Quilt No 021: USA Memories

Eighteen months in the making, this is my completed ‘USA Memories’ quilt recalling our trip to New York and Boston for Christmas 2016.

Our first selfie together on Top of the Rock, looking across at the iconic Chrysler Building. The poignancy of One World Trade Center and our walk along Battery Park. Every town’s outlet mall had to be checked out for North Face bargains (none to be had). Trinity Church was right outside our hotel in Boston and had an amazing carol service late on Christmas Eve. Stowe, Vermont, was where the fabric came from and where there was still snow on the ground with more forecast (we were too late for the Fall leaves). Above the Bay at Thornton Adams was one of the B&Bs we stayed at – not the most bizarre, but we did have the house to ourselves for the whole evening, not seeing our host until the following morning. Vermont’s Finest, of course, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream factory tour featuring experimental ice cream flavour of white chocolate and coffee (oops, we were sworn to secrecy). And finally, the Mayflower at Plymouth – we didn’t see the ship, but the museum was fascinating. Fabric snapshots of a fabulous break.

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Art Journal: American Adventures [Travel Journal]

It’s taken some time, but I’ve finished the journal I handmade last year and finally got round to taking and editing the photos of the finished article. I intended to journal each day before going to bed, but got a little behind whilst in New York as our room was so small that there was actually nowhere to work on a flat surface, and there was no communal area I could use either. Consequently, by the time I got to Boston, and there was space to work, I was already five days behind. Then life on the road for the final few days also meant I was doing other things at the end of each day. So it meant finishing off the work once I got home, but that brought back good memories of a lovely, and much needed, holiday.

As a format, the piano hinge worked very well – I was able to slide out each of the sticks in turn to work on the pages individually, which was far easier. The fold out sections added a little more space, and the wallets somewhere to put the various bits of ephemera that I collected along the way. With techniques from collage to napkin decoupage, hand drawn typography to watercolour illustrations, it was fun to put together. I would have liked to do more urban drawing, but for speed, mini-photos had to suffice.

Sit back, with a cuppa of your choice, and holiday vicariously as you work through the journal 🙂

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Memory Quilt: Block No. 8

No, you haven’t missed seven previous instalments – this is the first of nine blocks that I’ve tackled for a new memory quilt.  I wanted to make a quilt as a ‘souvenir’ of our trip to the USA over Christmas – in addition to my travel journal which is yet to be finished…

We chose the fabric whilst away, in a lovely quilting shop, Stowe Fabric & Yarn, in Stowe, Vermont, and once I got home and had five minutes to myself, I started designing. It’s the first quilt I have made that uses appliqué techniques – and I’m going to need a bit more practice on my satin stitches I think. The quilt is going to feature nine appliqué panels, and here’s the first. No guesses as to which tourist venue this panel refers to…

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