Dream Catcher Quilt

My quilt guild had a doily challenge because one of the members had a couple of bags of hand crocheted doilies that were given to her. So the challenge was born. We could add a doily to a quilt in any way we wanted to. The suggested size was 18"x 18" or 18" x 20".

I had used cotton doilies in the past under a teacup block, but I wanted to do something different with this crocheted doily. I decided to paint the doily because plain white was just too boring for my taste. At first I thought of just making a Dream Catcher by sewing it onto a wooden or metal hoop, but I didn't have the right size hoop. Next I thought I could tie 4 small branches together and then sew it in the center of the branches and add strips of fabric and ribbon on the bottom branch. But when I tried doing that, it just didn't look right. And while neither of those ideas were quilts, I figured it would meet the challenge of using a doily at least.

But the Dream Catcher idea was still rolling around in my brain, when I thought why not do a Dream Catcher Quilt? Black fabric was the obvious background color so that the painted doily would pop. Since most Dream Catchers have ribbons and/or feathers dangling from the bottom, I thought I would quilt my feathers with variegated thread colors. I like how the quilted feathers looked, but you couldn't see them very well. So next I brought out the Shiva Paint Stiks™ and painted the feathers with metallic paint. That is just what it needed. I hand embroidered the "strings" and added a lot of pretty hot fix crystals for bling. I also added some beaded trim to the bottom of the quilt. Finally I used my Kumihimo disk to braid the hanging rope and thought a branch looked more organic for the Dream Catcher, rather than a wooden dowel. I really love how this came out too. I didn't follow the suggested size of the quilt for the challenge, but this is my quilt, and I wanted something that would please me.

Painted the doily and added hot fix crystals.

Quilted the feathers and then painted them.

Beaded trim at base of quilt.

I used a variety of paint colors as well as variegated threads for quilting the feathers.

The stick with the braided hanging rope (which I made with my Kumihimo disk).

I dotted more hot fix crystals around the feathers too.

There was only about 7 people who showed their doily challenge quilts on Thursday at our quilt guild meeting. I forgot to bring my camera to take photos of them and I guess the person who does our guild blog didn't take any photos either. Oh well, at least you can see mine here.
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Bloom Quilt Top

I finished my Bloom Quilt top. These are the Bloom blocks from Lori Holt's sew a long. I told you that I would set my differently than Lori did. I had a gradient green fabric that I used for the sashings and border. I added 4 applique butterfly blocks.  Not sure if I will add another border around the whole top or not. What do you think?

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Prickly Pear Quilt Top

I made the blocks for this top several years ago. I actually made an extra 2 blocks for some weird reason (maybe I can't count, lol!). These blocks got buried in a pile of UFO's for years. I have no idea if I had a plan with the extra blocks or not. I decided these blocks needed to be put into a top and the extra blocks I can use for something else. This is a pattern by Karen Stone, called Prickly Pear, which is perfect since prickly pear cactus grow here. I think this pattern must be out of print now.

I used batik fabrics for the prickly pears and a commercial black cotton and purple cotton for the background fabrics. I machine blanket stitched with variegated threads on some of the shapes and solid colors on others, to sew the applique pieces in place. This is a positive/negative quilt block. You have to be careful when cutting the shapes out, because you mix the shapes up so that you have different fabrics on each block. I found this to be fun, although a lot of work too. Now I just need to quilt it.

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