I am currently working on a massively large (for me) art quilt. It has gone through 10,000 iterations. At the moment, this is my favorite arrangement: But it all could change tomorrow. To get a sense of the scale, you can watch this 12-second video: And here are a few close-up photos. It's almost all hand painted, hand stamped, hand dyed, and/or hand screen printed fabric. I'm currently taking a "class" with Irene Roderick that's all about personal style. I put "class" in quotes because it's more of a critique group. Each week Irene gives a short lecture about some... Read more →

This past weekend my local quilt guild held its biennial quilt show. (Special shout out to blog reader, Martha, for coming by to say hello when I was working the mini quilt table!) I thought I'd share a peek at some of my favorite quilts (and quilted pieces) from the show: There was a great mix of traditional and art quilts. I, personally, tend to gravitate towards the art quilts -- which you can see in these photos. Here are links to some of the quilters websites/social media where I could find them. I also included links to the quilt... Read more →

Back in 2018, I took a class from Pat Pauly. I came home with yards and yards and yards of fabric that I printed over the five day class. It's no secret that one of the keys to me being prolific is that I'm very fast when it comes to making things. I did so much printing that I had to buy more fabric half way through class! Over the past few years I've pretty much been hoarding my pretty fabric. I did use it to make some shirts for myself... ...but that's pretty much been it. (BTW: It's the... Read more →

I love the look of a quilted coat! I believe that all of these beautiful coats were made by the person who also made the quilt: source source source source source source Now, if you don't quilt you can buy a quilt and make it into a coat. But that turns out to be quite controversial. Someone recently sent me this video and I have to say that I had a strong reaction to it. I'd love to know your thoughts on quilts being cut into coats and other objects. Yay or nay? Thanks for stopping by! Read more →

Believe it or not, it turns out that I make more things than I can share here on the blog! It's crazy, but true. I make A LOT of stuff. And I've got the messy desk to prove it! So here are a few things I've made recently and haven't had time to share with you! I made this mug for my Mom! I used some food-safe markers I had sitting around from a project I did back in 2015. They're food-safe, dishwasher-safe, and microwave-safe. I don't think they're made anymore, but the Pebeo ones have been around for years... Read more →

I'm going to be giving a lecture on Surface Design in Quilting at the Watertown Public Library tonight. The event is free, but reservations are required. Here's the flyer for the event: If you're interested in learning more about Surface Design on fabric, here are four tutorial videos I've shared over the years, specifically about printing/painting on fabric: I'm going to tell you the most important things to remember about painting/stamping/drawing/printing/etc. on fabric. If you're not going to wash the fabric, then anything goes. Use any art supply in your stash and have fun! If you are going to wash... Read more →

Don't let the alphabet soup title of this post scare you! It's important to understand file extensions so that you can create all of the magical projects you dream up. FCM - This is the proprietary file extension that the ScanNCut uses for cutting data. PES - This is a machine embroidery file extension. I like to use a program called Simply Applique in order to help my ScanNCut and my Brother embroidery machine "talk" to each other in order to make projects like this: In the video in this post I share how to take a PES embroidery file...... Read more →

I had a wonderful group of artists in my live online Screen Printing at Home class. Here are two nice notes I got from students after class: "Thanks for an awesome class Julie! You're an excellent teacher. I came away with a much better understanding of the process and some good ideas for the future." "Thanks for demystifying screen printing -- so much simpler than I thought, and no fancy anything required! I can't wait to start playing!" I thought you might like to see some of the demo pieces I created during class. We printed on paper and fabric.... Read more →

I took some of my screen printed fabric and made a flat bottom zipper bag with it: The screen printed fabric I used for the pouch has a real grungy feeling to it (as opposed to the screen printed fabric I used as the background in these photos). I think that the grungy feeling makes it feel perfect for storing art supplies. It has funky flair but I'm not at all worried about accidentally ruining it with a splash of paint or an uncapped marker. Originally, I was going to use the fabric you see in the background to make... Read more →

I stumbled across Erin Wilson's work on Pinterest and it was love at first sight. I like all of her work, but her works on paper are the answer to so many questions I have about my voice in quilting. From her website: 8” x 10” paper dimensions 5” x 5” approximate artwork dimensions hand-dyed cottons pieced and stitched onto archival paper I loooooooove it. I love piecing. I love the art and architecture of piecing. But I haaaaaate the quilting part. This feels like such an elegant solution to that problem. (Also, I love that it isn't square and... Read more →