Thursday, August 28, 2014

Generous Gift and Using Up Fabric

     I was in the studio minding my own business when my husband came in with two plastic cases. I thought they were hardware or fishing tackle or something like that because he had just come home from bike riding with his buddies. He opened them up and this is what was inside!
Gobs and gobs of  embroidery floss
     "Holy moly! Where did you get that?" I asked. One of his friends cleaned out his garage and the floss was from his late mother. It was in two separate cases in random order so I dumped it all out and began to organize it by color as you see in the photo. I'm planning to keep only some of it and take the rest to my art group to give away. I can't imagine that there are any colors missing.
     The last couple of weeks I've been busy making wheel chair covers. I've made seven. I'll be traveling in the Fall a bit so I wanted to have them made through the Holidays and I found it was easier to make them in pairs. So here are photos of six of them. (I haven't taken a photo of the last one  yet.)
Night sailing

Day sailing


Modeled after my friend's dog


A request for another dog


Butterfly

Hummingbird
     I inherited that gingham fabric and wasn't sure I would ever use it, but it sure has been useful for these covers. It's very colorful as a background. Little by little, I'm digging into my stash of commercial fabrics. That's a good thing, because for my art quilts I hardly ever use these fabrics anymore and I hate for things to go to waste. I'm linking this to Off The Wall Friday where you can find other art quilt blogs. Please make comments on their posts to let them know you stopped by. Thanks for visiting.







16 comments:

  1. The covers are very nice, great idea for all unused commercial fabrics!

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    1. Thanks, Vera, it feels good to share the lovely fabrics.

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  2. This is a great idea, I love it

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    1. The covers were my friend's idea. I'm happy to keep making them. They really brighten up the retirement home.

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  3. I think I have floss envy! How generous of you to make these beautiful wheel chair covers........inspiring!

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    1. Too bad you don't live near me. Well, since I'm retired, I want to do something for charity with my sewing and this just seemed to come my way.

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    1. Thanks, Heather. It's nice to take a pause to create some art without any pressure of critique or entry dates for a change. Now back to some regular art quilts.

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  5. Oh! Your chair covers are great! The dog people are going to be over the moon :-)

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    1. Thanks, I did a cat a while ago so I had to bow to the other side. Hamsters next? (I don't think so.)

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  6. I love your chair covers and I'm sure they are a huge hit and a spot of cheer at the nursing home. Your floss inheritance is incredible and the cases they came in are pretty neat, too.

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    1. She must have done a lot of embroidery or else kept forgetting what colors she already had. And yes, the cases are awesome. His friend was going to throw all that away. Lucky my husband saw it in the trash pile and asked if I could have it.

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  7. That is an amazing stash of floss! I am definitely envious ! Your chair backs look so creative and will give so much happiness. Thank you for being so giving of your time!

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    1. When I go to the retirement home to visit my friend who is there, I see all those residents stuck there for the rest of their lives with so few possessions after giving so much of themselves, it's the least I can do.

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