Fall Leaf Project

I've been wanting to create a design to remember the beautiful fall leaves. I pulled some appropriate colors of 50 wt. Presencia thread to support the quilting, along with a few leaves for inspiration. This is the mulling-it-over stage, an important part of figuring out what to do next.

Sarah made this card for my birthday, knowing how much I love the leaves on her college campus. I'll never recycle this one. When I went to visit her last week, she had tacked leaves all around her dorm door. Crazy creative girl. This got me thinking about this project again...

When in doubt, toss it all together. Leaves are a most interesting shape to quilt. So much variety! Try sketching an arc to form one side of the leaf, come up to a point, then arc down the opposite side. Add a stem, then go inside the leaf and add veins. After a few drawing attempts, go to your fabric and stitch what you have taught your brain to do. Being 'artistic' is not required. Just follow the lines nature has shown you, keeping a sample within eyesight as you quilt. If your shape looks anything like a leaf, you're doing great. I definitely stitch better than I draw but the pencil work is an important precursor to quilting. Get your sketch book out and try it.

Copyright ©2008, Sharon Baggs

Spectacular Spectrum

Color can intimidate. But look at nature, an obvious place to start. A myriad of brown, green, yellow, orange and blue dictate color choices. You can't go wrong. My little neck of the woods, Portland, has been more gorgeous than ever this fall. Chalk it up to a long stretch of sunny days that brilliantly illuminate creation's vibrant palette. Who wouldn't want to wrap up in these rich autumn hues? Time to pull out these colors from your fabric stash before the cool blues, grays and whites of winter set in. Go make a quilt.

Copyright ©2008, Sharon Baggs