72 x 57 inches // 2024

machine pieced, machine quilted

leftover blocks / scraps from other quilts, cotton

This is the fifth in a series of quilts made entirely from scraps that would normally have been discarded. Trash, after all, is trash only when we decide it is.

Come Together revels in the spontaneous joy of a dynamic community created from disparate strands.

72 by 72 inches // 2024

Machine pieced, machine quilted

Quilting cotton

A slight swivel at the core—here, a mere quarter turn to the right—challenges the squared and bounded symmetries at the edge of things.

—Quilts=Art=Quilts, Schweinfurth Art Center, Auburn, New York, November–December, 2024

90 by 90 inches // 2023

Machine pieced, machine quilted, machine bound.

All recycled linen and brocade. Brocade tablecloth (orange/yellow), linen bedsheet (blue), unflattering linen pants (tobacco), and leftover linen from shirts (white/cream).

Artist Statement:

Combining a well-loved and heavily used tablecloth purchased on a trip to Italy (yellow/orange), with a torn linen bedsheet (blue), scraps of linen leftover from shirt-making (white), and a pair of unflattering linen pants (tobacco), this quilt captures the essence of our experience of Lucca—a medieval walled city—as respite from the turmoil of tourists we suffered from in Florence. Its time on the table over, it has found a second life providing warmth and comfort as we sleep.

_______

Lucca is a medieval walled city in northern Italy—it has a central square of shops and apartments surrounded by a grass-topped wall around it’s outer boundary.

We visited Lucca more than a dozen years ago and found it a peaceful respite from the turmoil of tourists in Florence. While we were there, I bought a brocade orange and yellow tablecloth that we used daily until it finally ripped down the middle. So many meals around that tablecloth!

I wanted to use it in a quilt so I gathered up other bits of saved linen fabric and set about cutting and composing.

At 90 by 90 inches and being linen and a heavy brocade, it was a beast to work on (it weighs 7 pounds)—it’s quilted by machine in a windowpane pattern. It’s perfectly imperfect and will live on our bed for many years to come, reminding us of that sweet, calm afternoon in Lucca.

63 x 41 inches // 2024

Machine pieced and quilted

commerical cotton

I got curious about triangles and how they play with line, how bright colors combine with dull, how the resulting blocks intersect and create movement in an otherwise static composition. Bloom is a study of control and chaos, much in the same way a formal rose garden is both linear and untamed.

—International Quilt Festival, “Save the Planet 24” exhibit, Houston TX, October 31-November 3, 2024

—International Quilt Festival, “The Changing Climate” exhibit, Long Beach CA, July 6-8 2023

51 by 65 inches // 2023

Machine pieced, machine and hand quilted.

Marcia Derse ‘palette’ fabrics + kona cotton + an old bedsheet (12 shades in all)

Artist Statement

The giant bull kelp forests form a unique ecosystem that is habitat and home to countless aquatic creatures. But overgrazing, overfishing, and pollution have conspired to deforest these magical underwater realms. There are devastating declines on every continent; the losses in southern Australia and northern California, where a mere 5 percent of the once teaming giant bull kelp forests remain, are especially heartbreaking. When kelp forests disappear, their undersea nonhuman inhabitants disappear too, along with the web of human livelihoods they support. Using twenty shades of green, aqua, and brown, this improv-pieced quilt shimmers like the kelp's underwater world. The black band along the edge warns us of what we stand to lose.

A note about the process

Funny thing about this quilt: I wrecked the first iteration of it by being thoughtless and had to take extreme measures to ‘save’ it. Which is ironic since it’s theme is saving the disappearing giant kelp forests, 95% of which are already gone.

When I quilted it the first time, I chose a fluffy wool batting and used organic wavy lines done very minimally. It looked terrible! Yet somehow, I didn’t know to stop and redo it. In a mindless state, believing it would be OK, I went ahead and bound it. And it was still bad. Then I did a terrible thing: I washed it! Which just made it so much worse. I tossed it aside thinking it was a goner until something told me I should have a go at saving it—even if the only outcome was learning a few tips and tricks, it felt worth the try.

I removed the binding and unpicked all the quilting, which, I won’t lie, took patience and perseverance. The backing fabric was a casualty—too small to re-use because it’d been trimmed.

The top was only sort of OK, very warped from being washed with not enough quilting to hold its shape. I ironed it repeatedly, using lots of spray starch and things slowly improved. This time around I choose a nice flat cotton batting, re-basted it, and then quilted it together using simple organic vertical lines. I left a few larger gaps for hand quilting which I did in meandering loose stitches that feel like air bubbles floating up through the kelp forest.

This time around, I thought long and hard about each step of the process.

And you know what? I think I actually did manage to save this particular kelp forest.

If you’re interested in what people are doing to save the real kelp forests, The Kelp Forest Alliance is hard at work in California and Australia. If you are so inclined, I’m sure they would love your support.

—QuiltCon, The Modern Quilt Guild, February 2025, Phoenix, Arizona

—International Quilt Festival, November 2023, Houston, Texas

53 x 30 inches // 2023

Machine pieced and quilted

quilting cotton, shot cotton

Joik:02 is the second quilt in a series of explorations of movement and color inspired by the free-form joy of the joik, the traditional a cappella song of the Indigenous Sámi people of Norway. In the words of musician, artist, and reindeer herder Ursula Länsman, “A joik is not merely a description; it attempts to capture its subject in its entirety: it’s like a holographic, multi-dimensional living image, a replica, not just a flat photograph or simple visual memory” (Openhorizons.org). Made during a workshop with Sherri Lynn Wood.

64 x 65 inches // 2023

machine pieced, machine and hand quilted

scraps from clothing and other quilts, mostly cotton

This is the fourth in a series of quilts made entirely from scraps that would normally have been discarded. Trash, after all, is trash only when we decide it is.

More than one hundred circles have been hand-quilted onto the top of this quilt, reflecting the circular motif of many of the prints used. While the bold strips of patterned fabric are the primary focus—creating a precariously balanced column up the center—the stitched circles add a secret texture only experienced up close.

—SAQA’s “Color in Context: Red” touring exhibition 2023-2026
· International Quilt Festival, November 2023, Houston, Texas
· Australasian Quilt Convention, April 2024, Melbourne, Australia
· Sydney Craft & Quilt Fair, July 2024, Sydney NSW, Australia
· Melbourne Craft & Quilt Fair, July 2024, Victoria, Australia
· Brisbane Craft & Quilt Fair, October 2024, Queensland, Australia

AQS QuiltWeek:

· Daytona Beach, Florida: February 19 – 22, 2025
· Branson, Missouri: March 12-15, 2025
· Paducah, Kentucky: April 23 - 26, 2025
· Grand Rapids, Michigan: August 20 – 23, 2025
· Lancaster, Pennsylvania: September 10 – 13, 2025

—Modern Quilt Guild, QuiltCon, February 2023, Atlanta, Georgia

82 x 82 inches // 2022

machine pieced and quilted

cotton, Oakshott shot cotton, vintage & thrifted fabrics

Started in the spring of 2022, after the leak of the draft Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, I felt the need to work through my anger and frustration knowing that this fundamental human right to essential health care was soon to be lost for millions of women.

When seen from a distance, the more than 3,000 squares of this quilt form a red cross that swirls and fractures around the edges, eroding just as reproductive rights are eroding across America. Viewed up close, each square, made up of red fabrics that cover the full spectrum from purple to orange, solid to patterned, is uniquely shaped, a visual reminder of how each woman must uniquely cope with the unpredictability of having a uterus—from miscarriage to infertility, failed birth control to traumatic birth and delivery—and how all women collectively depend on and benefit from access to safe, legal reproductive care and safe, legal abortion.

As I cut and stitched up each block, I thought about how this disastrous decision, rendered by five men and one woman, will impact us all—women most directly, our families by extension.

The red cross is an internationally recognized symbol of protection and care offered to all in times of conflict and disaster. I can think of no better symbol to represent this unfolding calamity for American women, for those they love, and for those who love them.

—International Quilt Festival, November 2023, Houston, Texas

—QuiltCon, Modern X Quilt Exhibit, February 2023, Atlanta, Georgia

39 x 39 inches // 2022

machine pieced and quilted

scraps from clothing and other quilts, mostly cotton

Just like weeds—trash is only trash when we decide it is.

This quilt honors all of our quilting grandmothers’ sense of thrift and beauty by only using scraps of fabric that would've normally been thrown out, hopefully transforming them into something worthy of keeping.

Like many quilters, I somewhat obsessively keep all of my scraps, sorting them into separate bins by shape—strips, squares, oddballs. This quilt was made from the 'strip' scrap bin and the rules I set for myself were to use only these scraps and to try to use them all up. In the process of cutting out the bias blocks from the strip sets, I generated yet more scraps! But I kept those too, and I'm sure they'll make an appearance in another quilt somewhere down the line.

44 x 33 // Started spring of 2022, finished spring of 2023

machine pieced, machine quilted

cotton

I began this piece at the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, stunned that such a thing could happen. The quilt languished for an entire year while I struggled to figure out how—or whether—to finish it. Eventually, I was compelled to carry through.

Chaotic lines intersect over the quilt’s surface like the anarchic trajectories of the weapons and projectiles of war—tank tracks, missile and bullet trajectories, drone flights—that crisscross Ukraine’s landscape and skies. The quilting lines are not controlled or planned out, their points of convergence accidental. They are neither neat nor pretty; if the thread broke, I let the repair show. A few areas remain untouched by the random stitching, just as there may still be places in Ukraine that are, at least physically, similarly unmolested by the contrails of war.

Begun in a workshop with Sherri Lynn Wood using her “Rhythmic Grid” score.

9.25 x 25.5 inches // 2023

machine pieced, machine quilted, small amount of hand quilting

shot cotton, quilting cotton

Joik:01 is the first quilt in a series of explorations of movement and color inspired by the free-form joy of the joik, the traditional a cappella song of the Indigenous Sámi people of Norway. In the words of musician, artist, and reindeer herder Ursula Länsman, “A joik is not merely a description; it attempts to capture its subject in its entirety: it’s like a holographic, multi-dimensional living image, a replica, not just a flat photograph or simple visual memory” (Openhorizons.org). Made during a workshop with Sherri Lynn Wood and Eliza Hardy Jones.

28 x 24.75 inches // 2023

machine pieced and quilted

scraps of scraps! mostly cotton

This is the second in my scrap-bin series and is made from scraps leftover from the first, Scrap Bin Quilt No.1, which hung in the Modern X Exhibit, QuiltCon 2023. Cutting the blocks on the diagonal for that first quilt generated triangular-shaped scrap bits from the leftover corners. Some of those bits were pretty sweet, and I just couldn’t bring myself to just waste them, so I decided to use them in a new design. This small quilt is the result of that thrifty urge. Trash, after all, is trash only when we decide it is.

36 x 48 inches // 2022

machine pieced, machine quilted

kona cotton, vintage fabrics

I named this quilt Miss Trixie after the character in ‘Paper Moon’ —played to perfection by the late, great Madeline Kahn. I’ve always loved the movie’s look and feel—which I recently learned was all Polly Platt and not her infamous husband, director Peter Bogdonavich, from the podcast You Must Remember This—highly recommended!.

The vintage tiny print pattern reminded me of the character’s ultra-feminine dresses, which tried, pretty unsuccessfully, to obscure her lusty, bawdy nature.

This quilt uses the ‘Floating Square’ score by Sherri Lynn Wood, made during a workshop in the winter of 2022.

50 x 60 inches // 2022

machine pieced, machine quilted

Kaffe Fassett shot cotton

Using a palette of Kaffe Fassett coordinating striped shot cottons, I wanted to see if I could bring some spontaneity to an otherwise classic quilt block: the windmill.

After matching up the fabric into sets and sewing them into half-square triangles, I then arranged them on the design wall with the only rule being that each windmill block had to be intersected by a new color. To keep the sense of play, I also didn't allow myself to edit the layout: each block stayed where I placed it.

The result is a mix of precision and improv—the layout being free and spontaneous, the blocks being carefully pieced. I love how the lights and darks sparkle—they remind me of the joy of whirligigs spinning in the wind.

52 x 66 inches // 2018

machine pieced, machine quilted

leftover scraps from making clothes: cotton, linen, flannel

When I first learned to sew, I became obsessed with sewing my own clothes. Being a knitter for more than two decades, I’d developed a bad habit of always buying much more yarn than the pattern called for. In knitting, you rarely match the designers gauge and are constantly either running out of yarn or having a ton leftover, and since it’s better to avoid running out, the habit of over-buying got deeply ingrained. But not so with clothes making! You really only need the yardage for your size, so pretty quickly I found myself with way too much extra fabric.

I searched for a suitable scrap quilt pattern and found this one in the book Handmade Getaway by Jacqueline Sava Clarke & Karyn Valino. It features the Drunkard’s Path block made using the pathways ruler by ‘Sew Many Creations’, a very nifty notion indeed.

I love how this quilt came out and how versatile the block is with so many different layouts possible. Maybe I’ll make another someday since my scrap stash just keeps getting bigger and bigger.

92 x 84 inches // 2021

machine pieced, machine quilted

Kaffe Fassett shot cotton, quilting cotton

For a few weeks every September, a flock of Vaux’s swifts come to Portland to roost in a decommissioned chimney at a local elementary school. The birds gather at sunset, swooping and swirling around the chimney entrance for about an hour before funneling down all at once in a dramatic black spiral. People gather on the school’s lawn, picnicking and cheering when they disappear down the chimney. It’s a sweet scene and the inspiration for this quilt.

This is the first quilt I designed myself, planning it out on the computer and building it square by square. I’ve since moved on to a more improv method but this was the quilt that freed me from needing someone else’s pattern.

26.5 x 26.5 inches // 2023

machine pieced and machine quilted

scraps of mostly cotton leftover from other projects

Part friendship, part partnership, good neighbors enact a unique and delicately balanced relationship—dependably there when the need arises, fading into the landscape when life trudges on. In our neighborhood, we’re especially lucky; the proverbial good fence between our two yards happens also to be filled with flowers. When we catch a kitchen-window glimpse of lives next door, we catch a glimpse of blossoms first.

This is the third in a series of quilts made entirely from scraps that would normally have been discarded. Trash, after all, is trash only when we decide it is. The quilting is done in a tight grid using four colors of Aurifil thread (blue, orange, yellow, peach), one for each quadrant. Made using the “Floating Squares” score by Sherri Lynn Wood.

72 x 72 // 2020

machine pieced, machine quilted

fabric from stash

Like so many others, at the start of the pandemic lockdown in 2020, I not only made a ton of face masks, but I also made a quilt. Someday historians will study our pandemic quilts for clues to how we were coping, so I hope we all label them.

I started with that red square in the center and built outwards, using whatever fabric I had on hand.

I made ring after ring of closed walls with no way out, barriers that both kept the virus at bay but also kept us locked inside.

Once I realized that the pandemic was going to last for a good long while, I added those four escape routes because I needed to feel hope that we’d make it through—but I blocked them with another four red squares because Covid was waiting. You’ve either gotten it, didn’t get it yet, got it and then got it again—but at least by now we’ve learned to live with it.