It is what is reported as the direction finder for slaves traveling the Underground Railroad.
The idea for MY doing this scrapping came from a rather famous Western MA scrapper, SirScrapalot, who produces wonderful templates that i snag whenever he offers one. In August, just as i was getting my self moving on learning to digital scrap, he posted this quilting template (click) on his blog.
I like to quilt, and have a fabric project on my table, and decided to try to scrap it first. I'm in it now, but it is not the easiest thing to do, and i have a lot MORE respect for those scrappers who are doing a lot of this. Where on earth do you find the time? It's almost 2am, and i've been working on trying to finish this since about 5:30p!
I had actually started this in August and got very weary trying to create a template (or even a sketch!) that would work, but the papers that Monica Sunshine offered in her Halloween Party Kit (click) so reminded me of the Dashiki's of the '70s that i jumped back on this project, using 4 of her papers and a tag. I'm sure this square looks a little busy, but perhaps when i put some more around it and it looks more like a quilt, the busyness won't matter--it will just seem like a crazy quilt!
What i'm going for is the Underground Railroad Freedom Quilt which has been both praised and pooh-poohed. I like it, so will keep working on it. I think i got all of the pieces correctly measured, but i am still a little shaky in my confidence. The only thing that will cure that will be to keep working at it.
OH, and i made my first element, but can't really claim it. It's the brad in the lower right corner: the art came from Rachel Turner's "Colors of Africa Kit" (click) to which she holds all rights. But, I like it anyway. Given that i can't draw, i may never be able to create anything that will be fully mine, but again, practice will tell.
By the way, these are folk from my dad's side of the family. The happy couple (lol) in the center are my grandmother's grandparents. They were born and raised slaves, but died free. My grandma, i'm told, was born in 1895 or thereabouts. I don't think that any of the people in this quilt piece are still living. You'd think I'd know, but no, we were not close, as you'll probably be able to tell if you can read the little tags.
Really loved the mini tags from Nicole Kaltenbach's "The Leaf" kit. That thing just keeps growing and growing. I may have to buy a new computer just to hold it all! As well the elements from PC Art and the other 4 papers from Madom. It's really late, so i'm not going to post the links to these three blogs tonight, but i'll be using more of their work, so i'll either edit this post later, or put the links in the post for the next square. For now though, i've got to run. Have to get up in the morning--or rather this morning!
Credits for "Northern Star"
Vertical striped, plaid, purple and green papers, as well as "Tag 1" from "Halloween Party" kit ©Monica Sunshine
Papers "K" (circles), "M" (wavy), "N" (gold) and "W" (red) from "Out of Africa" kit ©Madom
Cloth mat, as well as star, chameleon, leaves, sun, and rocking horse ornaments from PCArt Bead Africa Gold, Green, Blue, Gift and Pink kits, ©2007 PCArt
"Chicken" brad created by LovinLifeGurl using "African_Kit_ornament3" from the "Colors of Africa" kit © Rachel Turner
White "Stitches" from Molly 'n Max "Moulin Rouge" kit (c) 2007 Molly 'n Max Digital Creations http://mollynmax.blogspot.com/
"ZigZag-Orange" stitches from "All Stitched Up" stitches kit, ©Kim Hill / CG Essentials with all rights reserved.
Other journaling tags from "Tiny Papers" from "The Leaf" kit, ©Nicole Kaltenbacher aka n.b.k-designs-proudly-presents.
Sticky tape from "JustinGregory" Kit ©Fishinmom Designs
Font: Dutchess and Arial
1 comment:
Actually, I'm a big fan of quilting myself. I grew up with my mother sewing and my grandmother making quilts all the time. I love the quilt theme of this layout and the use of old family photos is a great way to preserve family history. I wish I had similar photos of my family, but my family was never into phototaking before my sister and myself.
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