Silk Quilts

There is nothing quite like cuddling under a silk quilt ... especially one that has personal meaning. My friend, Alicia, and I created quilts as mutual Christmas presents for three of our friends with silk scarves that had belonged to the mother of two of them and an older friend to all of them.

Each of them is about 60"x 60" and batted with wool. Silk yardage, as well as silk-like fabrics are combined with the scarves to complete the designs on the fronts and backs. The exception is the backing of this one made for our friend who has grandchildren. The cotton batik and yardage on the back makes it a bit sturdier for her to cuddle under and read stories with them.

Two scarves also make up the front of the one above. The quilt below has one in the center set on point and the corner triangles are made from another cut diagonally into four sections. The green fabric is "silk cotton" by Robert Kaufman. The color selection was limited when we shopped for it. How well it blended in with this and the next pictured quilt surprised us. The print fabric on the back of this one is a rayon blend.

A center scarf is set square and another one is cut into corner blocks for the quilt below. They are combined with silk yardage to complete the design. The same purple satin is on all four sides around the outside edge of the back and that's the same green satin cotton in the center diamond.

This one had been planned for one of those three friends. That is until the son of one the women whose scarves were used for these quilts saw it. He fell madly in love with it, so this quilt will be his when Alicia finishes burying the quilting thread ends and hand-stitching the binding in place.

The top has one scarf on point in the center, two small scarves cut in half to complete the center square, plus another one cut into corner blocks framing black silk panels. On the back there are two cotton prints on the outside edges between the silk corner blocks.

The cuddle quilts I make are made as gifts for people I care about, be they family members or personal friends or someone in need of comfort and warmth. Most of my art pieces have price tags, but not these symbols of my love and care for those who receive them. An exception is the man who's getting that last quilt. He absolutely, positively would not accept it as a gift even though Alicia and I wanted him to have it. Our compromise is that he pay for the materials we had purchased to make all four quilts. Now she and I have the pleasure to find a way to splurge on something fun for both of us to do the next time we're together.

More Silk Scarves

The third quilt made from silk scarves is quilted* ...

It's ready for Alicia to hide the thread ends and hand stitch the binding in place. I stood on a ladder to take the picture of the quilt on the floor ... it really is square.

Another use that I've found for beautiful silk scarves is to employ them as covers for my sewing machines between uses. Right now I'm using two floral ones. I may switch them out next fall.

Also, I've wrapped my plain metal lamps with scarves which were hand-dyed by friends. Personally I rarely wear scarves, so I'm glad to have found ways to enjoy having them.

For more ideas of ways to utilize scarves go to this post, "Scarves Aren't Made For Just "Around Your Neck" at this link.

 * To see the other cuddle quilts made with scarves go here.

Arte y Pico Award

Doreen of Creative Meanderings has thought me worthy of this award. Many thanks to her and all of you who visit here to share in my creative adventures.

Speaking of which, I found a piece in my photo files that I haven't yet shared with you. It was created in 1997 to celebrate the 5th wedding anniversary of our older son and daughter-in-law.

The First Five Years - 34"x 31"

It began much earlier than the construction of it. The basis of this piece is a purchased hand-batiked crepe silk scarf. When I saw the batiked pieces created by Jan Tice in Jackson Wyoming it was an effort for me to control the whelm of feelings they provoked. I purchased two scarves. The other one is still waiting for a transformation.
I cut the scarf into segments and combined them with a Burgundy silk crepe fabric sample and a piece of Italian hand-painted silk satin. Structurally, that white satin is a whole cloth under all the piecing. I used the technique of foundation piecing to get it all together. Chenille yarn is couched to finish fringed edges of silk where another piece couldn't be "sewn and flipped" within the composition.
There is much symbolism within this wall quilt. Of course, the two figures plus multiples of five. The geckos represent "letting go and self-protection" and the dragonflies portray "wild and free spirits", while the crane is the symbol for long life, prosperity and good health. The sun 's rays is shining over all and there are many hearts for romantic love. Of course, I had no idea that I was portraying what would be the result of their romantic love ... the twin boys running in opposite directions with lots of commotion as seen at the bottom right.

This piece was made back when I did nothing but hand quilting. It's done with a heavy orange thread. Here's the template I made up for the rings of hearts.
It was awarded an Honorable Mention in 1997 Dogwood Arts Quilt Show. It hangs in Evanston, Illinois.
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There are 5 rules attached to this award and they are :

1. You have to pick 5 blogs that you consider deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also contributes to the blogging community, no matter what language.
2. Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his/her blog to be visited by everyone.
3. Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her/him the award itself.
4. The Award winner and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of Arte Y Pico blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award (blogger in Uruguay).
5. To show these rules.

NOW my nominations for this award:

1. Arlee who is wildly creative at Albedo
2. Judy who's depth overwhelms me at Judy's Journal
3. Paula who impresses the hell out of me at Self-taught Artist
4. Karen who does imaginative stitchery at Threadstory
5. Anne who does amazing work at Grains in the Wind

There are many other talented artists whose blogs I read and I would nominate all of them if I could. So rest assured, that if I visit yours regularly you are one of them.

Handkerchief Quilts

A number of years ago my friend had viewed a traveling exhibit in Milwaukee of quilts made with handkerchiefs. This prompted her to give the book about the exhibition, "Handkerchief Quilts" by Pat Long Gardner, to me along with her own collection. They were souveneirs from her brother who brought them back from AFS trips abroad during the 1950's. I made a wall hanging as a Christmas present for her several years ago with one that came from France. I was so pleased to have the most appropriately printed fabric for the inner border already in my stash. It also happened that there was the striped fabric on my shelves for the outer border that perfectly matched the colors in the handkerchief as well. It is hand-quilted.
Recently I made this piece using her hanky that had come from Germany.The border is a silk crepe scarf belonging to a lady who is one-hundred years old. I combined the two in this piece to honor the wonderful, caring friendship between my friend and her friend, Alice.
I wanted to retain the scarf's identity by keeping the original hem finish. To accomplish this I couched a finer orange yarn a 1/2" from the hemmed edge. The seam line on the back gave me a guide as well as a place to blind-stitch hem the backing in place. This left the original edge of the scarf to "flutter" but still stand up on the top of the piece.
The scarf border is machine quilted along the zig-zag lines and yarn is couched over the straigt lines. A fine rayon flat cord is couched over the lines between the cards in the handkerchief. I then zig-zag stitched between two fine lines that were printed around the outside edge of each card.

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