2019 #fussycuttingsewalong March roundup
Another month of the #fussycuttingsewalong finished! The theme for March was vintage/retro.
I will be honest, I didn't love this theme. I don't really go for vintage/retro fabrics, and those I do have don't lend themselves well to fussy cutting. So this month I did 5 star flowers, as compared to the 11 I did in February.
The first week of the month was a Freestyle Special for International Women's Day. This made me realise just how sexist some of my fabrics are. I have Avengers fabric that doesn't feature Black Widow. I have a fabric of athletes running in a race that's all men.
So rather than represent women directly, I chose a great woman, the fossil hunter Mary Anning, and represented her contribution to science and paleontology. Here's the pic I put on IG.
I chose the dino bones most like the fossils she dug up and colours that felt like the beach at Lyme Regis where she worked. The words are carefully chosen as the best matches to her work. I was really happy to include the word 'extinct'. One of her great contributions was that the fossils she discovered provided definitive evidence for the concept of extinction.
The panel is the best fabric representation I own of dinosaurs she actually discovered. As Mary Anning inspired the first known paleoart (the attempt to represent actual prehistoric life and scenes through art), so in a way this panel exists because of her,
The book is a fictionalised account of Mary Anning's friendship and collaboration with Elizabeth Philpott and is well worth a read.
On to the second week. For this one we had to do vintage/retro motifs in the inner diamonds. I made two for this week.
The first one is a very traditional take on the retro/vintage theme. The motif is children playing with balloons, dressed in an old-fashioned way. I couldn't find much to go with it, so I paired it with green polka dots, which always have a distinctly 50s feel to me.
The second one uses some licensed fabric from Aldi and shows Mickey Mouse in his original incarnation as Steamboat Willie.
After that was sections week. I really struggled with this one. I auditioned several fabrics without success. As retro/vintage is not my usual style, I don't have much larger than a fat quarter in those types of fabrics. Which meant finding something with both a suitable motif and six repeats was a challenge.
Eventually, I remembered I had this vintage VW camper van fabric in two colourways, so between the two of them I found six repeats of a section.
I played around with how to arrange the sections, eventually settling on alternating with the circle in the centre (top right).
Again, I struggled with something to pair it with. I cut out some blue polka dots, but they didn't quite feel right. I decided, as the circle in the middle looked a bit like a life buoy, or a rubber ring, I would declare it to have a nautical theme and added some little boats in the outer diamonds.
I am still not 100% happy with it, but I like the effect of a ring of triangles around the outside.
The final week of March has been central motifs in the outer diamonds. I chose this retro (albeit sexist - I guess that enhances the retro feel!) Marvel Avengers fabric. Again I was stuck with what to pair it with until I remembered this comic book word fabric, so I fussy cut a selection of the words.
This pic has exploded on IG (by my standards, anyway). It has attracted about double the likes of my previous most popular post. I am not sure quite why it has captured people's attention so much but I am happy about it.
So that's March! We have a freestyle week for the first week of April, but I am not sure what the theme for the rest of the month is going to be. I am hoping for something a little more concrete to work with, but I shall have to wait and see.
Thanks for reading!
Linking up to the Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More, and Can I Get a Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.
Another link up with Clever Chameleon who features my Halloween La Passacaglia post in her colour inspiration! Thanks very much!
I will be honest, I didn't love this theme. I don't really go for vintage/retro fabrics, and those I do have don't lend themselves well to fussy cutting. So this month I did 5 star flowers, as compared to the 11 I did in February.
The first week of the month was a Freestyle Special for International Women's Day. This made me realise just how sexist some of my fabrics are. I have Avengers fabric that doesn't feature Black Widow. I have a fabric of athletes running in a race that's all men.
So rather than represent women directly, I chose a great woman, the fossil hunter Mary Anning, and represented her contribution to science and paleontology. Here's the pic I put on IG.
I chose the dino bones most like the fossils she dug up and colours that felt like the beach at Lyme Regis where she worked. The words are carefully chosen as the best matches to her work. I was really happy to include the word 'extinct'. One of her great contributions was that the fossils she discovered provided definitive evidence for the concept of extinction.
The panel is the best fabric representation I own of dinosaurs she actually discovered. As Mary Anning inspired the first known paleoart (the attempt to represent actual prehistoric life and scenes through art), so in a way this panel exists because of her,
The book is a fictionalised account of Mary Anning's friendship and collaboration with Elizabeth Philpott and is well worth a read.
On to the second week. For this one we had to do vintage/retro motifs in the inner diamonds. I made two for this week.
The first one is a very traditional take on the retro/vintage theme. The motif is children playing with balloons, dressed in an old-fashioned way. I couldn't find much to go with it, so I paired it with green polka dots, which always have a distinctly 50s feel to me.
The second one uses some licensed fabric from Aldi and shows Mickey Mouse in his original incarnation as Steamboat Willie.
After that was sections week. I really struggled with this one. I auditioned several fabrics without success. As retro/vintage is not my usual style, I don't have much larger than a fat quarter in those types of fabrics. Which meant finding something with both a suitable motif and six repeats was a challenge.
Eventually, I remembered I had this vintage VW camper van fabric in two colourways, so between the two of them I found six repeats of a section.
I played around with how to arrange the sections, eventually settling on alternating with the circle in the centre (top right).
Again, I struggled with something to pair it with. I cut out some blue polka dots, but they didn't quite feel right. I decided, as the circle in the middle looked a bit like a life buoy, or a rubber ring, I would declare it to have a nautical theme and added some little boats in the outer diamonds.
I am still not 100% happy with it, but I like the effect of a ring of triangles around the outside.
The final week of March has been central motifs in the outer diamonds. I chose this retro (albeit sexist - I guess that enhances the retro feel!) Marvel Avengers fabric. Again I was stuck with what to pair it with until I remembered this comic book word fabric, so I fussy cut a selection of the words.
This pic has exploded on IG (by my standards, anyway). It has attracted about double the likes of my previous most popular post. I am not sure quite why it has captured people's attention so much but I am happy about it.
So that's March! We have a freestyle week for the first week of April, but I am not sure what the theme for the rest of the month is going to be. I am hoping for something a little more concrete to work with, but I shall have to wait and see.
Thanks for reading!
Linking up to the Peacock Party at Wendy's Quilts and More, and Can I Get a Whoop Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.
Another link up with Clever Chameleon who features my Halloween La Passacaglia post in her colour inspiration! Thanks very much!
Wow! You've done a super job on the fussy cutting! Great fabrics!
ReplyDeleteYou have a lot of quirky fabrics. It looks like you're enjoying all the fussy cutting. Thank you for linking up to the Peacock Party.
ReplyDeleteHa! I just got sidetracked chasing down that author and book.... turns out our library has electronic download, so I mean, seriously sidetracked...... thanks :) Love the dinosaur block.
ReplyDelete