Iris and Fern

Iris and Fern

Near the rose are an iris and fern. The fabric for the fern is this wonderful batik that had the veins that worked perfectly for the fern. The iris is the same iris design that I used in Beautiful Bouquets. The colors are different but I also added embroidery embellishment to the flower.

Rose applique

Rose applique

I've been very busy working on the Libby's Garden quilt and will be showing some of the sections in the blog.
The rose is made from batik fabrics. Some of the fabrics came from a piece of ombre fabric, which is really nice because you can use different values from the one piece of fabric and they go together well.
The leaves are the same material I used in the rose in my Beautiful Blooms book. I really like the look of the fabric for these particular leaves.
In this image are other leaves - this gives an idea of the overall quilt. It is based on the tree of life idea where a wide variety of different flowers and plants grow on the same trees and stems.

Trees and ground

Trees and Ground

The quilt is a bit further along, but this shows when I first added the trees and ground.
For the ground I used a green hombre and cut strips from different values. Although it looks like there are three values, the values are a bit lighter at the top and gradually get slightly darker at the bottom. I stitched this together as a unit before attaching it to the background.
The trees are mostly symmetrical, but not identical reverses of each other. This gives the sense of symmetry but is more interesting because of the differences. I found a great fabric for the trees that looks like bark and is a good scale for the quilt. Some of the smaller branches are a different brown fabric, so there is a bit of variety. Because there was a direction to the brown print, I'm taking advantage of the placement of some of the other applique elements to cut the fabric to allow the direction of the fabric to follow the direction of the branches. That is the main reason there are gaps in some of the branches.
At the bottom, I've added some of the vines that will hold most of the flowers and leaves for the lower part of the quilt. I put all of the trees and vines on the quilt and basted them in place so it provides the framework for the rest of the pieces. I will be appliqueing all of the edges as I go.
I've also already added the morning glory flowers and a few other elements. Much more to come!

Beautiful Bouquets

Beautiful Bouquets

This is the applique quilt that was accepted in Lancaster Quilt Week 2018 and is on display this week. The quilt was inspired by some of the bouquets that my husband has given to me. All of the flowers are hand appliqued, and some of the pieces have hand painting and embroidery.
The quilting was done on a stationary machine and took many painstaking hours! Normally I make quilts for patterns and while I do my best applique work, I don't really consider putting them in shows because of the high quality required for the quilting in shows. I spent a bit more time than usual on quilting this quilt, and it was accepted into the show so I was thrilled with that. It didn't win any awards, but just getting to show it was great!

This is a close-up of the orchid blocks, and you can also see some of the border with this. The background fabrics are Daiwabo taupe fabric, which I really love to use.

I am currently working on a book with these designs and hope to have it completed later this year.

Chinese Lanterns

Chinese Lanterns

A few years ago I began working on a series of long and narrow quilts. The first was the Lamb Cottage quilt which I discussed in my last blog post. This one is based on a photograph of Chinese lanterns that my husband took. The applique is done, but I'm still working on the quilting. Notice I have the same foundation pieced border that I used in the Lamb Cottage quilt. When piecing the flowers themselves, I used different shades of orange hand-dyed fabric.
To construct the quilt, I pieced the entire background first so that there would be a base on which to applique. It's difficult to tell in the picture, but there are stepping stones in the background. It's a lot of work that isn't obvious, but I like the effect of the complex background with the bright leaves and flowers in front.
For the leaves, I used different batiks as they were and didn't have to do any coloring or painting. I washed paint on some of the fence fabric to make some pieces darker than others.

Lamb Cottage

Lamb Cottage

A few years ago I decided to make some quilts that were long and narrow since I have some wall space that can only accommodate narrower quilts. The first of these quilts is my Lamb Cottage quilt. I based the design on a combination of photos that my husband and I took while in England. The lamb was from North Yorkshire, the cottage from southern England.
I decided that I wanted to have a unifying border with these quilts so that they could be hung together. I designed this paper pieced lattice border which uses leafy fabric and wood grain fabric and gives the appearance of the leafy fabric behind the wood.
For the main part of the quilt, the sky fabric had a print of the distant trees so that didn't have to be pieced. For the chimneys I used a brick print, and the flowers in the flower beds were fussy cut from a floral fabric. The hedge was from two shades of the same green print. For the grass, I cut sections from a grass fabric and pieced them together so it would look like the natural ridges seen in grass. The lamb is pieced from a range of taupe shades.
There is a pattern for this quilt available on my website at susantaylorpropst.com.

Quilt accepted into Lancaster Quilt Week

I haven't entered a quilt show before, but decided to enter my "Beautiful Bouquets" quilt into Lancaster Quilt Week 2018 and it has been accepted. If you are interested in the show, here is information.

Local Quilter Semifinalist in International Quilt Show

Paducah, Kentucky, USA – Susan Taylor Propst from Colorado Springs is a semifinalist for the 2018 AQS QuiltWeek® – Lancaster, Pennsylvania March 21 – 24, 2018, at the Lancaster County Convention Center. Susan Taylor has been chosen to display the quilt, BEAUTIFUL BOUQUETS, along with 200 others in this AQS contest. First, Second, and Third Place prizes in seven categories will be awarded, along with seven overall awards including Best of Show. Winners will be announced at the show and posted on the AQS website, QuiltWeek.com. More than $50,000 will be granted, including $10,000 for the Best of Show and $3,500 each for Best Wall Quilt, Best Use of Color, Best Original Design, Best Hand, Best Stationary, and Best Movable Workmanship. Regardless of how BEAUTIFUL BOUQUETS places in the final judging, all semifinalists´ quilts will be displayed at the show, which is expected to draw more than 15,000 people.

AQS Founder and President Meredith Schroeder says, “The contest quilts this year represent a wide variety of colors, scale of prints, and techniques used. There is something for everyone to enjoy in the Lancaster quilt contest.”

Quilts were entered in this international contest from 46 US states and 13 other countries. Come see a wide range of special exhibit quilts including: New Quilts from an Old Favorite: Flying Geese; Contemporary Art Quilts—U.S. and Brazil; Cherrywood Challenge 2017: Van Gogh French Gallery; SAQA: Korean Quilts Now; Statler Challenge; For the Love of Linens: Quilts by Cindy Needham; and the AQS Authors’ Showcase.

The American Quilter’s Society hosts several shows annually, each with its own quilt contest. Besides the Lancaster, Pennsylvania show, AQS hosts other prestigious shows in Daytona Beach, Florida; Paducah, Kentucky; Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Virginia Beach, Virginia.

For more information, please go to www.QuiltWeek.com.

I Spy quilt

I Spy Quilt

I have been collecting novelty fabrics for an I Spy quilt for a number of years, so when my grandson was born I was ready to make a quilt. I hadn't decided how to put all of these novelty pieces together, especially since they were of various shapes and sizes. I also have collected a lot of texture fabrics, such as wood, bricks, rock, straw, etc. so finally came up with the idea of combining the two.
I cut the novelty pieces into a square or rectangle that suited the shape of the object, and then added strips of the texture fabric to bring the square or rectangle up to a 6 1/2" square. This simplified the piecing and gave a really nice variety of colors and textures in addition to the novelty objects. Here is the finished quilt top.

This is a close-up of one of the sections of the quilt top.

Chipmunk and Jack-in-the-pulpit

Chipmunk and Jack-in-the-pulpit

This is another picture from the applique quilt I'm working on. The sewing is almost complete for the chipmunk and jack-in-the pulpit. The primary fabric for the chipmunk was a horse fabric with ivory and tan areas, so I fussy cut to get the shading I wanted. The jack-in-the pulpit leaves were a wonderful batik that already had leaves printed. However there wasn't fabric available for the striped areas of the flower, so I used crayons to color the red area leaving the pale green un-colored.

New Pattern - Two Peacocks

New Pattern - Two Peacocks

I completed the quilt, "Two Peacocks" in 2013. The quilt was inspired by a plate I saw in a museum. The plate was black and gold, so didn't have color which made it fun to choose the fabrics. I've had a friend asking for the pattern so finally got a chance to make up the pattern for this quilt. It is available on Etsy and at my website. The center circle is all applique which can be done either by hand or by machine. There is also embroidery: in the peacock crests and the flowers (stem stitch and french knots).

©2013-2017 Susan Taylor Propst

Tulip applique

Tulip

The design for the tulips was taken from multiple sources. The leaves were from a group of tulip bulbs that my husband brought home in the winter. The flower was from some tulips that were growing in England. I used yellow fabric and added the color with fabric pastels. I used the starch-press-glue method to make the unit with the leaves and flower, and then appliqued all of it to the background.
The tulip appears in the lower left corner of the quilt. You can see a bit of the ground that runs across the bottom, and the tree that runs up the left side.

©2017 Susan Taylor Propst

Alternate Beautiful Blocks Quilt

Alternate Beautiful Blocks Quilt

I like to complete several quilts when I design a pattern, utilizing different fabrics to show some of the versatility of the pattern. For the Beautiful Blocks book, I had a group of friends who were willing to test the instructions, so I decided to make another quilt with them. Instead of the light colors of the original quilt, I decided to use a black background. I also used a different border and eliminated the mock cathedral window cornerstones setting so as not to interrupt the black background between the blocks. This has the effect of looking like the block designs float on the black background.
These colors are kind of unusual for me, but I like how this turned out. I actually got the inspiration for the colors by putting a picture of the layout of the original quilt in Photoshop. Then I shifted the hue for the non-green colors and this was close to the result. The outer border is 3" wide, where there is a 1" width strip of green pieces between 1" strips of black. The corners are quarter circles, just like those used in the block on the bottom row. I am still in the process of finishing the quilting on this quilt.

Applique Center

Applique Center

I have finally completed the applique center! I have to say as much as I love the posies, I'm glad to be done with them. I've already started to add some of the elements around the center, but wanted to just show the center for now. It's a bit difficult to see in the photo, but there are ribbons connecting the posies and the bluebirds. The background was paper foundation pieced rings. I used pinless piecing to stitch the rings together. The outer edge of the circle was hand appliqued to the square piece of background fabric.
For most of the applique on the quilt, I have been using starch and press on the individual pieces, and then using glue to construct the units (such as the birds or the posies). Then I hand applique the unit pieces together before stitching the unit to the background. The background beyond the circle is a solid piece of fabric with a subtle texture. I considered piecing the outer background, but there will be enough going on with the applique pieces that I didn't want to make it more busy. As I add elements now I will add more pictures.
This part of the quilt is symmetrical, but the remainder won't be so I'm excited to really get into the work of adding the rest of the applique pieces.

© 2017 Susan Taylor Propst

New Patchwork Book

Beautiful Blocks

I taught beginning and intermediate patchwork classes for a number of years as well as creating applique designs. I decided a few years ago to revisit the intermediate class and update some of the patterns. The design is similar to what I taught in the classes, but there are more techniques and new ways to make some of the blocks. What is particularly nice for many quilters is that I have developed techniques for completing many blocks more easily all by machine, including the Dresden Plate block. I also know many students didn't enjoy the curved piecing so have used glue to make the curves much easier. The outcome of this is that I have written a book with all of the instructions and step-by-step illustrations. I have just completed the manuscript and it will be available on Amazon Nov 20, 2017.

                                                         ISBN: 978-1979475259

Viola and Lily of the Valley Posy

Viola and Lily of the Valley Posy

These posies contain violas and lily of the value and join with the bluebirds to surround the center of the quilt. Outside of this ring will be a tree-of-life type design with a variety of flowers and birds. I used permanent fabric markers to make the lines on the violas, and crayons to add the touch of color to the light petals of the flowers. I stitched the units together before stitching them to the background.
There are eight of these along with the eight bluebirds. Next week, I'll have a picture of the center of the quilt.

Bluebirds

Bluebirds

The next circle around the center contains 8 bluebirds and 8 posies connected by ribbons. The picture shows one of the bluebirds. I initially considered stitching many pieces for the light blue portions of the wings and tails. Having found these two fabrics which I felt were a great color combination for the birds, I decided instead to use the two fabrics and draw lines suggesting the wing and tail feathers. I used a light box with a paper pattern to draw the lines with fabric marker on all of the pieces. This was much quicker than stitching many pieces, especially since it would have had to be repeated 8 times.

Susan Taylor Propst  ©2017