Wednesday, December 26, 2007

My First Attempt at Landscape Quilting


Here is my first attempt at a landscape quilt.

As you can see by the photo, I am not done quilting it yet. I am finding that to be the most challenging part. I am outline quilting the tree trunks, which helps them stand out. The tops of the trees I think I will do a meandering or stippling. As for the bushes, I have tried to do leaves, but the fabric print has such small leaves that I am finding it difficult to do. I guess I will just have to keep at it and maybe it will look better when it is all done.

I had lots of fun finding my fabrics, fussy cutting and laying it all out! Even though it was a very tedious process. I never realized how difficult it was to find tree fabric. (with a little patience I found what I wanted) The gray trees, are actually the back of the black border fabric! So you just never know where you will find your fabrics.

After finding the fabrics, I also attempted to do some fabric painting and added some details with fabric markers. (now that was fun) The thin brown trees are actually done with markers. The details in the gray trees were added with markers as well. I even emphasized some of the grain lines in the larger brown trees. Pretty cool huh!

I wish I would have photographed the entire process to show you. It was very different from anything I have done in past quilting projects. Because this was so much fun, and I really like the results, I will be doing more of these in the future. So check back if you are interested in landscape quilts. I promise that the next one will include some extra photos.


In this photo you can see I tried to make the path look like it was a stream. At first I thought it was a good idea, but after looking at it on the wall for over a week I finally decided it was not working. All I saw was the blue fabric, which distracted from the rest of the quilt.

What do you think? I would love to hear your opinions.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Chris, I think I would have liked it to be a creek or a river bed. I think the blue offset the darkness of the forest. I really like your first attempt. You are such a talented lady. Thanks for sharing with us.

Chris Dahl said...

anonymous, thank you for such a lovely compliment. I appreciate the fact that you took the time to post a comment. (As for the river I did decide to take it out for this project) I plan to make another one and a river or some sort of water will be incorporated into the design.

Anonymous said...

I would love to know about your fabric paints/markers. What colors did you use and what brand? I'm going to start a landscape quilt and want to find some good fabric paints.
Chris (yes, I'm a Chris as well)

Chris Dahl said...

Chris,

Thanks for the visiting and commenting on my blog.

I used ordinary fabric markers that can be purchased in any craft/hobby or fabric store. Brand was FabricMate. I also used a paint pen, by Elmer. Found at JoAnn Fabrics in the paint section.

Shades used in this project were:brown,gray,black,yellow,orange, several greens.

Hope this helps!

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