This thread is behaving oddly, so will see if I can reply.....it says I"m on the last page, but posts are from March, and I know yesterday it was still showing me much more recent posts.
Well, in case anyone is able to see this, here's what I've been up to, though maybe since it's what's kept me from finishing my Rows, I should put it over there.....
First, the explanation....six years ago I started quilting while living in Brazil; we'd been in Brazil about 3 years at that time. Before I'd even finished my first projects, I was designing the next ones, and one that came to me during that time was this quilt. This quilt pays homage to Brazil, and the idea literally came to me fully formed, an image of the final quilt, and I sketched it out on paper as best I could. It was this drawing that my stepmom saw and decided I needed to have EQ7 software for my future designs, LOL! Actually, I just realized, this is the first quilt I "designed" on my own, even though it took me 6 yrs to acquire the skills and techniques needed to create it.
The central motif is a flower motif popular in the sidewalks in Brazil, at least in our area, with the side border being the *very* popular wave motif that is seen along Copacabana beach in Rio, and is used on tiles, jewelry boxes, fabric, etc. throughout Brazil (and repeated in sidewalks all over the country), and the bird is also a repeated/often seen motif. The dividing diagonal is to reflect that the left side is the sidewalks, the urban beauty of the country; the right side is where nature springs to life, the inspirations behind the sidewalk motifs. Brilliant flowers, the blue sparrow, the waves & sand of the many beaches.
I don't know how well it shows in the photo, but the left side has quilted into it (and then painted with a translucent wash of Lumiere paints) a city map of my neighborhood in Brazil, with the route marked from my apartment to the little market, and several other frequented buildings/places etched in. The Brazil map on the right has marked a trail of our travels and places we visited. Not every single city, but the big ones. That also was all quilted first then a bit of paint applied as shading/highlights.
The whole thing is pieced from hexagons (that were first pieced from house shapes, using Gyleen Fitzgerald's polygon 3 tool, and some of those were pieced from strips to cut the shape to give the brick & mortar appearance in the sidewalk side); the appliques were all first "made fabric" from the hexagons, then the shapes cut out & fused to a foundation and then appliqued on or, in the case of the wave borders, the foundation was pieced to the body of the quilt. The flower petals are machine raw edge appliqued.
The whole thing is ditch quilted, the applique's outlined, then various decorative quilting over that, different things in each area. It is not perfect by any stretch, but it is by far my personal best so far, and looks exactly how I've pictured it in my head the last six years. I went ahead and submitted it into a show, time will tell if it gets accepted or not. I'm just pleased to have it done.
Full photo, close-up of Brazil map showing the quilting and shading, close up of the city map showing my route for my daily walks.