Project Quilting 16.5: Follow Your Arrow

 

This week's Project Quilting challenge theme is Follow Your Arrow where participants were invited to explore arrows by including an arrow shape in our 1-week started and finished projects. In addition to Project Quilting, today is Day 14/100 of my 100 Days of Engineering Interactive Elements in my fiber art project which involves rolling dice to include a form of movement in my daily art project. Thankfully I rolled Artist Choice which provided lots of options for my Project Quilting piece. 

Over the course of the week, I considered a few different ideas related to arrows: Weather vanes, recycling, follow your heart, and archery--but none really got my creative juices flowing. I confess that much of this week has found me fairly unfocused as my mind has been thinking about current events unfolding here in the United States, health concerns, and my to-do lists as I pack and prepare for an upcoming international travel trip.

Today is International Women's Day and I found myself reflecting on the many facets and responsibilities of my life: family & friends, pet mom, artist, entrepreneur, student, yogi, nature lover, goal-getter, Californian, American, etc. Oftentimes, our brains can feel overwhelmed by our neverending to-do lists trying to be everything to everyone else--often foregoing our own needs. 

These thoughts reminded me of the final #CarveDecember2024 "Growth" prompt which inspired me to carve a head planter vessel featuring my own face. I had so much fun filling the block-printed vessel with other CarveDecember creations! 

With this in mind, I set out to create a small talisman bag with limited head space requiring me to focus on which relationships and/or responsibilities to focus on at any given day or moment. I chose a variety of smaller personal symbols to capture the areas that are most important to me trying to cap it at just ten.

Using Ranger Archival inkpads, each motif was block printed onto a scrap of designer fabric sourced from Fabmo, my local creative reuse center. 

The prints were then fused onto Pellon's 70 Peltex® Sew-In Ultra Firm Stabilizer backed with metallic performance wear fabric for quilting and outline stitching.

I was pretty excited by how well my project was progressing and decided to take a break for lunch followed by a walk with my pups. When I returned to my studio to start stitching, my sewing machine decided to stage a protest and break a needle, amongst other naughty behaviors. 

Not to be deterred, I changed the needle, cleaned out my bobbin case, swapped out threads, and managed to complete all the stitching without further issue (phew!).

Each symbol was then trimmed close to the stitch line. The raw edges were painted with Tulip Dimensional Fabric paint before propping up onto spools of thread to air dry.

Constructing the head planter talisman bag was fairly quick and easy with topstitching to hold all the layers together...

...before trimming close to the stitchline and painting the exterior edges.

Much to my surprise, my project was finished by 8:30 PM (which might be a new PQ record for me!) but it needed a bit of time for those edges to dry before I could take photos and video.

I am really proud of how this project came together. I posted a few short videos that showcase the finished project on Instagram, as well as some of the meaning behind each of these personal symbols here and the other half here. I especially love that, like my own brain, my stitched vessel is only capable of holding space for a few of these personal responsibilities at any given time. Moreover, as my life changes, I can add new designs to my talisman collection. 

Today, my vessel holds space for:

• Heart: Love from family, friends, and my pups
• Leaf: Growth that comes from participating in Project Quilting challenges and 100 Day Projects
• Arrow: Taking action to move me closer to my dreams & goals