Batik Fabric Swap Project Completed

At our meeting in November, we each brought one yard of batik fabric.  We took our yard of batik fabric and folded it in half, then snipped the edge and ripped it into two pieces.  The piece in my left hand, I got to keep. The piece in my right hand I gave to the quilter to my right.  The quilter on my left, gave me half of the piece she had ripped.  Then we each took the piece we received from the left and ripped it in half and passed half of it to our right.  We did this seven times.  We each took our pieces of fabrics home to make something and bring it in to show at our February meeting.  It was quite fun.  Many interesting projects were presented, several tote bags, organizers, table runners, etc.  I made a wall hanging using the hexagon technique I saw in Material Obsession 2.  Dimensions:  22.5" X 24.5"

Title: Cosmic Compass

I used up every bit of the 'tadpole' fabric, the gold fabric, and the grayish blue fabric, with just scraps of the blue/red left over. I used the rest of the gold fabric and grayish blue on the back of the wall hanging. I also used a couple odd scraps from my stash on the back.  I stitched in the ditch and stitched across the grayish blue, between the dark parts, so you cannot see the stitching. The binding is not a batik, but black with green dots from my stash.  It turned out pretty good for an experiment!

First Day of Winter - Here's my summer sea side wallhanging!

My quilting niece, whom I used to quilt with every Wednesday night until she went into the Navy, has finished her tour of duty.  She is now a stay-at-home Mom.  She is back into the quilting fold and lives out-of-state.  We wanted to do a project so we made a couple rules then picked a theme and away we went.  Of course she went faster than me, because I have a full-time job, a freshly retired husband, and various community commitments.  I did get it done around the first part of December.  I am loving it!

I was going to try and use fabrics that I already had, but something for a seaside theme was going to be very difficult.  Then a friend wanted to go to First Thursday at The Cotton Club, and so we went.  I looked at their batiks and found four that I decided would be good for an ocean, sand, sky, and a beach house.  Turned out the seagull batik was too dark and busy for the sky, so I used it for the border.  I already had couple other batiks and the grunge basics fabrics.  I like to call this wall hanging "Batiks Meet Grunge Basics".  I like how the grunge basics give a sun baked, weathered look to the houses.  The idea for the design was from a magazine.  A friend of the featured quilter, Lynn Edwards, had given her a wall hanging with an ocean, boat, and two beach houses as the main design.  This is my take on a similar wall hanging -no plaids or stripes here.  What you may not have noticed is the lace curtains in the windows.  One of the requirements of the project was to use a piece of lace.  When Quilting Niece got this in the mail, we skyped and I opened the one I got from her, while she opened the one she received from me.  It was sooo much fun!  And she gave me a cute little message owl, that she sewed as well.  When I hang hers in my quilt room, I will post a photo!