Practicing and Learning

It has been a full on few weeks. I have literally been quilting non-stop, finishing some projects, quilting some charity quilts (one more to go) and doing the online workshop with Bethanne Nemesh.

Must say that Bethanne's workshop is fantastic...very structured and organised and very intense which I love, of course.

I have been practicing on and off as time allowed. Here are some of the things that I have stitched out over the last two weeks.

More of the curls

A couple of wreaths

Love this last one (no idea why the colour is different...it's the same fabric taken at the same moment) and planning to do it again a bit more pronounced and neater around the outside.

And then today I stitched out an Amish feather spray which looks incredibly involved but was not too bad at all. My only issue was making my feathers a bit larger than usual to fill up the enormous space I had around me. Was really pleased with it though as this is stitched freehand and on a practice piece which I am always a bit more sloppy on. Would feel very comfortable stitching this out on a quilt.

This is only a small selection of the practice that I have done. I did practice a number of other things but that is just more of the same. So happy to be back to feather quilting and being able to straighten out some bad habits and learn some of the finer points of quilting feathers.

This month will be wholecloth quilting...I think there is a wall hanging we can do and then there is my design I finally and definitely want to stitch out. Given that Christmas is around the corner this will probably take me right through to January. Very exciting and very motivating...not sure how I will fit all this in as there are a number of other little things that need finishing.

Karin

Excited Plus!

I am getting a bit excited over here. I have enrolled in Bethanne Nemesh' online Freehand Feather Fiesta class which will start on 6th of November.

I have done one of Bethanne's classes in person some years ago - Feather Faster and completed this wall hanging after the class. The class was a drawing class and the wall hanging was suggested as a follow up. Still hanging proudly in our family room.

Apart from this I stitched out a sample of the various feathers she talked about...

...and that was it! From then on I continued on my familiar way of doing feathers, maybe incorporating tiny elements here and there but not really applying what I had learned at all. I found it extraordinarily difficult to loosen up my more formal feathers.

The current online class will go until March 2022 and is promising to be jam-packed. There will be some repetition for me as the Feather Faster concepts are incorporated in the class but I thought that this is a bonus in terms of cementing what I am learning. I will do that Birds on the Wire wall hanging again (she posted some lovely hand-dyed fabric) and have a look how my feathering is changing (hopefully).

Very excited about this as Bethanne is an excellent teacher. I am still using one of the hints she gave me in the drawing class to prevent my feathers from 'falling over'...very simple but so effective. Also have watched several of her FB videos that you can find on her web site. Always full of very useful tips and information.

As I have been mainly writing patterns and quilting away to get some quilts done, I sat down to do a bit of a feather doodle the other day. Wanted to empty a bobbin and also resurrect my somewhat rusty feather skills.

Yep, still good and ready to go...just reading through some of the class material has given me a few new and very exciting ideas about wholecloth quilts that I would like to try. Plan is to start a wholecloth in December (one that has been sitting around for a few years as a design waiting to be stitched out) and hopefully producing another more elaborate one in the new year. Can't wait!

Karin