Hummingbird #2

Last night before our regular quilt guild meeting, my little art quilt group met again over dinner. It has been a long time since we got together, and I've been rather delinquent in general, as I didn't really do anything for the group since I made my first hummingbird quilt in September. Blame it on that class it took at MATC and the holidays and all!

If you remember, we're working through the Art Quilt Workbook, by Jane Davila and Elin Waterston. I knew that we were still working in the "birds" series as a group, but had no idea what chapter or technique we were doing, and seeing as I started it Monday evening (for a Wednesday meeting...), I just decided to do whatever I wanted.

Here's my quilt:


When doing research late last summer, I had found a photo on iStockphoto that I knew I wanted to use as the inspiration for a quilt at some point, so I decided to have a go at it. I first reversed it in Photoshop, as there was something that I just liked more about having the bird oriented to the right. I printed out the image at approximately the size that I wanted the quilt to be (remember, our projects are literally the size of a piece of paper), and then rough cut pieces of fabric using the printout to help me with scale. I threadpainted a bit on top of the fabric to tone down some of the colors (like the green on the hummingbird's back as well as to make the white on the throat and belly less bright). As for the flowers... well, I have to admit that I cheated a bit on them and used the leaf shapes that are in Edyta Sitar's pattern "Geraniums," which I finished ages ago, but still need to quilt. In some ways, quilting these was a good test case for how I will quilt them in that project.

At first, I wasn't sure about this project, as the wings aren't quite placed properly, and I don't think the striping across them looks real. But in the end, I am rather happy with how it turned out and am very glad that I had the group to challenge myself to even start such a thing.

Next month, we're switching themes. The new one: food! The technique: painting. I may be in over my head (but at least I could use food to paint!).