The Quilt Project goes up tomorrow! (Around lunchtime, Oct. 24 in Australia)

I'll be checking it out when it does, and you can have a look, too, when the website comes online!

http://thequiltproject.blogspot.com

Sir Philip Sidney 1554-1586

That's all I know about him, but here's one of his sonnets:

Leave me, O Love, which reachest but to dust;
And thou, my mind, aspire to higher things;
Grow rich in that which never taketh rust;
Whatever fades, but fading pleasure brings.
Draw in thy beams, and humble all thy might
To that sweet yoke where lasting freedoms be,
Which breaks the clouds and opens forth the light,
That doth both shine and give us light to see.
O take fast hold; let that light be thy guide
In this small course which birth draws out to death,
And think how evil becometh him to slide
Who seeketh heaven, and comes of heavenly breath.
Then farewell, world; thy uttermost I see:
Eternal Love, maintain thy life in me.

Finished Quilt Square

A website will go up with the entire quilt in late October. I'll put the link up when I have it. For now, here are some pictures a friend took of the finished product.

Redwork Design

After some days of brainstorming, I finally had an idea I thought would work and started collecting reference materials. I started with a quote that seemed like it would go nicely on display, that reflects my interests, and that I hoped could be enjoyed by others. After rejecting several, I kept a paraphrase from LDS scripture that I felt was nice, but also carries extra significance for me because of the context it is taken from (Doctrine and Covenants 121:33++).

The second step was to choose a picture of the heavens. I started thinking about telescope pictures of nebulae, galaxies, planets, etc., and decided that most of them wouldn't translate well into two tone work. One fortunate morning (I think it was morning) I thought to show the heavens viewed from earth--a nice mountain skyline with the Sun and the Moon both in view. I just had to pick the skyline.

I chose Squaw Peak, Lightning Peak, and Y-Mountain--the skyline I grew up next to. My sister and niece sent me pictures to work from, but there was a small problem. The skyline was too flat and two wide, and Lightning Peak wasn't nearly as imposing as it was in my memory. As you can tell, I solved that by shifting Squaw Peak (on the left) and Y-Mountain (on the right) closer together, and lifting the profile of Lightning peak higher and more into the foreground. I felt a little bad misrepresenting my mountains, but the picture was much better for a quilt square. When my mom sent a picture of the skyline from a different perspective, Lightning peak really was more prominent, and I felt better about my memory.

The Sun and Moon I took from the NASA images website. I looked for pictures that showed interesting texture, since these bodies were to be the central theme of the quilt square. The central Sun picture shows weather on the Sun, and the outer one shows ejecta.

For the last part, I thought it might look good to have someone staring up at the heavens. A picture of me and my boy made a good starting place, which I have further modified in later stages. We'll see if time allows it to remain, since I'm down to a few days to finish the project.

Putting it all together I showed the composite design to my wife.

She was terrified. What had she done recommending I participate in a project with people whose crafting she admired? Would they stop following her blog? Would the blame her for the eyesore in their quilt? Fortunately, the next stage of the design relieved some of her fears.

More updates to follow!

The Quilt Project

At my wife's instigation, I just joined "The Quilt Project". I'll be doing a quilt square in redwork embroidery with 30-40 other people. I'm quite excited to see what everyone creates, and it's a great starting project for a blog where I plan to show things I've made and various other things I've found interesting and beautiful. Here's the blog that's sponsoring the project:

Sonnets

I love the sonnet, both to read and to write. Sometimes one seems particularly beautiful or really makes me think. I'll share one at a time as the mood takes me. Here's one by John Donne (1573-1631). I love how this reads like someone speaking, but on inspection keeps perfectly to the standard metric and rhyme of a sonnet. This is characteristic of many of my favorites.

At the round earth's imagin'd corners, blow
Your trumpets, Angels, and arise, arise
From death, you numberless infinities
Of souls, and to your scattered bodies go,
All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,
All whom war, dearth, age, agues, tyrannies,
Despair, law, chance, hath slain, and you whose eyes,
Shall behold God, and never taste death's woe.
But let them sleep, Lord, and me mourn a space,
For, if above all these, my sins abound,
'Tis late to ask abundance of thy grace,
When we are there; here on this lowly ground,
Teach me how to repent; for that's as good
As if thou hadst seal'd my pardon, with thy blood.