Cindy Grisdela ~ art quilter

After several false starts, this is my quilt in progress for the QAWM – Quilt Along with Melody challenge.  I used scraps of the bright novelty fabrics I’ve been collecting for some time–bits and pieces left over from other projects. I made wonky log cabin blocks with black and white centers, then cut them in half and shuffled them. When I laid the quilt out with just these blocks, it was too busy, so I used some of my black and white scraps to make half-square triangles for sashing and borders. It seems counterintuitive, but the busy triangles actually seem to give the eye a place to rest.  I think I’m going to use up some more of the bright scraps and make a piano key border out of irregular strips, but I couldn’t wait to share my progress! Hopefully I’ll be able to post the finished top by the end of the month.

Visit Melody’s blog to learn more about the challenge and see the progress of others taking the challenge.

The beginnings of this piece had been up on my design wall for a couple of months patiently waiting for me to decide how to finish it. But life kept getting in the way–shows, the holidays, my son home from college, the winter doldrums–until a couple of weekends ago I found myself with about 24 hours to myself. Suddenly my creative wheels came unstuck and I was able to focus on the way forward with this.

I think the spiky blocks give it some interesting energy. I plan to hand quilt it with a heavy perle cotton thread. It doesn’t have a name yet–sometimes the right name just comes to me as I’m quilting a piece, so we’ll see about this one.

I’ve got several different projects going on right now–this piece is ready for quilting, a have a commission piece that’s ready for quilting and my scrap quilt for Melody’s challenge is up on the wall. There are fabrics and scraps covering nearly every surface of my studio. I think I need to have a straighten up session so I can think more clearly!

I found that the blocks I was working on for the Quilt-Along-With-Melody challenge were too regular and predictable for me, so I’ve decided to take another route.

I cut 4.5″ squares of black and white fabrics and dumped out all the scraps I’ve been saving from the bright novelty prints I initially said I wanted to put a dent in for this project. I’m using the scraps to make log cabin blocks with irregular strips. I have 12 blocks going and I’m chain-piecing the blocks, picking up random strips and adding them as I go along. When the blocks are finished, I plan to cut them either in half or in quarters and mix them up. Then I’ll sew the blocks back together.

This is much more “me” and I’m happy with it. I was inspired by a new book, Freddy & Gwen Collaborate Again, by Gwen Marston and Freddie Moran. So I’ve been furiously sewing log cabins in between bouts of shoveling snow, which I hope is over now. Working with these bright blocks is good medicine when it’s so wintry outside.

Visit www.fibermania.blogspot.com to see Melody’s progress and check out how others are interpreting the challenge.

Snow Days are relatively new to me, since I grew up in Florida and never even saw snow until I was 18 and in college.  But we’ve had quite a few this winter and since we’re snowed in from the monster storm that hit the DC area this weekend, I’ve been thinking about the idea. Snow days mean you have to slow down. You can’t get out of your driveway, so there’s no place to go, unless you can walk. There’s no newspaper or mail. I can live without the mail, but we get three newspapers a day and I really miss reading them with my morning coffee.

To keep me busy, I have a quilt in the hoop to hand quilt and I’ve learned how to knit. Both of these activities are meditative for me. When I hand quilt I enjoy the slow pace of the needle moving through the fabric and my mind is free and open to new design ideas. Not every project lends itself to hand quilting and I would never give up my machine quilting and go back to doing everything by hand, but I do usually have a hand project going. Knitting is a different activity altogether. I’m not very good at it yet–I’ve finished one scarf and I’m almost finished with another one in a different technique so I can learn something new. I’ve tried to learn to knit three or four times in my life, but I think I’m going to be able to stick with it this time. It will never take the place of quilting for me, but it’s a new way to think about fiber and design, which are my favorite things as an artist.

Snow Days are family days–we make a fire in the fireplace, watch movies, make homemade pizza and eat popcorn. We read books. We reconnect with each other. Snow Days force us to take a break from our busy lives and I think that’s a good thing.

These are my first attempts at the QAWM project – better known as Quilt Along With Melody. At the beginning of the week, Melody issued a challenge on her blog to make simple blocks during February to use up fabric you had laying around. These are novelty prints that I’ve had for a while, but I’m using more batiks and hand-dyed fabrics now, so it seemed like a good idea to use them for something.

I’ve learned something about myself with this project. It’s hard for me to cut up fabric and make blocks without knowing what they’re going to be!

The first two blocks I made were two variations on the pink, green and multi-polka dot blocks. I liked them so much I cut them up and put them into a setting that I think will end up being a pillow. I used up a little bit of fabric on those, but making them into something right away wasn’t the point. So I went back and just started making blocks willy-nilly. And it was hard! I kept thinking about what they wanted to BE. I think this is a good exercise for me to help me loosen up my need to control my designs.

I’m not really happy with the 9 large blocks-they seem too disjointed and well–large. So I’m going to make some more blocks and maybe cut them into smaller blocks like I did with the first set to see if smaller blocks are more appealing to me. Maybe there’s a reason I don’t use these fabrics much any more! I view this project as something to have fun with, not necessarily to come up with a finished product.

Anyway–thanks Melody for the challenge! Click on the link above to read more about the project and see Melody’s progress.