Saturday, October 22, 2011

Love Letters: Amaryllis

Once upon a time, in a small kingdom far away, a self-professed art quilt blogger wrote about a terrific new book she had purchased, titled “Appliqué Art,” by Stewart Merrett.  This book was a visual feast, with beautiful projects created from sumptuous velvets, silks, and moiré fabrics.  The little blogger promised herself that she would one day tackle one of these enticing projects, and, finally, after a LONG, LONG time, she did.
She gathered together a collection of decorator fabrics . . .
and, using instructions from the beautiful book, she designed a letter “E” to place behind the lovely floral pattern.  She used a satin stitch and 40-weight Sulky rayon thread to appliqué the pieces to the velvet background.   The piece was then outline-quilted with 30-weight rayon . . .
She trimmed it with a velvet border . . .
"Love Letters: Amaryllis"  ©2011 Diane Evans
and brought it to her local A.C. Moore shop to have them place it in a gilded frame.
Her husband (a prince of a man) was so pleased with the little wall quilt that he hung it in a place of honor in the castle, which pleased the blogger very much, since it had taken her SO LONG to finish the piece that she was certain it would languish in her pile of QuIPs (“Quilts In Progress”).
The moral of this tale?  You can finish anything you set out to do if you have enough determination and a 65%-off coupon from your local frame shop.
Diane

12 comments:

Lynne said...

It's lovely; I'm so glad you finished it and it was hung in a wonderful place!

connie said...

:-) Funny what motivates us. This piece is beautiful. You should be pleased!!! I love Amaryllis and you did it justice!

Sharon Rotz said...

Clever story line to go with your lovely quilt.

Calicojoan said...

The power of a coupon, and a little inspiration. Just beautiful, my dear!

Anonymous said...

The quilt is lovely and you chose the perfect frame!

Quilt Rat said...

What a wonderful tale to go along with such a beautiful piece.
Better hang onto that prince :-)

Joanna Monroe said...

Today at our ARTAA meeting, I was lucky enough to see Diane and "Amaryllis". The pictures are great, but with the lush fabrics, it's really yummy up close.

Anonymous said...

This is the best blog entry I've read in a long time. What fun. And what a beautiful love letter.

Marlaine said...

Beautiful quilt, beautiful story!

Chris Daly said...

Such a lovely piece of work Diane and what a fun post. I hope you and the prince live happily ever after.

MulticoloredPieces said...

I like the way you have written your story and used the art work to illustrate it. Great post!
best from Tunisia,
nadia

Tangled Stitch said...

It's beautiful, so sorry I missed it. Lovely!

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