Textiles at Mayo

We're back from Mayo, it was a very successful trip for my husband. I never watch the street signs while we travel and I don't know how I saw this one but I caught it out of the corner of my eye as we went by, then turned around to photograph it.
I worked on this block while at Mayo, it's my husband's childhood home. I'm not quite finished with all of the embroidery details, I want to put in window panes and some grass around the tree, and then all the family details in the front area. The house was dyed with daffodils, the windows from sumac tree bark. the tree branches needle-felted.
The Mayo building has a wonderful art collection from all over the world, modern and antique, they offer guided art tours. The building has 19 floors. As you get off the elevator on each floor, there is a glass case with a textile from around the world (vintage and antique) on display. Then, as you turn to walk to your doctors waiting area, one side of the building is all glass windows looking out over the town. They have glass sculptures on display from famous glass artists all over the world. While my husband waited for appointments I rode the elevator to all the floors and photographed the textiles and some of the glass sculptures. I was in heaven, I'll share of some of them with you.
Bolivia Women's cermonial mantle, 19 mid century, alpaca. I don't know how well you can read this description, I tried to photograph it through the glass. There is so much work put into the all the textiles, I wish it would have been easier for you to read, the descriptions mean a lot.

Japanese Robe, Late 20th century. cotton Used indigo-dyed cotton embellished with applique and embroidery. Poverty necessitated frugality. The motifs for textile design were passed from mother to daughter, children sometimes learned them by drawing in sand.
I don't know much about glass artists but I do know Dale Chihuly's work. These are 13 of his pieces in the lobby. They are breath taking. I would hate to dust them!

Amish quilt. Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Cotton and wool Circa 1890 to 1900.

Detail of corner. Autumn. wool tapestry, 8' x 13'. This tapestry is very dramatic (and huge). Artist Zophia Butrymowicz, Poland
This quilt is in the breast cancer library. I don't know who the artist is. This sculpture is also there, the artist is Jane Buckles from Canada, it brought tears to my eyes looking at it. These are her words: What you see before you is a woman "stopped dead" in her tracks. Behind her is strewn the once, but no longer, important day timer, its pages crowded with the banalities of existence. As with the metamorphosis a butterfly experiences, I see the survivor, through her cancer, transformed into a beautiful creature with a heightened awareness and reverence to the preciousness of life.

I'll share some more of Mayo's collection with you soon.

Earth Day quilt show

In 1996 I thought it would be a great idea to have a Earth Day quilt show at our April guild meeting. Our members brought different flower, tree, and "earthy" quilts to the meeting. We displayed them, everyone received a participant ribbon and there was one viewers choice ribbon. We have done this almost every year since, this year we also had a different category, recycled quilts. Here are a few of the quilts. The top one Mary made of old jeans for her nephew, on the quilt she machine embroidered some of his favorite things, golf, baseball, fishing etc.
Kay recycled antique quilt blocks in to a new wall hanging.

Beverly used old shirt plackets from the Rag Co. There were buttons sewed along the strips which she cut off and sewed the strips together.

The quilt on the left used recycled jean fabric in it and friends signed it for a get well quilt. The circle floor mat is a collection of left over scraps from a quilt she made. She decoupaged into the mat. Beverly also made this rag rug out of left over fabric scraps. The tote bag is made from empty Capri Sun packages, I don't know if Cathy stuffed them with anything. The flowers are participant ribbons.

This quilt was made with her nurses scrub shirts.

Two t-shirt quilts. This isn't a recycled quilt, Jamie made this African inspired quilt, it's much more striking in real life.
Mary had this wall hanging in the general show. This was my first recycled quilt, in 1996 after marbleizing Easter eggs with a store egg coloring kit, I took the left over dye and marbleized some fabric. This piece reminded me of the Earth, I appliqued it on the blue fabric and quilted it.

My friend Marlyn used her new embroidery machine to sew this top, she gave it to me after the show (1996).
My friend Deb and I made the first show ribbons out of recycled junk mail. We stamped them with earthy sayings. The large ribbon was the viewers choice.
My birthday is on Earth day and Deb made me this cute wall hanging for my birthday that year. The watering can is tin with silk ribbon flowers. The first boarder is our natural dyed cotton with black walnuts. Ceramic buttons in the corners. I still hang it up every summer with a tree branch, it has little loops at the top.
Deb just sent me this card and some fabric for my birthday. She hand made this card and it looks just like spring in my yard. I love it. The background and tree are needle felted, the flowers, leaves, bird and nest are silk ribbon embroidery.
Sunday, my husband and I are going to Mayo to get a second opinion on his heart, I will be gone for about a week. I've spent time there before and they have a wonderful art collection from all over the world, modern and very antique. The town, also has a lot of art gallery's, in between appointments we tour around. If they release him Tues. we're going to head to South Dakota and camp for a few days and do a little hiking. I'll see you the end of April have a great Earth day!

National Quilting Day

Every year my quilt guild PALS (Patchers at the Lakeshore) has a special all day quilting on or near National Quilt Day, this year they had a special mystery quilt project you could make if you wanted to. I'm not sure of the name, it came from the internet. There was two sizes to choose from, table runner or lap quilt. I didn't make one I worked on my own project. This first picture is Jamie and Cathy with their table runners. I love how the fabric piecing shows the round circles around the star.

Kay, one of our guild chairmans, piecing her top. The blue is a wonderful batik.
Her finished project.
Mary, our other guild chairmans finished top.

Lillians piecing.

I'm not sure of her name, but the fabric was much prettier than the picture shows, the dark was a beautiful brown batik.
Matha , (a nurse, do you remember her from the hospital, Deb?) She made (not finished) her table runner with jelly bean fabric for her Easter table. Her first grandchild was born in Dec.
Another.
And my friend Beverly, she stopped by to chat, she does alot of twilling ( a hand embroidery stitch) and is showing her twilling on her pocket.