Revisit of an old post

Long ago, near the first of this year, I got my Avante. And, I attempted another blog, which left me frustrated because I could not put pictures between the text, nor edit anything but the text. I quickly gave up blogging. Now that I have found a better platform, I will revisit that attempt, this time with pictures in the appropriate places! :-) As soon as I figure out how to link to another web page, I will link to the Henna practice pages that I studied as I waiting for my machine to arrive.

originally titled: Week 1 Adventures; Posted: 9 January 2011 at 9:45 p.m.

I ordered my HQ18 Avante before Christmas, and after several weeks of impatient waiting on my part, it finally arrived at my home. I have been having a wonderful time practicing on it, save for that broken needle and drive to SLC to have the timing adjusted just 2 days after I got my machine (oops!) My machine arrived Wednesday, and it's only Sunday, but I have pictures to show for it that I think are quite good for a complete nube!

 

The dragon is my daughter's design; she drew it on the fabric and I quilted it. It looked rather plain so I decided to try microquilting and found that small circles were actually easier to make than large ones! It's pink in the bobbin thread, and the other side was cream on cream for the top. The dragon is my favorite thing done to date, and I can't wait to put more of my daughter's wonderful drawings to fabric.

 

The feathers were terrible on the quilt practice, but I knew I could get pretty ones on paper, so I took a friend's advice and used a Crayola washable marker (I have kids, so I have plenty of those!) to draw my feathers on the fabric, and the result was remarkable! Feathers I wouldn't be ashamed of people seeing. The Crayola markers completely washed out. (You don't see any marker on these pictures, do you?)

The southwestern theme was taken from Henna-practice designs, and then I decided that they needed to become cacti and red rock so prominent in Utah where I live. My clouds need help, I will admit that. I intend to do some more exploration with those, and with the Colourque technique (also called Ink-Lique) to paint the fabric afterward.

So many things to try, so little time! :-)