RECYCLE

This is my 'glutton for punishment' quilt, i.e. my second competition entry!

Yes a very different style from me, but it was a laugh making it.  As a quilter, surely there is only one way to recycle, and that is the tried and tested way of course, cutting up your husband's wardrobe!

The background fabric was painted by me.  I used salt to give a splodgy effect.  You will probably have to click on the photo to see this in detail.  This was actually one of the first pieces of fabric that I painted, years ago.  Finally I  have been able to use it.

I painted the word recycle (using fabric paint) onto the fabric, using freezer paper as stencils.

Before Alan left for work, I got him to take a photo of me.  I am supposed to be looking surprised.  I think I only succeeded in looking fat!

I took one of Alan in his dressing gown.  The boring man would not do the naked pin up pose for me, despite my pleas. What a spoilsport!  Maybe if enough people requested it...

Back to the quilt!  Using an idea that I had taken from the Quilting Arts DVD, 'Stitch Imagery', I loosely watercolour painted the photo onto watercolour paper.  That hefty line of blush was a mistake, which I later photoshopped out.

I only painted in the detail I wanted for the quilt.  I was using a much more complex image than they used on the dvd (a few cotton reels), so I had to really simplify things. 

Once dry, the paintings were scanned into the computer.

I then printed the scans out onto ready prepared photo fabric.  As you can see from the middle image of me, the colour was really weak, so I had to go back into editing and punch up the colour.  The result was still very muted (left), but the DVD had explained that, so no problem as far as I was concerned.

Using fabric paint, I painted over the images, to punch up the colour.  The mistake I made was doing this at night, under yellow lighting.  I also used a weak mix of paint.  In the morning, when I put the figures on the background fabric, they were swamped by its colour.

I went back over the colours with stronger fabric paint and Derwent Coloursoft pencils on the flesh and shirts.  Soft pencils are great for adding colour to fabric, as are crayons.  If you are at all interested in this method, get hold of Gabrielle Swain's DVD, Master Class, Borrowed Tools.  I highly recommend it.

I didn't want to waste a sheet of expensive photo paper to add the text bubbles and lines of text.  I cut freezer paper to A4 size and ironed it to white fabric, which I had previously washed to remove the sizing.  I cut the fabric to the exact size.  I put it into the printer as regular paper and printed on it.  I then iron set it.

The problem with this method is that it can really get jammed into your printer.  A second sheet that I tried to print with text, stuck a couple of times.  I realised after that I should have cut the fabric just a smidgen smaller than the freezer paper.  As for how colourfast this method is, I wouldn't use it on anything that I was worried about.  On this quilt, if it starts to fade, I'll just go over it with a fabric dye pen.

The shirts are my favourite part of this quilt.  They were really fiddly to sew (lots of thread and bobbin changes), but they look so (and I can't believe I am going to say this word), cute!

I had originally planned to bleach the letters out using a bleach stick, but decided that paint was a more sure way of getting the result I wanted.  To make the letters a bit more interesting, I turned the letter L into a ruler, using a fabric dye pen.  I also outlined them with a line of black thread, which is only noticeable close up, but helps the letters pop out at you.  For the same reason, I didn't quilt within the letters either.

As you can see, my signature 'quilt the hell out of it' style prevails, even on a small quilt like this, and if I ever make a DVD, that is what I am going to call it!

I thought of all sorts of fancy designs, but decided that the background was busy enough with all the colour, so just did a simple meandering loop-de-loop.

The most interesting part of this quilt however, became what happened to the back and binding.  You may recall that I had wanted to have an envelope style, with my previous quilt, but had decided against it, for fear that judges would hold hiding the back (where knots and tangles show), against me.  For you non quilters, I mean a back that covers all the quilting and doesn't have binding.  The benefit of that is that the front of the quilt would look rather like an unframed canvas.

I decided that this wasn't a quilt that was going to win any prizes so I could happily use that method.  I therefore put plain white fabric onto the back, intending to cover it later using the same fabric as on the front.  However, when I finally finished quilting and looked at the back, I thought it looked amazing, and certainly far too good to be covered over, so I spent some time carefully cutting and burying all those tiny knots that I had previously thought  would not need to be taken care of.

Those who have quilted with me know that I hate working with white fabric on quilts and that I rarely use it, so I was surprised that I liked an all white back.  However all the blue stippling and my preference of using the same colour in the bobbin, as the thread I use on top, really paid off.  The back really doesn't look bleached white now.  It was actually quite a pity to have a hanging sleeve on the quilt, hiding away some of the back, as the letters really stood out.

All in all, this quilt worked out better than I thought, given the lack of any thought time behind it.