilt is at In Good Company right now so I can't show you pictures of it yet.  In the meantime you can imagine what could be done with this little gem!  My son has started first grade and I am looking forward to a week of working in my studio uninterrupted.  Summer was fun and I love my little boy, but I can't say I'm not glad that school has begun!

I'm ready to spray baste the work in progress at the beginning of this post and then to begin quilting on it, so I will try to include another in-progress picture before posting the completed piece.  

Spray Paint on Fabric and Blue Glue Resist

This week we had the second meeting of the art discussion group that I recently organized. We met at a member's beautiful home and had a wonderful time visiting, sharing and doing an interesting fabric project. The project involved spraying spray paint onto water in a tub and then laying a piece of fabric over it to pick up the paint. We used many different paints including metallics. The results were varied and definitely interesting. Sometimes the paint kind of bubbled up and didn't adhere to the fabric and then tended to flake off. On other pieces the paint was thinner and seems to be pretty well adhered to the fabric. One suggestion was to overlay black netting to help contain the paint, although there might still be some flaking. The colors and patterns were wonderful. The movement of the water causes wonderful swirls and motion in the pattern of paint. This is an easy project and with some very usable results.

A recent project for my textile arts class was to use Elmer's Blue Gel glue to draw on fabric creating a resist. Let it dry and then use thinned fabric paints to paint between the lines however you wish. Let that dry and then heat set it using a press cloth to protect your iron and pressing surface. Then let it soak and occasionally agitate it in warm/hot water to dissolve the water soluble glue (I had to kind of rub and run hot water over it to get the residue off completely). The pieces I created came out really beautiful and I have already finished (quilted) two pieces which I really like. I don't have pictures at this time, but will post them soon---check back!

Please check out www.saqa.com and view the auction quilts that will up for sale starting September 10. This is a reverse auction so they start at a high price and it goes down each day, with a low of $75 on the last day. There are some beautiful pieces by extremely and talented, and some well-known, fiber artists. My donation never did show up and appears to have been eaten by the U.S. mail service. It was a lovely little piece so I am rather sad to not have it included in the auction to help raise money for this organization. This group works to promote fiber art as an art form throughout the world through it's continuous exhibitions and publications and any other means of promotion. I have sent off my piece entitled "In A Heartbeat" to travel with the Fibrations exhibition starting September 11 in Cody, Wyoming at the Yellowstone Quilt Fest. I am honored to be included.