"Venus in the Garden" will be on display at the Internation Quilt Festival in Houston Oct/Nov 2013. 

63" x 63"

Pieced and appliqued using my hand dyed fabrics, free motion quilted.

This piece was created from one of my small drawings. It feels like a tropical garden to me and when my sister saw it, all she could see was Venus Flytraps. So there you have it! 

This was a really challenging one to quilt! I was so relieved when I finished it. It was quilted on my new Bernina 710 (which I love by the way!) but due to the large scale of my design, and the density of my quilting, it was pretty exhausting. Sometimes I wonder why I do this to myself, and then I do it again.  :)

I played around with the thread color on this one and didn't go for an exact match like I've done before. I wanted the quilting to be visable.

Mid way through the quilting, I could feel that I was straining my body, so I had my husband install this hanging system I had seen in Caryl Bryer Fallert-Gentry's studio in Paducah KY.

My "quilting" life has been transformed!!!

It was really easy to make, and you can move the pvc pipes around needed. 

It's best to have a variety of sizes, long, medium and short. These clips actually suck, so I need to get better ones. 

By taking the weight off, you can move the quilt around with total ease, and I could feel an immediate improvement! 

Now here's the really silly thing, I have a machine with an 18" throat, and I've only used it twice. 

It's a Innova, and I really love it. There's no stitch regulation, because I don't like that, but this baby can go! You might find it strange that I rarely use it. 

This is my foot pedal system. You can't even get this anymore, so I'm kind of lucky. The pedal on the far right makes it go, the one on the left slows it down and the middle one speeds it up. When I quilt my pieced work, it's easier for me to use my one of my Bernina's. I quilted the background of Nan's Whale and From a Seed on this machine.  

 

"Lair of the Amethyst Deva" will also be in Houston. This is one of my favorite pieces. I really love her so much. 

27" x 32"  Improv pieced using my hand dyed fabrics, free motion quilted. 

 

Nina-Marie's "Off the Wall Friday"