To Art Quilting and Beyond - Week 3/Part 4

OK so I told you it would be something a little spacey, right?

Well....here it is...

UFOs!

Or to be more specific - New uses for UFOs

We all have them. If you don't have any, please don't tell me!! It would be too painful...

I have many pieces languishing in a container hoping beyond hope to someday be an art quilt. Oh I DO have plans for them. Plans are not what I'm lacking. Time is what I'm lacking. Time to incorporate them into an art quilt as we usually think of them. How else could I give them a meaningful life other than hanging on the wall? What about another tactic? The first one was rather easy for me to "re-purpose"

Years ago I did a couple of pieces because I saw what a friend had done and I wanted to play for a bit. The challenge intrigued me. First I made a fabric interpretation of one of my favorite art pieces. I'm a HUGE fan of John Waterhouse so I chose one of his pieces titled "Destiny".  It is a painting of a woman sipping tea looking out a round window at ships in the harbor. I imagine her dreaming of places her destiny might take her.  Here is my rendition in fabric. Please keep in mind...this WAS years ago!!

Since winter is coming soon and I LOVE to curl up on the couch with a cup of tea in the afternoon and watch TV or write in my journal or do handwork AND since a dear friend gave me a VERY special teapot, I wanted to use this small piece to make a tea cozy!

First I found fabrics I wanted to use with it. The blue background is the main fabric and the red roses I wanted to use for the binding. I also chose a red floral for the inside. I quilted two pieces the size I would need in a simple meandering pattern.

I put the red binding on the UFO on three sides. I didn't do the bottom because it would be taken care of when I put the binding on the whole tea cozy. (The original piece is 9" X 9". I cut it down to 8" X 8" to be a better size for the tea cozy)

Then I measured it with the teapot and drew off the rounded corners. Hope you can see the marks.

Both quilted pieces were cut and the sews together (inside out/red sides out). I used the binding to cover the inside seams. I know it won't show but I wanted to be sure it didn't get messed up when it gets washed.

And finally I put the binding around the bottom of the tea cozy. (oh I almost forgot - I also put a small tab of the binding on the top of the cozy)

Here it is with my VERY special teapot and then over the teapot. I think it is a very appropriate and meaningful use for this particular UFO.

              

Just for fun I also made a coaster out of a leftover corner of one of the quilted pieces. Just zig-zagged the edges. This will be for the teapot to sit on.

Then just for fun I got out the other part of this experiment. The idea was to take the same fabrics and make an abstract piece out of them. OK...here it is....my first abstract.  Be kind.

I cut it down just a bit because I wanted to make an eyeglasses holder and it was just a smidge too long. This one also started out at 9" X 9". Then I cut curves on the top corners. Used some black fabric as a binding and voila! An eyeglasses holder like no one else has. And I get to carry my art around with me!

So next time you dig through all those UFOs...perhaps some could be given a different Destiny!

If you have done different things with your UFOs or if you have been inspired and have some ideas, please share them in the comments for this post!

UFO Tutorial - day 1

I have a box full of random, un-used, leftover, odd-sized, ugly, new and old blocks.  Some of them I have already improved.

 And a couple have even become small quilts.  This one was snapped up as soon as I finished it and is now hanging in a young teenager's bedroom.

So how do you turn an ugly duckling into a swan?

These six blocks were in a bag of vintage blocks I bought, sight unseen, at a flea market years ago; they have been in my trunk for ages.  As I look at them now I know I would never have bought them if I had seen them. I don't know what the pattern is called but they are clearly swastikas to me. I estimate that they were made in the 1940's, but some of the fabrics look like 1910-20 vintage, as well.

I decided that cutting these individually would be too much work, so I sewed them together and will cut them as though they were a whole top.  They are hand-pieced and I was happy to see that they were not all the same size and that a lot of the seams were 1/8".  This is true of many old blocks; who came up with the "you must have a 1/4" seam" idea?? 

As I cut this thing up and re-sew it, you will be along with me to see what works and what doesn't because I never know in advance what I will be doing.  I'll take pictures as I go along and will be happy to answer questions.  It may not turn out to be a masterpiece but for sure, it will be better than THIS!
Stay tuned.