Bloggers Quilt Festival - Random Acts Map

hi! welcome!


i'm amy dame.


if you'd like to know more about me, i'll direct you over to the excessively long about me page, but the basics that that seem to either repel or attract folks are these - i hate capitalization, i swear a lot and babble just as much, i'm a bleeding heart lefty who's super opinionated, but i try to keep the worst of it off the blog, i get distracted kinda easily due to a mixture of mental and physical health stuff combined with my inherent inability to focus on one project or technique, and i often get so excited that i bounce up and down and clap my hands like a 6 year old. (if you like me, you might find it endearing, otherwise, it's probably just annoying)


and most importantly, i love quilting! i'm the vice president of the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild, and i'm the challenge and swap coordinator for the Fraser Valley Modern Quilt Guild. my guilds are amazing. not only are they full of incredibly TALENTED people, they're also full of incredibly AWESOME people!


this is the third time i've posted for the Blogger's Quilt Festival, the last two are here and here. previously i've posted recent projects, but today i'm posting a quilt that i finished last summer, but am still incredibly proud of. i blogged about it a few times when i finished it, but i never did post any of the construction details, so i thought i'd do it now.


the past few years i've participated in the Queer Arts Festival Curated Art Exhibition, and this was my piece for 2012. 2011's patchwork and machine embroidery piece is HERE, and my 2010 embroidery pieces are linked HERE (2010 pieces are totally NSFW!) (also, there's still a page about me from last year on the QAF website.) the QAF is a three week multi-disciplinary festival held in Vancouver, BC, Canada every summer by the Pride In Art Society, and i've been attending it for years.



every year my projects get more and more complicated, and my 2012 piece was incredibly ridiculous! i don't remember the exact measurements, but it's at least 50" x 60", it has thousands of tiny pieces, and i used an incredible amount of thread and spray adhesive.





my artist's statement is in this blog post, but the short and sweet version is that i wanted to create a piece that encourages people to think about what makes an act specifically queer, and where in the city those acts have taken place. i wanted to draw attention to the concept queer "ghettos", or the lack thereof, and the concept of community spaces. and since my 2011 quilt that encouraged audience participation was such a hit, i wanted to make a quilt that would be interactive.

i posted about this quilt a few times right after the show, but i never did get around to posting about the details, so here they are - (feel free to skim, i know not everyone will care!)


Step 1 - i drafted a pattern of Vancouver which included all streets and parks. i blew it up to the size i needed, and printed out each section. i taped them all together to create a full size pattern (like assembling a pdf pattern), and using a sharpie, i traced over all of the streets that i wanted to transfer to my map to make them more visible.

Step 2 - i connected yardage of wash-away stabilizer to be big enough to cover the full map. i laid the stabilizer over the paper map and retraced all of the sharpie lines onto the stabilizer, then set it aside.

Step 3 - i laid thin white broadcloth over the paper pattern and traced the shape and edges of water and land, and all of the parks in the city.

Step 4 - i sandwiched the white broadcloth with a layer of cotton batting and a second layer of white broadcloth as the backing.

Step 5 - after purchasing a wide variety of grey and green fabrics with a bunch of different textures, i started cutting them into small pieces. a LOT of small pieces! nothing more than an inch or two wide, and most were much smaller than that.

Step 6 - working in small sections, i used 505 spray adhesive and a UHU glue stick to adhere the tiny pieces to the broadcloth backing fabric. i used the variety of greys for the city itself, and the greens for all of the city's parks. this step took a looooong time!

Step 7 - i added a layer of grey tulle over all of the small pieces to hold them in place.

Step 8 - i freemotion quilted the entire map, using grey on the main areas and a mixture of greens on the parks. this was really fun, though also super hot in july! i particularly loved the fmq i did on the parks. these threads were all 50wt, a combo of cotton and polyester.




(the back shows the quilting better)

Step 9 - using 505 spray adhesive, i adhered the blue satin "water" fabric all around the city and free motion quilted it heavily.

Step 10 - i used more spray adhesive to adhere the washaway stabilizer from Step 2 to the map, and using 12wt cotton thread, began stitching along all of the streets on the map. i started out using aurifil 12wt cotton, and really struggled with it. it's a very loose twist, and because a map has so many criss crossing lines, it didn't hold up very well. i also had a ton of issues with tension and the thread breaking, though i think my needle choice caused a lot of that. i started to run out of thread, so i did a frantic search for more in the lower mainland, and no one had any! thanks to a FVMQG member's suggestion, i found Sulky 12wt cotton thread locally and switched, and it ended up working much better anyway.


(a close up, complete with tension issues!)


(the back with the 12wt quilting over the 50wt, with the ocean fmq as well)

Step 11 - i washed the quilt, to remove the wash-away stabilizer. it shrunk a bit, but the use of the poly cotton base fabric and the netting helped some.

Step 12 - i bought hundreds and hundreds of straight pins, stuck them all into foamcore boards and spraypainted them pink. while the paint was wet, i sprinkled them with fuchsia glitter. yes, i did think i was going out of my mind by this point!



Step 13 - i created a list of street names in a word file and printed them onto printable Shrink Plastic. i cut them all out, hole punched both ends, and shrunk them in my oven.

Step 14 - my dad helped me build a frame for the quilt using 2x4s, 1x2s, and a layer of styrofoam insulation for the pins to stick into. the frame had to be in two pieces with a hinge, to fit in my van!

Step 15 - using my staple gun, i stapled the quilt to the frame we built. i treated it like a canvas i was stretching, or a stool i was upholstering, stapling one side, then stretching over to the other, etc.

Step 16 - i cut strips of the blue satin, pressed under the edges, and using strips of stitch witchery or wonder under, used my iron to adhere the strips to the sides of the wood frame to cover the stapled edges.

and FINALLY - my mom and i installed the piece, including sticking hundreds of glittery pins into the map for people to use to mark their spots. i used white straight pins to label the streets of the quilt, and about 10 minutes after i finished, the opening gala for the art show started!



The Full Piece


UBC and endowment lands


Stanley Park


Downtown core


Beach Avenue


Downtown closeup


Seymour St


Granville Bridge


East Vancouver




Quilt Measurements: i don't remember... it's in storage right now, i'll measure it next time i'm over there and add them in. it's definitely bigger than 50"x60", i know that!
Special Techniques used, if any: applique, free motion quilting
Quilted by: me!



whew! that was a long post, with a ton of pictures, so congratulations if you made it all the way to the bottom. i don't blame you if you skimmed!



please note, i know that i'm taking a risk posting a political art piece for the Bloggers Quilt Festival, but i'm hoping we can all be responsible adults. if you disagree or disapprove of me, my life, my loved ones or my use of the word queer, please be respectful and keep it to yourself. thank you! regardless of how you feel about the theme, i hope you enjoyed my quilt itself, and the Bloggers Quilt Festival overall.

now go check out some of the other awesome quilts in the festival! (and don't forget to keep track of your favourites to nominate as you're surfing around!)

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Whale Love!

hi! welcome!


i'm amy dame.

(there are lots of amys in quilty blog land, aren't there?)

this is the second time i've posted for the Blogger's Quilt Festival, and the quilt that i'm sharing this time around is a little mini quilt that i made for one of my guildie friends. i haven't blogged this before, so i'm including more info than i would just for the quilt festival, so feel free to skim.


if you'd like to know more about me, i'll direct you over to the excessively long about me page, but the basics that that seem to either repel or attract folks are these - i hate capitalization, i swear a lot and babble just as much, i'm a bleeding heart lefty who's hella opinionated, i get distracted kinda easily, and i often get so excited that i bounce up and down and clap my hands like a 6 year old. (if you like me, you might find it endearing, otherwise, it's probably just annoying!)


and most importantly, i love quilting! i'm the secretary of the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild, and i'm a member of the Fraser Valley Modern Quilt Guild. my guilds are amazing. not only are they full of incredibly TALENTED people, they're also full of incredibly AWESOME people!


do you know Sonja? she's pretty much the queen of paperpiecing. her patterns are all super fun, both the ones that she sells in her shop, and the ones that have been published. i've stitched up a few of her blocks, and recently she drafted up a pattern based on our guild logo, and i sewed that one up too.

she's also a fabulous photographer, and takes pictures at all of the VMQG meetings. a few months ago, some of us decided to submit quilts for the Modern Quilt Guild Showcase at the International Quilt Festival, and Sonja very helpfully took pictures of our quilts for us. at the time, i kind of spaced on thanking her properly, so i had it in my head that i should make her a little something. i was thinking pincushion, or needlebook, or pouch, but somehow it turned into an actual quilt!





ever since Sonja updated her blog, Artisania, with a new header, i've been in love with the little whale on it. i think it's part of a future pattern idea of hers (she's too busy designing patterns for books and magazines to finish the ones she's started!), but i just think he's the cutest thing. inspired by the mini-quilt that she made of her freaking adorable fox pattern, i thought two whales would be fun. a friend would keep one from getting lonely, right?

so i drafted up a pattern and sewed up the two whales, and added a little patchwork border around them. i embroidered their faces (twice actually, cause i hated my first attempt and ripped it out, i'd used too many strands of floss) and the little hearts between them. aren't they sweet?





i'm so happy with the water!! i was so proud of myself when it occurred to me how i was going to show the waves like Sonja's header does, without resorting to raw edge applique. when i showed this at guild last week, i said that it was a variation on cathedral windows, but i'm not sure anyone knew what the hell i was talking about.

basically, you start with strip of fabric that's got the top folded over by an inch or two. you tack the fabric down in multiple spots, and then curve the fabric between each spot down, pulling the fold into a wave shape. with cathedral windows, you're tacking down the corners, and then curving the fabric between them, right? so therefore this is a variation of cathedral windows.

well, in my head it is. that's amy-logic for you. i have just spent a ridiculous amount of time googling for faux cathedral windows quilts and haven't found what i'm looking for, or even as much info on the other kind of faux , cathedral windows, which is surprising, really. apparently i fail at google!

this is actually the closest i can find to explain what the hell i did - Tamiko at Patchwork Notes Hoo-Ha Pouch Tutorial, except that i just did one row, and i removed the straight lines of stitching. (as a sidenote, i just came across that pouch a week or two ago and damn, isn't it gorgeous? i'm slightly obsessed at the moment!)

i'm not quite as happy with my hearts. i was trying to make them look casual, freehand, less precise than i tend to do, but i think they might have just turned out a little bit wonky looking. hm.





i enjoyed echo quilting on the white, and really loved the contrast of the chevron like quilting around the whales with the curves around the hearts.

the water was quilted with four or five colours of blue thread, just freehand curves.

i used a synthetic batting, because it was the only pure white batting i had in my stash and i didn't want the cream colour of my cotton batting to show through the background. it was a bit puffier than the batting i usually use, so it added a bit more texture, which was fun.





the backing was this pretty print, and i included two hanging triangles in the upper corners. i didn't backstitch at all while i was quilting, because it would've shown a lot on a quilt this tiny, so i was VERY thankful for Krista's self-threading needle tutorial! this picture only shows the threads from when i went back in and added the quilting around the hearts, so you can imagine how many there were overall!


so! what do you think? it's a bit of a departure from the sorts of things i usually sew, but it was so much fun to do! i'm not sure if it's considered a wall hanging or a mini quilt for the new categories that have been added this time around. opinions? have you been keeping your list of quilts to nominate, as you've been surfing around?

i hope you've enjoyed the Blogger's Quilt Festival! as i click post, there are 28 minutes left to enter (i'm a master procrastinator), and 620 entries! that's amazing! be sure to pop over and say a huge THANK YOU to Amy for all of her hard work coordinating this!

Sherbet Pips Strips - Bloggers' Quilt Festival!!

hi! welcome to everyone who's popped over from Amy's Bloggers' Quilt Festival!


new guests and regular visitors might like to check out my brand new "about me" page, over there on the right. it's kinda long, so feel free to skim. i tend to babble.


the short version is - hi, i'm amy dame. i've done almost every type of craft imaginable, except knit, but through it all, there's been sewing. about a year and a half ago i got back into quilting hardcore, thanks to the MQG. i'm on the exec for Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild, and i'm a member of the Fraser Valley Modern Quilt Guild, and the quilting bug doesn't seem to be waning! i also do hand and machine embroidery, make clothing, and occasionally do more art focused pieces. i've been blogging here for a bit more than 4 years, and i'm terribly embarassed by the quality of the photos in my older posts. remember when we thought those were good?!

thank goodness digital cameras have improved!


unfortunately, technology doesn't always guarantee good help.


(what a wimp, it wasn't raining that hard!)


i kind of wanted to use my Foxy Improv quilt for the Bloggers' Quilt Festival, but really, i JUST posted it! i know that's okay, but i figured something that i hadn't shown yet would be more interesting for regular visitors.


so Sherbet Pips it is!


this is a simple quilt, but i wanted it to be. this summer i felt like i'd been working on too many stressful, deadline based projects. (the largest one being my quilt for the art show, obviously). i'd purchased quarter yard cuts of a bunch of Sherbet Pips prints for no other plan than to make something for myself. (i'm sure most of you can emphasize!) i never used to make quilts that were all the same fabric line, but i fell in love with how cute this line was, and i just couldn't resist!


i knew i wanted to make a strip quilt. i originally plotted it out in photoshop and it was a very fancy strip quilt.



impressive, but damn, i so didn't have the energy for all that. by this point, i wanted EASY!

so i redesigned it.



i thought about adding solids, but none of the Konas actually matched very well, so i stuck with white. this is actually the first quilt i've made with this much white. it's commonly used in modern quilting - that's exactly why i've avoided it! (i have a tendancy to be perverse)



i love the quilting on this quilt. i did enough straight line quilting to remove the basting pins, and then i went back in and did the curved, swervy lines. i like the contrasts.



i used Aurifil 50wt for the quilting because i didn't really want the white thread to stand out on the prints and it worked perfectly.



someone in my guild told me later that my quilting on this had inspired her when she couldn't decide how to quilt something, and it was so awesome to hear. it wasn't super fancy quilting, but it was perfect for her project. we need to tell people when they inspire us more often!



i saved one of my quarter yard cuts for the binding, and i'm so glad i did. the scarf print gave a fabulous stripey effect.


before i made the back i plotted out another strip quilt pattern, for a baby quilt this time, and set these strips aside. then i pieced the back using what remained of my scraps, a large section of one print (i accidentally ordered two quarter yard cuts of the same fabric - the perils on online shopping!), a teensy bit of white and a large piece of red flannelette from my stash.



ignore the fact that my sister is attempting to use the quilt as an umbrella, though not quite as obviously as in the photo at the top. focus instead on my AWESOME BOLER that's finally home!! it's still a disaster inside, but it's fabulous anyways! cleaning it out and fixing it up is my winter project.



i love the way flannelette quilts up, it's so yummy.


i made one of my usual machine embroidered labels for the quilt. pretty simple, just the title of the Quilt, my name, location, date; and the snail.



i've never had a label go this wonky before. hmm. of course, i didn't realize it until AFTER i'd quilted it all.it doesn't look that bad in the photo, it's really only noticable on the left side, but it's definitely wonkier in real life.



a bit of a close up. i scanned a piece of one of the fabrics and digitized an embroidery design based on one of the tiny little snails. isn't it cute? that's also the first time i've tried one of the fill stitch patterns that are in my digitizing software (the design sewn into the snail shell), it was fun. i included a portion of selvedge in the label, since the entire quilt is one fabric line.




i hope you're enjoying the Bloggers' Quilt Festival! make sure you go over and check out some of the hundreds of amazing quilts being shown, and maybe you'll find yourself a few new blogs to fall in love with!

{edit to add}
i'm also linking up to Maniac Monday over at Sew Happy Geek, just for the hell of it!