Art Quilts by Mary Schilke

Springtime Quilt

2009-12-15T20:35:00.002-05:00

Was great to work on this quilt on a snowy day

The Jackie Bag From One Song

2009-10-04T16:38:00.011-04:00

Ok , Now I love these bags and you can learn from my mistakes I just made the Jackie, This bag came out much nicer as I used Dream Poly select ( black) . I took pictures along the way and I will tell you what I would do differently the next time I make one. In the photo on the left I set the Block to be 15"wide and 20" long I rotated the bag vertical so I could stich both halves and the squares without rolling. After I stitched out the 2 bag halves , I used the measure function to determine the size of the square to wrap around the top of the bag handles. My Handles were aprox
2 inches wide so I made the block 4 1/4 inches. I then went and cut all 3 Pieces out of the quilted material. ( Next time I would make the square 4 1/2 inches.) It can be difficult to turn this right side out with the thickness of your batting and fabric. I then took the bag and sewed the front and Back seam together with a 1/4 inch allowance next time I would do the 1/2 inch so I could press it open better. Then I stitched across the bottom of the bag. After the tube was finished I inserted One end of the bag into each side and double Stitched it. It was now finished. I still would like to finish the edges but wanted to try this one out quick so all of you could see it. Here is the Bag all sewed together, it is small I would make the width 25 and extend the handles proportionally

One Song Rectangle Bag

2009-10-03T12:00:00.003-04:00

Great fun ! One Song Needle work Rectangular Tote . These are fast to make and would a great present, guild raffle etc . I loaded on a large backing and stitched out 2 at a time. I spray basted the fabric down . Learn from my mistake and think about the direction of the print on your fabric when putting it on machine. I also cut out the little indent before staystitching on the second one and it came out just as good.

light up dog collar

2009-08-03T09:13:00.002-04:00

These are great especially for black pugs!!!

7 week old Pups

2009-06-01T14:06:00.007-04:00

Growing fast, and too cute!!!! They love kids!

Butterflies

2009-06-01T14:03:00.002-04:00

Today a mass of butterflies were in my backyard, Don't know if they just hatched or if they are migrating. They seemed to love this dog toy near the puppies. I don't know what the attraction is.

Uncle Buddy PLaying with 1 month old puppies

2009-05-20T19:14:00.000-04:00

The Puppies have Arrived

2009-05-03T16:58:00.008-04:00

While I was away at MQX , my beloved Betty had 7 puppies. 6 Black Girls ,1 Fawn Boy.
They are purebred pugs, Daddy's name was titus. This is her Picture 1 week before giving birth.

I can't imagine having to feed all those mouths at once! I have taken some shots and filmed some video , Hope you enjoy. Be warned it can get quite nosy!

Here she is Pups are now 2 weeks old ,eyes open and reluctantly letting them nurse.
Cant blame her they are bigger than her .... Time to see if they will bottle feed !

January Quilt Retreat

2009-01-27T15:52:00.004-05:00

Another excellent retreat put on by the Red Barn Quilt shop, After being mangled by a facial( I'll never have one again) where a shoulder massage killed me, I created this quilt. It used 2 jelly rolls and a 2 yard piece of border fabric. This will be for Jake's big boy bed.

Jakes 1st concert

2008-12-26T22:02:00.003-05:00

No description necesary . Too Funny!!! Center in Blue Shirt

Treework- Twilights Gloam or Black Hole Sun

2008-11-25T19:48:00.005-05:00

I piece of fabric, yep that is all I used in this quilt. I had spilled some setacolor on the floor this summer and wiped it up with this cloth, The trees are made out of the ends of the piece I cut off, The dye had not hit that area. I glued the strips down and then I added a little quilting. Of course it is still in progress. I have added magic markers, dye pastel sticks and some black thread but I am going to add lots more stuff.
I want to do some bobbin work on the trees , shredded threads. beading etc but for mow , I have approx 1 hour into the project and it's coming to life.
I love trees, I love the way the light shines through them I could stare at them all day. To not be able to see the light shine thru the trees is a bad day.
I encourage you to try this, it's a great technique very relaxing too!!!!

Tree Work or I should be Doing Something Somewhere!!!

2008-11-14T13:11:00.005-05:00

This quilt gave me the best laugh I have had in ages, I had just taken it off my machine when a really good friend walked in and saw it, she exclaimed " oh my god , you should be doing something somewhere" and I started to laugh. During any givin day, I'm a home care provider for a person with disabilities, watch my 5 year old grandson, run a small quilt shop, machine quilt peoples tops and run the largest machine quilting show in the country with my dear friend Janet-Lee Santeusanio !!! Yes I'm a slacker I should be doing something somewhere LOL.
But thats why I did this..... Its made with fabric strips, water soluble glue sticks and laundry markers. Fast and easy to do . The embellished leaves were purchased in a pack of 50 for $1 .
This Quilt is for sale on Etsy.

The Light thru the Trees

2008-10-19T19:25:00.008-04:00

Inspired by a the foiliage, I went out to my studio and pulled a piece of hand-dyed fabric from my stash. I chose 2 other fabrics to represent tree bark and started ripping Strips.

After I threw down a few trees , I used a water soluble glue stick and a black permanent Laundry marker to give some shadows.

Step 3, I Used colored markers, fabric pens and some acrylic Paint to add shadows , branches and leaves.

Right Now I have added on a border fabric I had laying around. I did this as I want to go to my sewing machine and quilt down the loose pieces. I will then cut down the borders and add a theme fabric. I plan to use piping in a varigaited green around the picture, apply silk leaves and then machine quilt it.

Here is the current view, I have not sewn down the pices yet everything is held in place with a glue stick.

Buddy rides Wheeler

2008-09-01T11:02:00.007-04:00

Guess who loves my grandson's new 4 wheeler , Buddy the pug!! Who would have thought ..He rode this for a an hour today, we has to make him get off !!! Crazy Pug!!!

I finally have an IQ!!!

2008-06-04T19:53:00.013-04:00

I Finally have an IQ , Now my friends can see the proof. After MQX , Zoltan Casa came and installed my Intelliquilter. I love it .

I did a Raffle Quilt for a good friend Evelyn Barber for the Humane Society I think the Panto I used by Munnich Designs was awesome. Here are pictures Front, Closeup and back side.

This was fast and fun to stitch out .

Here is a sampler Quilt I did today . Lot of work . I did a combo of freehand and IQ

There were too many Blocks so I did a close up shot of 2. I need practicing on centering etc but the IQ is a tremendous tool .

A Walk in the Woods Finished

2008-01-05T16:16:00.000-05:00

Here is the final piece:

Finishing edges of A Walk in the Woods

2008-01-05T15:54:00.000-05:00

As Always I fly by the seat of my pants .... and avoid bindings as much as possible. Yes I can do them but I don't want to ! I have taken the piece and zig zagged stitched all the ways around the outside edges. After I did this I chose a mohair metallic variegated thread and used a button hole stitch to adhere them to the edges. I kind of did a ribbon candy type wrapping of those threads just before the foot of the machine, I then stitched over the area till I got to where I needed to lay the yarns down again, remember to leave needle down so you can lift the foot up to lay in more threads. You could also just tug the yarns into place. As always ( still flying by the seat of my pants , I ran out of one of the yarns) What to do ??? I pulled out a leaf trim to stitch down around the upper portion of the quilt. Remember : Rule # 1 is there are no rules. Below you will see the progression of the quilt edges.

Above is the decorative Leaf Trim , .
To the right is the fringed border, notice the way I let the leaf hang free over the fringe.

Burning sheers Video

2007-12-30T14:00:00.000-05:00

This is a little video I made up while I worked on my walk in the woods Quilt, Stay tuned for more finishing work on this piece.

Walk In the Woods Part 2

2007-12-28T14:31:00.000-05:00

The next pictures shows the first border added, Please note I used a rotary pinking blade to give the edges a textured edge. I then layed this piece on top of a second border piece and top stitched in a metallic thread just shy of the pinked edge. When it was stitched down I used my duck billed scissors to remove excess fabric from areas .

I used stamping to do the fish, I stamped a light color of cream down; then I stamped in a dark color. After I did this I used art chalks and a medium stamp. I pressed the medium on the stamp and stamped over the cream printing I then dusted on the chalk and whisked away the excess. This is mot a medium size stamp but a stamp pad full of mediium. It was fun to see the images of ferns and fish appear as I applies the powder. patience was key here because I had to wait for area to dry before I could restamp over with the black ink.

Here's a close up of the fish and the ferns . Keep playing till it looks right to you. My grandson came in and said it needed Birds and a deer . So I next took a piece of Lutradur and using acrylic paint and a fabric medium painted it a midnight blue color.After the lutradur dried I applied steam a seam !! to the front and then I layed a piece of foil on top. I put parchment paper over the foil to protect my iron. After it cooled I pulled off the foil and was left with a webby spider web effect. I used this piece to create the crows. I went online and looked for non copyrighted crows. Found some I liked then I traced them on tissue and cut the images out of the lutradur. I then applied them with fusible web.

Here's an overall view as it stands now, notice the sketched in tree branches for the crows. I blocked the quilt to maintain its flatness by pressing it with a damp cloth, be careful when repeatedly pressing as you don't want to melt the angelina, or burn the inks. Obviously this is not a piece that will ever go in a washing machine but you still need to be careful

Stay tuned for part 3 as I add leaves, deer and bind the finish piece.

A Walk in the Woods part 1

2007-12-28T13:18:00.000-05:00

This is my latest piece, It was totally improvisational and you will see the process I used to make the total piece. I started with a small square of hand dyed fabric I had created last summer.

I placed the fabric in a plastic embroidery hoop so the fabric was face down and the muslin was facing me. The hoop edges are raised and the fabric is flush against the bed of the machine. Do Not put your hoop under the needle with the flat side up. I loaded embroidery cord and dyed yarns onto my bobbin and used a strong poly thread on top. I proceeded to stitch some free form tree trunks.

As you can see in the photo above right the embroidery floss gives a lovely raised stitch. I use straight stitch only , drop the feed dogs and I also use the teflon machine quilting mat on the bed of my machine. It's fantastic. My next step was to take some silk roving, wooly yarns and threads and free motion attach them to the front of the piece. I switched the hoop so now the top fabric was facing me and the muslin backing was flush to machine bed. I used tiny pieces of angelina fibers and film too.

After this step I went to my heating tool and burned away excess areas of thread or angelina that were blocking the background fabric from shining thru. I attempted to video this so bear with me as I was holding the camera and burning at the same time. I did wear a face mask to stop fumes from getting me sick !!! Remember to use caution .

After this step I free hand stitched in a rock wall and then used Tsuknieko inks to color it in.

A landscape was pencilled in and then some Pine trees.

At this point I did some more thread play , working on the front side of the piece, adding in smaller tree branches etc. I added in some pieces of cut novelty fringe, threads and yarns to give the tree tops some more dimension. I used a quilt basting spray on the tree top area. I then sprinkled the threads and fibers on the top and used a free motion darning foot to capture the pieces . This is a great time to use up all your odd filled bobbins. If your tension is good it doesn't show and it eliminates thread waste.

I then proceeded to do more stitching and fill in areas with trees yarns etc. The Borders were attached and then pinked with a rotary cutting blade. Keep on playing remeber there is no wrong if you like it add it , if it doesn't work we camn always cover it up !!!!

Stay tuned for Part 2 of a Walk in the woods:

Cording Foot Binding

2007-10-18T12:00:00.000-04:00

Ok I like to finish things fast and try to avoid hand sewing. Recently, I decided I was going to apply my binding, then blind hem stitch it down with monofilament from the back side.

To the left is a photo of the cording foot on my Bernina. This is an awesome foot and I can't say enough good about it. After I applied the binding I used the foot to aply a 4ply embroidery yarn along the inside edge. This covered the blind hem stitches too. I also used this foot to apply the stems of the flowers.I should tell you that the center panel was made by my grandson, we picked up leaves dipped them in paint and pressed them to a hand dyed piece of cotton. We also used rubbings with shiva paint sticks, foiling and art glitter.

When the piece had been cured and heat set, I applied 2 borders, machine quilted it. Longarm and Domestic machines were used.

Jake finds his groove

2007-10-17T19:15:00.000-04:00

Out of nowhere my grandson started dancing !!! oh heredity does play a part in us all .....

Lower Left of my Farthing Created by Maureen T of IL.

2007-10-15T22:35:00.000-04:00

Here is the first piece of my farthing. It was created by Maureen Tinley from IL. She did a great job; fusing, painting and shading the piece. Each person can interpret the piece as they see fit. As the pieces come in I will post them and then you will see the process of the 4 pieces being sewn together, quilted and bound.

Farthing Quilt

2007-10-15T22:31:00.000-04:00

Based on a book by gwen Baggett I started 9 groups of women who are all participating in the challenge. We each divided up into a group of 4. Each member chose a pictur cut it into 4 pieces and sent three of the pieces off to the other people in their group . my picture was taken on cliff Island Maine.

Puff paint trees with Foil in background

2007-01-13T14:14:00.000-05:00

These trees have been smeared on puff paint by my fingers, foil applied to background first and soon I will post thread painted version. I will do all thradplay first

Snow Scene in fabric paint and thread

2007-01-02T10:54:00.000-05:00

This is a quick little piece I just did , machine applique, fabric paint and rayon threads.
I used the expanding heat sensitive paint and fabric pens. I wasn't to impressed with the puffiness I thought it would be thicker but it's the first time I used it too . Any thoughts on using puff paint would be appreciated.

Great Anti Chlor Tip

2006-11-06T10:28:00.000-05:00

Just received a message from a girl who read the blog, instead of vinegar and water to stop the bleaching process ( dye Discharged leaves quilt below) you can use the anticlor they use for Aquariums !!! How cool is that.......... Thanks to Anne H.

Fast and Easy printed fish

2006-11-06T09:03:00.000-05:00

Heres a real simple idea, go to your stash, find a novelty print and cut out the motifs you want in them. This was obviously a fish fabric. I laid them on a marble piece I had made, put tulle over them to stop raw edges from fraying and couched down fuzzy yarn....

Wholecloth of a different Color

2006-11-05T15:09:00.000-05:00

Irena Bluhm is a phenomenal quilter who shares her joy of quilting freely. Last year at my quilt show Machine Quilters Exposition LLC . I managed to steal away and have a little class to learn her technique. The following 2 photos show how easy it is to turn your wholcloth quilt into a breathtaking piece of art. Irena will once again be teaching the technique at the 2007 show. Visit www.MQXshow.com and will get you all the info you need to treat yourself to meeting Irena.

Quilting Arts Magazine Inspired me

2006-11-05T15:02:00.000-05:00

In the latest issue of Quilting Arts Magazine , there was a quick class on using a rainbow sheer, silk flowers and a pre pieced quilt . This was a quickly done piece, approx 3 hours from start to finish. ( The pieced part was a ufo hanging around) . It' s nice to be able to take a few hours and accomplish something. For the backing I used a piece of black felt to cover some areas where the varigaeted thread didnt behave!!!!!. Edges were stitched 1\4" away from all the edges and the rotary cut with a wavy edge.

Under the Sea

2006-11-05T14:53:00.000-05:00

When you make a mistake piecing cover it with fish!!!! This quilt was supposed to be a tessellation, frustrated over not being able to figure out the correct lines to cut , I covered the marked lines with Tulle, Fish, novelty Threads and Machine Quilting. All applique' applied while on my Gammill. I laid a rainbow sheer on and quilted in the sea ferns at the bottom. I then cut away the excess sheer and went back in with more thread. The fish are simple shapes ripped or cut from Novelty fabric and covered with tulle. Yes it's not just for bridal showers anymore!! LOl

In the close up photo below you will see the rainbow sheer. Lots of shiny fun to use.

Love Abides

2006-11-05T14:33:00.000-05:00

A smile after heartache.... This quilt portrays a moment of shared laughter after losing a loved one. Enlarged from a photo , layers of fabric , tulle and paint went into making the recreation of this quilt. Hand dyed sky, hot fix crystals and acrylic paint were added for depth.....

making this quilt helped me deal with a loss in the family.

Shadow Leaves

2006-11-05T13:53:00.000-05:00

Talk about easy and fun. This piece was done using bleach and water. Inspired by the book " Casting Shadows by Colleen Wise. My grandson , Jake and I created this quilt in an afternoon. He chose leaves off the ground and we traced them on freezer paper. Next iron them down to a piece of black cotton and spray with a bleach water mix. When the color started to leave we threw it in a bucket of water and dish soap. Rinsed it thouroughly and then set it in Vinegar and water for 15 minutes. We pressed it and the put on fabric leaves offset on each one. 2 borders were added , I threw it on the longarm and it was done. A quick trip to the framers for a copper frame and there it was!!!!! Fast , Fun and easy!!!!!!!!!

Where's the Bird Bob

2006-11-05T13:49:00.000-05:00

This is a framed art quilt of my dog Bob Marley. He's my constant companion and spends many hours in the studio with me. The piece was done with fused fabric, piecing, thread painting and machine quilting. Bob loves to chase birds and this is suitable for his nature.

Do Unto Others - Thread Painting

2006-11-05T12:29:00.000-05:00

A few years back I had the Pleasure of working with the very talented Ellen Ann Eddy. Her book Thread Magic is one of the most inspiring books I have. Her use of color and imagination are goals I strive to achieve.
The piece I made is called " Do unto Others" It depicts a frog eating a fly and then a bird about to eat him. The piece is worked on stabilizers that are appliqued to a background fabric. Hand dyed yarns were wound on the bobbin of a domestic sewing machine to create texture. Various sheers were fused onto the background. It was an excellent class.
The close up shot below shows a detail of the bird. Rayon threads and metallics were used in a zig zag stitch.
If you have thread Painting you would like to share please do so.