Still fiddling with these ovals, trying a new layout on for size before I start sewing the suckers down.
This project started out as a variation on Amy Butler’s patchwork duvet pattern. See an earlier post about it here. The original pattern calls for a patchwork background topped by these ovals, but I decided just to do the ovals on top of a plain light green background.
Last time I was laying these out, I was still following the general layout of the original pattern (see the earlier post), but that design minus the patchwork background seems too static to me. I’m liking this much better. What do you think? Of course you have to imagine away the navy blue because it will be light green in the end.
I’m not loving the colors as much as I did when I started, but oh well. I’m committed now, and I’m ready to finish this thing. I got really bogged down with the ovals because of some fabric shortage issues, which led to some creative piecing on the fly.
Meanwhile, I’m inching toward the finish line on the Cuppa Cuppa Patchwork. Stay tuned.
Also, I just started the Blogging Your Way e-course with Holly Becker of decor8. Looks like it’s going to be a good time.
Have a great weekend!
By: Emily Smith Pearce,
on 1/26/2011
Blog:
Emily Smith Pearce
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Here’s a sneak peak at another patchwork project I’ve been pecking away at for a long time. I’m feeling the need to finish these bedcovers lately, so hopefully I’ll have more to show you soon.
This patchwork pattern is a modified version of an Amy Butler design (Patchwork Duvet Cover) from her book, In Stitches. It started out as thrifted clothes I picked up on one trip to the Goodwill in Charlotte. Here’s an early pic:
I decided this print (below), though I liked it, had too much white to work in the design, so I used fabric paint to darken the white to a kind of purplish brown color. You can see the result in the first photo. It’s a watercolor-type paint, so it doesn’t change the “hand” (the feel) of the fabric much.
The oval appliques will go on a light green background when I finish the last few. I tried laying them out on white (top photo) but I didn’t think it worked so well. What do you think?
I've gone a little
Ripple crazy. Thank goodness it's for a great cause. Above is the Junk A Doodle I got from one of my favorite illustrators,
Holli Conger. So love this!
When Devon of
Devon Industry posted this painting on her blog I wanted it badly. I suggested she list a print of it in her Etsy
shop and she did, so now it's mine. She's one of my Twitter pals. Love her work!
I'm working on my marketing and promotions this week. I'm ready to up my game. Here's a little sketch I drew last night. I love how ideas seem to come out of nowhere. I've never thought of a dinosaur who's into ballet, but here it is.
This is the Amy Butler Barcelona skirt I finished right before vacation. I used her home dec fabric, too. I love how it feels like it has more structure because of the fabric weight. It's also fully lined! I altered it a bit. There's one whole tier missing. Since I didn't take notes while I made it, I may not be able to repeat it. Oh well.
Poetry and Nature go together like espresso and biscotti, like John and Paul, like tomatoes and garlic. Jane Yolen and Jason Stemple explore the symmetry of nature and verse in their lovely new picture book Shape Me A Rhyme: Natures Form in Poetry.
Shape Me A Rhyme works on two levels. Yolen's straightforward, beautiful verse and Stemple's bold, bright photography make Shape Me A Rhyme perfect for reading aloud to a very young child. Its creative approach to shapes and poetry means this book would work equally well as part of a grade school unit on shapes, nature, or poetry.
Each two-page spread in Shape Me A Rhyme is devoted to one shape. Yolen and Stemple cover the circle, triangle, coil, star, square, heart, arch, wave, oval, fan, rectangle, and crescent in their exploration of shapes in nature. Yolen's subtle humor is present throughout, as in this poem devoted to the square:
A shadow square
Upon a frond
Resides beside
A quiet pond.
Since nature rarely
Seeds a square,
We must make do
With what is there.
How cleanly these lines read, comprising in their sound and meaning the stoic square.
Accompanying Stemple's dynamic photos and Yolen's verse are related words in different fonts scattered about the page. The square, for example, is accented with "block," "tetragon," "quadrate," and "quadrangle."
Read Shape Me A Rhyme to a child today. There's much to discuss--from poetry to natural forms--in its pages.
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Other blog reviews:
5 Minutes for Mom
KidsLit
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Cloudscome is hosting at A Wrung Sponge today. Check out her Found Poetry experiment. I'm going to try this at the rink tomorrow and I'll report back over the weekend.
You are beginning to sound like a pioneer woman. Have you churned any butter lately?
GD Bob
hmmm…good idea. I’ll have to try that next.