Improv Chinese Coins: a finish: "Season of mists ..."

The AHIQ  invitation for the first quarter was to use Chinese coins as the basis of a quilt. They could be developed in any way we wanted as long as Chinese Coins were the starting point.

Ann gave links to some examples, which I found inspiring and which led to some left-over batik jelly roll strips being sewn together, without any definite plan. I then cut free-hand through  the whole thing intending to rotate one piece and then sew them together again. 

As there was an odd number of strips, after rotation the middle one stayed in the middle which didn't look good to me so I turned the pieces back to the original position to insert another strip of batik. Firstly I cut through the panels to make a branching structure. Sewing the inserts in the side panels was tricky: bias strips would have worked better, but I was using 2.5" jelly roll strips, so cutting on the bias was not an option. The vertical insert naturally went in much more easily. 

This was beginning to resemble a tree, or magma rising through the Earth's crust. I settled on a tree,

 with leaves:

The leaves in the photo above are double-sided and I sewed them down with a zig-zag stitch along the central nerve of the leaf. Others are single fabric and machine appliquéd directly onto the background with blanket stitch.

The 3-D effect of the leaves is clearer in this photo

  

Material: 

Top: assorted batik scraps
Wadding: pieced scraps of cotton wadding
Backing: pieced scraps
Thread: background Aurifil 40 wt.; leaves Aurifil 50 wt in colours matching the leaves.

Dimensions: 19" x 16.5"

I'm linking up to

Click on the button to see more improvised Chinese Coins.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Improv Chinese Coins

Ann and Kaya who host the Ad Hoc Improv Quilters (AHIQ) suggested making improvised Chinese Coins this quarter. My Chinese Coins have looked like this for about two weeks now: the coins (that I showed last month) and a tree,

inserted tree: bias cut fabric would have been better; fitting the branches in distorted the background.

and some double-sided leaves to attach once I've quilted it.

Double-sided leaves: some finished, others simply fused and waiting to be zig-zagged together. More needed.

"Once I've quilted it" being an important phrase here - for me, deciding on a quilting motif is always a challenge and inevitably leads to procrastination.

It's completely put together from scraps. Not only the top, but also the wadding:

 and the backing are pieced:

The leaves are strengthened with double-sided fusible interfacing, so I'll be able to attach them along the central nerve or at one end allowing the underside to be partly visible. I'm hoping they will appear to "float" but it's important I think to get the rest quilted first.

The strata in the background, the "coins", are from a 2.5 inch fabric roll. Having joined them together I cut them in half intending to turn one half upside down and go from there. However that didn't work because with an uneven number of strata the middle one stayed in the middle, and didn't look good. Here followed some pondering and turning pieces round, trying more fabrics before I decided to leave the orientaion af the strata as it was and insert a strip. This became the trunk of the tree, but only after I had inserted branches into the two panels. The trunk and branches are made from a 2.5 inch strip cut longways freehand. Using a "jelly roll" meant I couldn't cut the strip on the bias which would have been easier to insert; it was quite a struggle forcing the straight fabric into the cuts I had made.

While thinking about quilting this mini I also made a few more coin blocks on a different scale. (I needed a rest from all that thinking!)

These strings are six inches long, and of varying width. I've decided to make a rainbow collection of them, following the Rainbow Scrap Challenge colour each month; although this month's colour has been red and not yellow/orange! Even choosing the colour was ad hoc! The number I make each month will depend on how many scraps I have in the colour of the month that are at least six inches long. In my view a piece of fabric is only a scrap if it is really really small. I've no idea how they will all come together over the year.

There isn't really much to show here for two whole months' work, is there? Still, I'm working on it and have learnt plenty. I'm looking forward to next quarter's invitation, and hoping I can push my limits even fuurther.

I'm linking up to

 

Click on the button to see some improv masterpieces.

Happy sewing

Marly.
 

AHIQ Challenge: Chinese Coins

Kaya and Ann at the Ad Hoc Improv Quilters have devised challenges for this year, and the first one, I discovered this past week, is Chinese Coins. (That will teach me to concentrate on sewing for two and a half months and neglect Blogland!) Now I've seen a few Chinese Coins Quilts in blog posts since I started quilting five years ago, but was never really impressed! Sorry! I must have been looking in the wrong place because Ann gave links to some amazingly dynamic stacks of coins, a far cry from the piles of jelly roll cut-offs I've seen before.

So what did I do? I found some 2½" batik strips, from a roll of  pre-cut 2½" batik strips (a jelly roll in all but name!), stacked them, cut through the stack at 17" and sewed them together along the long sides with the darkest at the bottom and the lightest at the top. How boring!

I didn't choose the brightest of colours but stuck with earth tones. I'm thinking the Earth and Mother Nature, sedimentary rocks, peat cuttings. Colour-wise rather like an early Van Gogh, before he went off to the South of France and discovered irises and sunflowers!

If I read the challenge instructions properly I've got one more month to make this into something. Something, that is, other than the resemblance of a stack of peat propped up to dry!

I'm linking to

 

Click on the button to see more improvised Chinese Coins. I am sure there will some amazing variations on the theme.

Happy sewing

Marly.