Contemplating Ruth

The next verse is Ruth 3:16 And when she came to her mother in law, she said, Who art thou, my daughter? And she told her all that the man had done to her.



Most people probably know the story: Naomi who leaves Bethlehem with her husband and two sons to Moab. Both husband and sons die and she returns to Bethlehem with her daughter in law Ruth. Ruth marries Boaz and becomes known as King David's great grandmother. And ultimately she is in the lineage of Christ the Saviour.

I love the book of Ruth, but to represent this verse into fabric proved not to be so easy....Usually I don't like to be too realistic, I really enjoy symbols and a more symbolic-abstract approach.

Sometimes inspiration comes from words, or pictures. Or at other times I like to try a certain technique. A while ago I was looking at stained glass windows and Tiffany glass. So I have set myself the task of creating a stained glass look. There has to be a woman in the picture too...unavoidable..What better way to get my family into this project? Anne Roos, our 16 year old daughter is the first one. I took a couple of silhouette pictures and traced them.

I am envisioning Ruth coming back early in the morning from the threshing-floor and Boaz. She returns with barley and the knowledge that Boaz is going to see who can marry her. Therefore I see the picture of a woman returning past the fields with a smile on her face, happy to tell Naomi all that Boaz has done to her!

The lay out for all the 'stained glass' pieces

The colour scheme for the sky should be of a sunrise. I put all may blues, purples, oranges, yellow together, but I thought it quite harsh. I therefore decided to get a white cotton out wetted it. I painted the wet fabric with acrylic inks and now it has a more subtle, softer look. I hope it dries nicely!

And yes it's did! I used Heat n Bond to cut out the 'puzzle pieces'. It's an adhesive with a paper backing, so you iron it on and then peel off the paper so you can iron it on to any other fabric.

cutting out pieces for the sky

And placing them on back fabric, making sure the outline of Ruth is visible. So far so good :)

Overview

I have decided to mount my quilts on canvasses for a better presentation. I have painted a couple of canvasses and this is my 3:16 work so far:

Genesis

Exodus

Leviticus

Numbers

Deuteronomy

Joshua

Judges

Unveiling Judges 3:16

Judges 3:16 But Ehud made him a dagger which had two edges, of a cubit length; and he did gird it under his raiment upon his right thigh.

Hard to make even stitches when you sew circles

This turned out quite nice, although I had a few hiccups with printing the letters. I wanted the right part a bit darker and the left in mirror image a bit lighter. I the end I used a pencil to make the text more readable. The target quilting went better than I expected.

This week I have painted some canvasses and mounted all my quilts on them. I am very happy with the result, will try to post them in the next blog post.

Ehud the lefthanded judge

The book of Judges describes the turbulent times when the Israelites began to establish themselves in Canaan. Joshua had died without naming a successor and  "every man did that which was right in his own eyes." (Judges 21:25). God therefore gave them judges (which has a different meaning than the word means today). They were suppose to rule and provide protection as well as to administer justice.

The verse I have to deal with is about one of these judges named Ehud. His name means 'united' and we know about him that he was left handed.
He ruled in a time where the children of Israel were under bondage under Eglon the king of Moab. The Israelites cried unto the LORD, and "the LORD raised them up a deliverer, Ehud....(judges 3:15)

Verse 16 now....But Ehud made him a dagger which had two edges, of a cubit length; and he did gird it under his raiment upon his right thigh.

With this dagger he killed Eglon and therefore delivered the Israelites from the enemies, the Moabites.

This is the first time I haven't made any sketches. I just saw the picture of a dagger in my mind. And decided to go for a simple representation. I first thought about using strong colours. Like red and yellow to represent anger and blood.

I decide to dye my own fabrics, they turned out alright, but I thought them too bright. Because it wasn't so much out of anger or revenge that he killed the king. It was because this king was an enemy of God. So I thought more about the colour of the dagger and came up with more subdued silver and gold tones. Some red has to be in there though...

I drew a dagger on freezer paper and tried to make a mirror image

Just a picture before quilting, because I might ruin it.....Planning to quilt a 'target' on top and that might be tricky...

The lettering went slightly wrong. I used Transfer Artist Paper, and printed the verse in both normal and mirror version using my deskjet printer and then ironed it on as per instructions. It wouldn't transfer though....I had the iron on the hottest setting and pressed and pressed...anyway I gave up and just used a pencil and wrote the words on it where they hadn't transferred properly. After some research people commented that the TAP paper has a limited shelve life. OK...mine has been sitting in my cupboard for about a year. Wish I had known.

Planning to use my red hand-dyed fabric for a small border. But first...quilting time. I am planning on a target, which might be hard sewing perfect circles and the fabric might pucker and...I am going to try it!

Revealing Joshua 3:16

Finally my Joshua quilt is finished!

For the first time I have tried a so called 'pillowcase finish'. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The pillowcase finish (see how I did it:http://www.bluemoonriver.com/PillowcaseTurn.pdf ) is a bit tricky because it means your edges are already finished before you do the quilting. And heavy free motion quilting usually affects the size. But it worked pretty well for this one.

Progress again

After a wedding, engagement and a lot of dress making I started working on my project again. Yesterday I tried to redesign my blog a bit and I like the new, fresh look. I have done an 'in between - experimental little quilt' as well. Better post it for the record. Is has nothing to do with the project 3:16, but I might want to use the techniques.

A little collage using acrylic inks, teabags, drawing on abaca paper, tea labels, pattern tissue. I have quilted an old tile motive over top. 

But back to Joshua 3:16: That the waters which came down from above stood and rose up upon an heap very far from the city Adam, that is beside Zaretan: and those that came down toward the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, failed, and were cut off: and the people passed over right against Jericho.

I already had the design ready for months, but wasn't completely happy with my colour scheme. I have started afresh and decided to use what's in my stash. One of them was a nice aqua colour which I hand dyed and sprinkled with salt. So it came out with a nice 'water-look'.

I am up to putting all my layers together - batting and a backing. And then ready for quilting it. Haven't though about how to quilt it yet....Probably some diagonal lines on the footsteps and some stone/wall textured look for the looming walls of Jericho. Here's the piece so far:

footsteps and people are drawn and painted with inktense pencils. The walls of Jericho made with dark brown fabric and glued dried teabags on top.Words are printed on fabric by using Transfer Artist Paper.

 I should have picked a slighter lighter brown for the wall, but I didn't know the teabags would completely blend in. Maybe I can correct it with a lighter quilting on top. On the other hand it might show how the Israelites felt in their hearts.

A few thoughts on Joshua 3:16

I better start blogging again before I forget how to do it :)

First I will put up the next five verses I am planning of working on:

Joshua 3:16
That the waters which came down from above stood [and] rose up upon an heap very far from the city Adam, that [is] beside Zaretan: and those that came down toward the sea of the plain, [even] the salt sea, failed, [and] were cut off: and the people passed over right against Jericho.

Jdg 3:16

But Ehud made him a dagger which had two edges, of a cubit length; and he did gird it under his raiment upon his right thigh.

Rth 3:16

And when she came to her mother in law, she said, Who art thou, my daughter? And she told her all that the man had done to her

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1Sa 3:16

Then Eli called Samuel, and said, Samuel, my son. And he answered, Here am I

 

2Sa 3:16

And her husband went with her along weeping behind her to Bahurim. Then said Abner unto him, Go, return. And he returned.

    I really would love to spend a lot of time on these! But there is a busy time ahead of me where other things have priority. Still hoping I will receive a few quiet days....
I have been thinking about the quilt about Joshua and here are some of my thoughts on paper...

 

There has to be water in it of course and a city and some people. Trying to get the composition right

And then the colour scheme...I dried some teabags and would like to include them. It think brown, blue and green go nicely together. But it's a bit dull...

I think this would be better, but I don't have enough green. Might do some fabric hunting to find the right green for the plains of Jericho.

For some reason I can't rotate an image after I have put it on the blog. Just tilt your head a bit to the right ;) This is the sketch I am going to work from.

 I know it's a bad time of the year starting, but I would like some continuation. So maybe I won't actually start working on it soon, but who knows I might find a few hours :)