Lily of the Americas

Lily 

Lily is my favorite thrift store find ever.  

Right off Cheshire Bridge Rd,  Step Up Society had estate quality donations.  They benefited two important causes, Grady High School and the Veterans who ran the Society.  Robert deserves his retirement but I miss the clutter and treasures there! 

Lily, above, was rescued from a broken Step Up frame.  Simply stating "Eagle Mola" Framed Textile c. 1977,  she was likely created by Cuna women of Panama.  I'd seen and loved their handwork since traveling to Panama and Costa Rica with McFarland Methodist Church as a teenager. 

As the Joyful Sound, led by Coach John and Laura Trundle, we sang several songs as we traveled to the most remote and beautiful villages in Costa Rica.  One village in particular, Pueblo Nuevo del Cota (sic), was only accessible by boat and possessed one light bulb as the first electricity in their concrete floored sanctuary.  We slept on swim mattresses and showered enmass in our bathing suits.  We left all but our return home clothes to the last village. This was my first airplane trip and a life defining experience. There is no better feeling than sharing what you have, in doing what you can.  

As we traveled, I saw women stitching similar reverse appliquéd molas which would then sell in the markets to help support their communities.   Their talent and the stories they tell through this handwork is an essential and favorite art form.

As part of my rescue of Lily, I posted a photo on Facebook Guerrilla Sewing and was roundly chastised for Cultural Appropriation.  I'd felt I rescued her from broken glass but opened all sorts of ownership issues. Colonial occupation of peoples, underpaid "women's work" and exploitation of artistry were frequent themes.  There were also remarks from children of these Cuna women who appreciate this uplifting of their culture.  I printed all the feedback and made a pocket behind Lily to include in her story.

She went on to greater rewards, winning Best of Show: Best Artistic Design at Amelia Island Quilts by the Sea show, 2023. I'll always love Lily.

I "rescued" another gorgeous textile, this 1994 handmade batik with Musicians and Dancers, purchased in Africa by a friend's parents.  I was gifted this and felt such responsibility to the "Musical Dancers" makers.  I can't take credit for the beauty of this, I'm simply helping it get into the world. 

I'm planning to donate this batik (work in progress) to the upcoming Atlanta Quilt Festival.  https://www.atlantaquiltfestival.com/. Check it out starting August 1.

Musical Dancers, 1994, Africa, 40x29"

1950s, Amber Hardrath, dear neighbor Howard Hardrath's late wife, bought this at the sale of Atlanta Journal Constitution's retired editorial and advertising print blocks.  Howard gifted me several and I've loved this one.  "Let's turn the eyes of the world on GEORGIA!' with Johnny Reb full of bluster and a perplexed Earth. Timeless, apparently. 
 

 

Blackbird Sunset

 

Pre Covid I taught this pattern (18.5 x 29") at Intown Quilters in Decatur, GA. It's based on a traditional Chinese Coin pattern with branches inserted along the tree trunks. This sweet little quilt shop has now closed.  I have several hardcopies of the pattern and will mail to you. The pattern should be downloadable (soon) as I get the kinks out of this blog. Be in touch debrasteinmann@gmail.com for more information.

blackbird-sunset-patternDownload

http://debrasteinmann.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/blackbird-sunset-pattern.pdf

Fabric, etc.:  ¼ yd dark for Tree trunks. Printed bird. FQ or scraps for sky, circles, squares, leaves and tree tops.  Threads. Paper for foundation pieced sky. Backing, batting and binding fabrics to finish.

Sky:  Cut five paper strips 21×3.5”.  Fold in thirds to help gauge color value change, red to orange to yellow. Sew various sized fabric strips to paper, starting at bottom with red then flip each color up for foundation piecing. Trim to size before removing paper.

Trees:  Cut four dark trunks 21X1.5”.  Sew sky and tree trunks together (18.5”Wx21”L), adding 1×1.5” raw edge limbs inside seams at angle from trunks.  Embellish trunks with threads, etc.  Add small raw edge green tree boughs at limbs.

Tree tops:  Four green fabrics, cut raw edged.  Tree top pattern downloadable with rounded edges at bottom, tree top overlaps sky plus three inches to square up Tree-Sky section to 18.5”Wx24”L.

Leaves:  Two greens, right sides together, sew all the way around leaf.  Trim then slit back, turn and iron flat.  Stitch randomly on Trees and Sky.

Circles on Squares:  For top and bottom borders cut 16 dark squares at 2.75”.  Corresponding circles finish to 1.5” using raw edge, yo-yo method (pictured) or make a freezer paper template.  Attach circles to each square using appliqué.  

Top and Bottom Borders: Sew row of eight Circle on Square units 2.75x 18.5” at top and bottom of Tree-Sky section.  Final border is strip of 1.5” squares or 1.5” striped fabric across top and bottom.

Blackbird:  Appliqué pre-printed bird at base of trees. 

Finishing:   Sandwich top, batting and backing.  Quilt as desired, using tree texture and sky as guide.  Perle cotton threads to quilt will add more texture.  Square entire quilt then add bias binding to finish. 

Hoop Project and Atlanta Sewing Circle at Georgia Museum of Art

There were several more attending.  We barely remembered to take this group shot.

 

During the Fall of 2019, before everything changed, Gees Bend artist Mary Lee Bendolph filled five gaIleries at The Georgia Museum of Art (GMOA) in Athens with her dazzling quilts.   Her creations rival any artistic medium, composed with balance and texture. Through her quilts you see a mastery of color, the stitches setting the tempo as well as the structure.

Ms. Bendolph is a foremother of the movement giving quilts and cloth expression an appreciation as Art.  Each of her quilts tells a story as old as our lives. Her hands create a channel to the voices of her ancesters. The grouping of her work as a whole felt immediately essential. It’s apparent her quilts come from the depths of her soul.

Though generations of women who make quilts, and the High Museum introducing her to Atlanta, I was honored to meet Ms. Bendolph and, on a later date, conduct a quilt making workshop at the GMOA.  My goal was to provide an introduction to quilting without being hindered too much by technique.  In two hours… 

It was wonderful to share a rainbow of colors for people to choose from. With Ms. Bendolph's work providing our inspiration.  My lifelong fabric collection has never been so happy.

Linda Jones

Aunt Betty Baker 

Ms. Mary Lee Bendolph with her family of quilters. 

Under the watch of Ms. Bendolph's quilt, I made a 3-D progression

Mary Lee Bendolph

This Atlanta Sewing Circle reimagines the Hoop workshop as an ‘At Home Project.”  

Don’t follow rules and you’ll have more fun.  

Supplies needed:  

• Sturdy wooden Embroidery or Quilting HOOP, any size.  
• Quilt fabric SANDWICH for this hoop circle is three squares about 5" wider than the hoop opening:
• 1-TOP Cotton fabric.
• 2-BATTING (or thin flannel)
• 3-BACKING fabric
• Fabric scraps to chop into shapes
• Basic Sewing Supplies: scissors, needles, pins and thread

During our workshop, we spent the first twenty minutes in the galleries, soaking in Ms. Bendolph’s designs and imagining our own circle of inspiration.   Look through the hoop as a window.  What colors and shapes bring you the most joy?

Check out the Gees Bend quilts and their blocks of color. Check out Paul Klee or Sonya Delauney for great colors and design.

You could pencil outline the hoop circle on paper to sketch ideas.  Simple is powerful.  Dark colors on light background or Light colors on Dark.  It doesn’t take large fabric pieces to make a great design.

You could use heirloom linens, cut to size. A circle hoop grouping can be powerful.

This Hoop will serve as a fab stretching tool while stitching and eventually your finishing frame. The Hoop screw is the top of your circle. You can use it as a wall hook down the road.

Hints:

*Work only with the Quilt TOP fabric until it’s close to complete so put the Batting and Backing layers aside. You'll make the sandwich when ready.    

Note: The batting isn't always necessary in a hoop.  For thicker fabrics, sandwich Top cloth with Backing only, wrong sides together to make a slim sandwich.  Decide if the texture is worth the extra bulk.  After deciding the hoop placement, it's good to press fabric where it will be to reduce bulk there.  Remember,  No rules.

*The Quilt TOP can be used in many ways:

#1-Whole cloth (as is) with cut shapes and stitches added as appliqué.  Use a glue stick lightly in new shape center or pin to attach before stitching in place. Work with the TOP in the hoop and adjust as you go to keep it cinched flat.  PS I hate glue and spray adhesives, they add unnatural elements but are used by many with great ease.  No Judgement here.

#2-Pieced Top: Slice across the TOP and add a strip of contrasting fabric to the opening.  Try strips in colors as you like to add, finishing to the size of BACKING.  

#3 Mandala:  The nature of this circle having no beginning or end allows a mandala practice as you stitch your way around the hoop. I love having poppies emerge as picture shows below.

#4- Log Cabin: start with a small color square and add ~1-2” random strips, sewn right sides together, ironed open each time. You’ll add rows (logs) to the outside edge as you go, each row adding to the cabin.  Cut to match size of BACKING before you make the sandwich.

#5 Use the Whole Cloth approach, as in #1, and put a shape in the center.  Make colors with fabric scraps or threads in concentric circles around the center shape.  Leave part of the original fabric showing as you circle around. Work your way back to the center with meditative stitching.   Create a mandala poppy or turtle with radiating circles.  Each layer is growth.  Each radiating pattern is releasing your spirit.  

When you get the TOP appliquéd/pieced as you like, layer with the BATTING and BACKING.  Trim layers to roughly the same size. Loosen the screw to place the three-layered Quilt Sandwich inside the Hoop. 

Now Quilt Becomes a Verb and is where your design comes to life.

Hoop Ideas.  

Hoop Quilting:

Thread the needle and put a fat knot* in one end of ~18” of Perle (size 12, 8 or 5) cotton thread.  Smaller size# is thicker. I like to adjust needle size to a bit larger.  I hate fighting a needle eye. With my older eyes.

Poke needle through from the back where you’d like to start.  

Pull the thread tight then ¼” or so poke thru to the back.  You’ve just made a STITCH.  Make more.  Make a couple in a row and get into a rhythm. 

*Alabama Chanin makes their knot show on the top layer. No Rules.

To finish, tighten the screw at the Top and turn to the backside of your Hoop. Iron around the backside rim so leftovers lay flat. Use big Perle cotton thread to make a fat stitch around the backside of the circle, 1-2” inside the Hoop edge. Use smaller lengths to gather-stitch and knot segments around your circle. I often trim away the excess fabric inside this finishing circle.  Put your name on it.  Add special pins, mementos or earrings as part of the quilting.  Extra points if you wire a small stick across the finished Top screw mechanism.

Chopstick chopped then wired to Top hoop screw

Poppy as Turtle on random pieced top

The Underside or Backing.  
Gather the finished fabric sandwich to back with big stitches 2" inside the hoop to finish.  
Add a label or write directly on the backing fabric. I love stitches to show.

Arc of a Diver and Tony Wright

Steve Winwood's LP "Arc of a Diver" was released in 1980, one year after I'd married and moved to Atlanta.  The music is mesmerizing and soul restoring.  I have two vinyl copies and notice the blues are different with each printing.  The CD is an even richer blue.

As much as I've been transported by the multi-instrumental genius of Mr. Winwood, I felt moved by this Matisse inspired cover design by Tony Wright.  Mr. Wright has created many LP covers, among other art,  and his Traffic's "Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" cover is known as one of the best designed LPs ever.   

I immediately wanted to interpret his Diver in fabric.

Arc of a Diver by Tony Wright, 1980

 I've done many interpretations of water in fabric but none have I enjoyed as much or contemplated as long as this one.  The color movement and dance of the swimmer finally worked.  I finished it in a few months, 38 years after the LP landed in my studio. 

Arc of a Diver quilt for Matt 23.5" x 27"

Being an Aquarian holds truth to me.  I have a spiritual need to see and be near water. I don't make a quilt without finding a place for watercolors.

I wrote Tony Wright to thank him for the inspiration and "come clean" about using a blown up copy of his diver.  He was most gracious in reply, even thrilling me with compliments and the thought that the water quilt doesn't even need the Diver!?!?!  

Mr. Wright gave me permission to use the design on another, larger format with the Diver below.  I gave this quilt to Coach Pedro Orendez, founder of of Water World Swim, whose SanFrancisco bay swim we've enjoyed for many years.  Matt swims from Alcatraz to shore with hundreds of "Centurions" and I get to watch.

Coach Pedro's Arc of a Diver, 60" X 72"

I don't often like a quilt as much finished as I do the process of creating it.  This Arc of a Diver was a part of nearly forty years of my quilting. I think he will show up again someday.

It's time to move to other waters and for now it's the Nantahala River below.  This one, for a friend, is the first thing I've finished in 2019. 

 I used Kaffe Fassett's "Malachite" green to create the flow of this river. Nantahala is a Cherokee word meaning "Land of the Noonday Sun" since the steep river canyon and forest shades this NC river through most of the day.  The softer green, blue and yellow scrappy log cabins represent the river bank with sun shining through the trees.  This uses 6.5 X 8.5 rectangles to throw splashes of color across the quilt. I see it now and the River could use more dark green.  Always rethinking... 

Nantahala River 60" x 72"

It's been a joy to work with all this water.  

Thanks again to Tony Wright.

“Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing in the end can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does.” 
Margaret Atwood

John Ross and stitching a story

Rossville, GA hometown hero John Ross (1790-1866) was leader of the Cherokee Nation 1828-1838 and fought against the Indian Removal from this area. The Andrew Jackson government-forced march of these native people from here to Oklahoma is known as The Trail of Tears. 

This home also served as a hospital during the Civil War, eventually for both Confederate and Union forces.  I learned much later that Dr. Hoover, with his office to the right of this photo, was the leader of the area KKK and John Birch Society.  Many stories remain untold.

In 1964, "The John Ross Story," written by Helen Cooper, was staged on this front lawn.  At eight years old, with elaborate lighting and a perfect prairie dress created by my mom,  I played his daughter Jane Ross.  I can feel the excitement again just by being here, dreaming through the decades.

There wasn't a fence around the Duck Pond when I lived here.

In 2013, I made my first family Memory Keeper Quilt. It's pictured here.  At that time I started stitching this John Ross House, mostly from memory.  I picked it up this summer as I collected my own miscellaneous memories in fiber.

This finished quilt includes two of Grandma Baker's doilies along with Elvis, my favorite turtle and fabric creations by daughters Callan and Mariel.  Grandma Eva Avans Baker (1909-1986) was 1/4 Cherokee and I've imagined our ancestors hiding in the hills during the removal years. Thankfully they remained.

The top border is Huckleberry batik from Whitefish, MT, purchased in July

Louella's Roses

Louella's Roses quilt was made for her 100th birthday, July 14, 2017.  I couldn't be at the party so sent her this quilt.  I chose several doilies for the backing to allow signing by all who were there.  This signing took on a greater purpose since several have sent wishes that her daughter Suzanne could later stitch on.

Louella in Tullahoma, TN admiring her Roses backing.

Callan and Mariel in the backyard fish pond, 1990.

NOW 2018, a year later, Louella is 101 and Luke has joined the family.  Mariel and I enjoyed taking him first to meet N GA Baker family and then to Tullahoma, TN to meet Louella. 

Mariel signed a doily for her and Luke's visit

All these years later, since Grandpa Paul Pyle's 1991 death, his dulcimer studio is frozen in time.  It's such a joy to see where they made 1665 dulcimers together.  Creative Clutter dream.

Lola Peacock and Two Quilts

Lola for Suze at Sixty

Few quilts have been as fun as making this Purple Lola for cousin Susan.  

I took her to  Intown Quilters  to choose a backing fabric.  She chose these large floral circles printed on black.  I stared at it for weeks, dreaming a design for the front, based on the back print.  The good thing about having her pick the backing was knowing what palette and vibe she wanted AND the deadline was "whenever" since she already knew about it. Perfect.

Along the way, I'd started a Family Tree Canopy quilt leading up to Callan and Johnny's Oct 8, 2016 wedding.  I mailed precut blocks to friends and family, asking that they bring them to the wedding. My starting the collection at the wedding was another Loose Deadline.  The wedding was wonderful and magical at Stan Mullins' Art Studio in Athens, GA.   There was so much to see during the festivities, Cal and Johnny never saw my collection basket.  I decided to slow down again and extended the block deadline.

Susan sent this AMAZING appliqué and embroidery peacock named Lola.

Lola by Susan

It took less than a week to see the floral circles as Feathers on a larger Lola.

I traced her bird and then enlarged to roughly 24" x 36".  

When Suze and I were young, Grandma Baker made each of us an appliquéd Cat Quilt in our favorite color.  She chose Purple and I chose Green.

 I made the purple background and then appliquéd Lola in a perfect spot.  Once inspired, I had this ready for her Surprise Birthday party,  November,  2017. 

Susan had the rare honor of designing her own surprise quilt!

Six months later, Callan and Johnny received their wedding quilt on her birthday, May 26, 2018.  There is so much love in these blocks and stitches.  I'm so grateful!

Lola is near Callan's left hand, three blocks over, near Matt's diamond shirt pattern.

Lola with Stevie and Cleo below.