January 20, 2010
I have always loved the book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. My dad sent me this wonderful site called Terrible Yellow Eyes which was started by an amazing artist named Cory Godbey. He got all these very talented artists to do different interpretations of the book and posted them. I decided I really wanted to do one of them as a quilt for my dad for his birthday. I wrote to Cory and he was kind enough to allow me to do a quilt of this particular piece. Here is the front and back of my quilt.
I machine appliqued Max and all the words. Then I hand embroidered the crown and scepter. I added the trees for the quilting. Here is a close up of Max.
When I was a little girl I had to wear a patch. One of the things that my dad did to help me strengthen my eyes was to take me out to play slug bug. (Which for the uninitiated is where you drive around looking for Volkswagen Beetles) This was before the new ones came out so you really had to look for them. Anyway to this day when I drive around with my dad we still play slug bug so I embroidered a slug bug for the back of his quilt. 
Categories: Art Quilts, Embroidery.
October 31, 2009
One of my friends who had a baby girl loves western things. So I decided to make this quilt. It was also one of the first quilts that I made on my new sewing machine. I decided to do red stars with cowgirls in the middle. I don’t usually do a lot of quilts with mostly solids and this quilt reminded me why. The problem with all solid fabric in a pieced quilt is that your points have to all line up! Which is something I sometimes have a problem with. Anyway I finally finished and had it all quilted when I realized that if I went ahead and put ties in it that would cover up the points, and magically no one noticed the points. 
I decided for the label to do pink cowboy boots.
Categories: Baby Quilts, Embroidery, Pieced Quilts.
October 31, 2009
For Easter one year my church asked people to think about the burdens that Jesus takes and caries for us. They then asked us to make an art piece to describe that. This is what I came up with.
I feel that Christ takes our brokenness, our failures, our fears and our pain and puts us back together into a whole person. He is the stitching that holds our lives together. I have gone from being a person with many fractured parts to a person that is whole. Of course I still struggle and the cracks are still there but with God’s help I will continue to become more and more whole.
I did the piece as a crazy quilt. I then hand embroidered the features. I don’t actually have blue eyes but I always wanted them so I decided to have some artistic license. 
Categories: Art Quilts, Embroidery, Random Musings.
October 28, 2009
I first started quilting about 10 years ago, when my first nephew was born. I have always loved quilts and I had really wanted to try one. I have tried a lot of crafts over the years and hadn’t really found one I really found a craft I loved until I started quilting. Of course, depending on when you catch me during a project I might tell you differently. I have mostly made baby quilts for a couple of reasons. One because my apartment is tiny, and two because a lot of my friends have had babies in the past few years. I have also done a few “art quilts” as well. Besides quilting I love to hand embroider. I find it very relaxing and calming. I always try and embroider the labels for all of my quilts.
Categories: Uncategorized.
October 28, 2009
I saw this quilt in the book Fantastic Fabric Folding: Innovative Quilting Projects by Rebecca Wat. I have a friend who had a baby girl so I decided to make it. I usually want people to use my quilts. I always tell people I want it to be worn out by the time the baby is two, but this was the first quilt I thought I would be fine with them hanging it on the wall. Anyway my friend Kat loves Asian inspired things so I knew she would love it, and she did.
The Kimonos are a combination of pieced blocks and folded applique. They took quite a bit longer than I thought they would. They took about twelve hours just to fold the sashes and collars them all and sew them on.
Thank goodness for Masterpiece Theater. I watched all twelve hours of Bleak House on DVD while I did it!
Categories: Baby Quilts, Pieced Quilts.
October 28, 2009
I made this quilt when friends of mine had a baby boy. The dad has always been a die hard Chicago Cubs fan (despite their consistent run of bad luck) so I decided to make this quilt. It took me a little longer than I expected, but happily it arrived at their house on Opening Day of yet another disappointing season. At least the quilt ended up nice.
For the label I used a different Cubs logo for the C in Caleb. (Thanks Beth for the great idea!)
Categories: Baby Quilts, Embroidery.
October 28, 2009
When my oldest nephew turned 6 I decided to make him another quilt. I had already made him two quilts before this, one when he was born and another one when he turned two. I saw a pattern in the magazine Fons and Porter’s Love of Quilting and decided to base it on that. This was the first time I did “stack and whack” cutting. I also decided to applique different jungle animals on the quilt as well as embroider animals.
Here is a close up of the applique.
Here is a close up of one of the embroideries.
Categories: Embroidery, Pieced Quilts.
October 27, 2009
Welcome to the brand spanking new HLS Designs blog. I hope to be posting photos of some of my quilts and different art pieces that I have worked on. Hopefully also I will be posting some works in progress. So check back to see how the progress is going. Thanks -Heather
Categories: Random Musings.
