July, July!

Actually, it's still June, but I'm posting these instructions now because I am planning on handing off fabric to Rebekah and Debbie at tonight's Modern Quilt Guild (Brighton chapter). The rest of you can expect fabric in the mail within the week!

Here's the plan for the quilt:

This began as a kelp shape that I doodled and re-doodled.  Inspired, of course, by Amanda's work.
It doesn't really look much like kelp any more, but I still call this "the kelp quilt" in my head. 
Maybe that's what kelp looks like on Mars?

I had originally conceived of doing with it in mineral green colors.  But, I changed my mind and decided on oranges and reds, similar to the colors in this textile by Ray Eames.  I might bind it in lavender, but probably candy blue, as in the painting above.  We'll see.  : )

I hand-dyed these reds and oranges to get the variation in colors I wanted.  I used pimatex fabric which is really lovely to work with, so I think you'll be happy as you sew. (I'll send the white, too!)

(by the way, I used the flat dyeing technique that Robin explained on her blog.  It worked wonderfully.)

This is going to be a twin-size bed quilt.
Here are my guidelines:
--I'd like everyone to please make a 9" tall, 65" wide strip.
--As you can see in the picture, I would like your kelp shapes to be in the center of the strip height-wise (don't stress, just aim for the center, okay?)
--Try to keep the plants less than 4" tall and the stems no more than 1.25" tall.
--Anything goes as far as how many plants you'd like to put in your strip, how long the plants are, whether you do some that are just stems, and where you position them in the strip width-wise.
--I love subtle wonk, but nothing crazy or forced.

Can't wait to see what you all make!
Here's a song to get you fired up!

Housekeeping!

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Bee members, here are your month assignments!

July 2010  - Rossie
August 2010 - Jess
September 2010 - Cheryl
October 2010 - Amanda
November 2010 - Debbie

January 2011 - Rebekah
February 2011 - Robin
March 2011 - Lauren
April 2011 - Blair
May 2011 - Malka Yahaira
June 2011 - Jacquie

I do believe I have accommodated everyone's wishes.
If something comes up and you need to swap your month, that's fine; but please try to arrange it yourself and let me (Rossie) or Cheryl know if you need help.

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Flickr group

If you would like to share your blocks on flickr, I recommend posting them to this group:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/quiltingbeeblocks/

That way they'll be seen by more people!  

The groups for individual bees don't seem to get much traffic, so we're not planning on setting one up.

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Blog button

As requested, here is a blog button

html code for above

<a href="http://midmodbee.blogspot.com/"><img alt="Mid Mod Quilt Bee" border="0" img="" src="http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1276/4672802101_3d0bb05c58_b.jpg" width="200" /></a>


In Blogger, add these by going to the "layout" tab;   click "add gadget";choose "HTML/JavaScript" as the gadget type;  paste in code; save your changes!

To make the button bigger or smaller, change the "200" to a bigger or smaller number.

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Words of wisdom

Cheryl put this so well in her email that I asked her permission to post this for posterity:
"We have a phenomenally creative group of quilters, artists, authors, and designers. We are all fans of mid century modern design. We believe that we can come together to create some amazing quilts. These quilts will capture the spirit of the artists involved. They will also, hopefully, capture the essence of mid-century modern design.

"So, instead of sending out precise rules and pre-cut fabric, please share your inspiration and a pile of fabric. Let go and see what comes back to you. We can trust each other to produce quality blocks, so trust the process."

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Please post each block you make

When you post a block you made, please attach two labels: (1) your first name  (2) ______'s quilt <--- filling in the name of the person for whom the block is destined.

This will make it easier to search back through posts. 
I have added ALL of these labels to this post so that you can add them to future posts just by clicking on "show all"



and then select the relevant labels.

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Feel free to post about other mid-mod stuff here.
I'm loving the inspiration posts, and their comments. Keep them coming and please use the "inspiration" label! 

I have figured out how to get the byline up below the title of each post, hopefully this will help us know who is talking when. (I'll try to clean up the way it looks soon).

Also, if any members want me to add their email address to the list of those who get emailed each comment, shoot me an email.  (You can also subscribe to the comments by RSS, but I like the email method myself.)


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I'm beyond pumped to get started!
Thank you all!

mid mod inspiration

You may be asking yourself what the heck a post office in backwoods North Carolina has to do with our fabulous new quilt bee (I'm so darn excited!!!). It's a good question, and it has to do with inspiration. See, I think I do have some understanding of the mid-century modern design aesthetic, but I've been looking for inspiration (already planning for my month, of course!) and I'm having trouble finding the exact right source. There's a lot out there in terms of mid-century modern architecture (see said post office; inspired mini quilt to follow!) and furniture, and I'm actually kind of interested to think about how that might translate to quilts. But I'm not finding textile-related things. Anyone else?