This is a UFO, it still needs quilting and binding (and maybe one more blue border). But the wonky border was really easy, with very little math, so I am going to show you how I did it. This was a fun Teresa Ascone panel from a few years ago, but it would work with any panel.
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You do have to do a bit of math to at least estimate how wide your final border will be. My pink strips were twice the width of my orange strips, in this case around 4” and 2”. That’s a total of 6”, and you will lose about 1 1/2” in seam allowances from top to bottom, so it would end up around 4 1/2” total. But those measurements are all optional; maybe you want it wider overall, but the center color to be narrower. So you could do 6” and 2”. Or 10" and 3", whatever you want. You just need to remember that you will lose the seam allowances off of each strip.
I cut my pink strips fairly short, around 10”. This is to get a steeper angle. If I cut the strip the whole WOF, it would be very shallow and not that interesting. So I had to make lots of these sections, not just the two shown here. You could do the math to figure out how many, or you can just start making them until you have enough!
In the first photo, I show how I cut them lengthwise at an angle. The exact angle isn’t important, in fact it’s better if they are all different. Just don’t cut corner to corner; you want some of the strip left on both sides.

IMPORTANT: You want to cut some ‘uphill’ and some ‘downhill’. I actually goofed in the photo… I cut them right, but then sewed one wrong, because they are batiks without a right or wrong side. I must have just made more after that, these are old pics. I don’t think it works to just flip a piece over, I think the ‘uphill vs downhill’ will stay the same. But you want some of each for wonkiness.

​Then insert the narrower strip between the other two. Square up the ends, and cut those in chunks. My chunks were between 1 1/2” and 2”, but that’s totally flexible too. Then start rearranging the chunks and flipping some the other direction, and sew them back together. Mix and match them from different strip sets cut at different angles and ‘uphill vs downhill’ too.
You could cut your chunks the same size, say 2”, but then you would have to do math to make each side of the border the right length. If the chunks are all different, then it’s easy to make each border section the right length. Either trim the end piece if necessary, add another piece, or make a seam a little larger somewhere along the section. Intentional wonkiness often equals less math! Once you have made a few sets, you will have a better idea how many more you need to make to have enough. It totally depends on the size of the quilt or panel you are making them for.
It’s a really fun way to make a wonky border!
Happy sewing! Beret

I have been neglecting this blog since newsletters are the new blog, it seems! So, please sign up for my newsletter (sidebar) if you haven't, because a lot more info goes there. But, there are some things that deserve a more permanent home, so I am hoping to do more blog posts than I have been. 
I have been teaching my collage class either in person or online lately, and this is a little snippet from it. My Poppy Patch kit has appliques that are a bit complicated, but of course I have tricks, so I will put those here.

I have been sadly neglecting this blog again, but there's a reason! It's because I have been more consistently sending my newsletter for the past few years. It's a much better way to stay in touch with what I am doing, as it comes to your inbox. I decided I should do a post here in case someone lands here, so you know where to find me. I post about what I am up to, new kits, patterns, and classes, and also lots of tips and tutorials.

If you sign up for my newsletter (check the sidebar on this page, or click the photo), you also get access to my free online workshop to make this quilted greeting card, which is also a mini art quilt. And could be made in other sizes as well. It's a great introduction to my unusual but not at all difficult methods! 
​Happy sewing! Beret

   I also got another batch of my acrylic card templates, they were getting low! They are not necessary, but so helpful, I use them on every card I make! (They are also hard to photograph😂) Happy sewing! Beret

     One of the biggest things I teach my students is that in order to design your own art quilt, you have to make some decisions. Of course I have ways to make that process much simpler, but it will always be a part of creating art. It is also the part that people usually find the most stressful. But it doesn't have to be! Here are a couple of tricks.
     First, you have to be willing to have things not turn out the way you want. Of course we want things to work if we spend time and materials on them. But if you really want to design your own, you have to practice, just like any other new skill. No one expects to pick up a guitar and play a song on the first try, but with art related things we kind of do have that expectation. (How many people think they can't draw, but have also not really spent a lot of time trying?) So first, let that one go! 
     For my second tip today, I'm going to use an example from some painting I did on a recent flight. (I always bring painting stuff now, it's so fun! This time the woman next to me was crocheting, but I think she will be looking for water brushes soon.😂) One of the decisions you have to make is, "Am I done adding things?" This can be one of the hardest ones! Especially the farther you get into it, the more risky it feels to keep adding things. Something to remember here is that there is no 'right' answer. It might be fine to stop where you are OR keep going. So again, just think of it as experimenting! (Also, most of my art quilts have a busy background, but a simple foreground, so that makes it easier when you are starting out also, just plan on it being simple!) 
     But here is a tip I use for both art quilting and painting. I take a photo after each time I add something new. With fabric, you can just lay a new element on, it's not permanent yet. With painting, it is, so I can't go back a step (another reason digital artwork is fun, there's an undo button 😂) But if I consider it practice, I still learn from it. This was in a sketchbook, it wasn't even watercolor paper, so I knew it was just practice. But I could also try to recreate it if I wanted to go back a few steps. This way I can look at each rendition and decide if I should have stopped sooner or if I like the final version the best. For the last few, I was adding details with a black pen. Which one do you like? 
     I hope you will try this, whether it's with art quilting, drawing, painting, or some other medium. Playing is such an important part of learning art quilting, and drawing and painting help train your brain as much as actually working with fabric! Happy sewing! Beret
PS: Of course there are gobs more tips on making those decisions in my Simple Secrets for Starting Art Quilting class! The self guided online version is always available😀
PPS: Scroll down for a few pics from my trip 😊

Flowers, grandkids, baby shower, baby birthday, so much fun! (The birthday baby belongs to my other daughter) Click here for a cute video of my granddaughter's sewing project! (On Instagram, and make sure to have the sound on!)

I finally managed to get a chickadee wall hanging kit made! I've been trying for years, but chickadees are tricky, as they have all three values in them. It makes it harder to find a good background fabric! This has my usual hand dyed fabrics from Starr Designs, I feel like they almost glow, especially in these jewel tones! 
Happy sewing! Beret

     In my 100 Days of Quilted Greeting cards series this week, the theme is cards that are dependent on a specific fabric. Sometimes it’s a mini panel, and sometimes it’s a motif cut out of a repeating pattern. One of my favorite art quilting tips is to make the fabric do some of the work, and look at fabric maybe a little differently than you are used to!
    For example, there are fabrics with landscapey items printed on them, like rocks, clouds, grass, etc. I don’t really love using those, although I do use tree fabrics, usually to fussy cut the trees out to put on a different background. (But I often make my own trees too.) But it’s fun to look for fabrics that give the impression of something like rocks, sky, water, tree bark, and lots more. I think this is one reason I like the Starr hand dyed fabrics so much. Their texture could be many different things found in nature! 

     Of course, I always love the hand painty looking fabrics for backgrounds. They do so much of the work! 

   Here are a couple that give the impression of snow, without being actual snowflakes.

     Batiks are another good place to look. The first one looks like it could be a fall forest in the background, and the second has swirls in the sky, which I love 😀

    And panels without a lot of foreground are often a good option for backgrounds too. 

    In the first photo below, the two fabrics are very similar. But because of the color, the blue looks like water, and the brown would look like tree bark if it was turned the other way. What do you see in the fabrics in the second photo? I think it's cool that there are so many repeated motifs in nature, it shows they were all made by the same Artist! Rivers, veins, and tree branches all look similar, or bubbles, rocks, and fish skin!
    I hope you will look at fabric with different eyes, and let it help you do some of the work! However, I have a huge caution here: Value and colors are still the most important. If a fabric looks like tree bark, but the coloring really doesn't go with the rest of your project, you are better off finding one that is a better color. Look at them from a bit of distance to see if they are all playing well together. 
   Happy sewing! Beret

    This week's 100 Days of Quilted Greeting cards (on my social media) theme is flowers. Thursday's post was about my iris design, which I have done with both applique and Inktense. The applique version is available as a card kit or pattern. Then I have a youtube video for the Inktense version. (I will link all of them at the end.) We were also talking about Inktense a bit in my class on Thursday, so I thought it would be fun to look at some of my other Inktense projects too! Maybe I will try to do another one of those Saturday Zoom calls in a few weeks with an Inktense project, that sounds fun😀

Note: I think it's more common for people to do thread sketching through just the fabric, and not the batting. I more commonly stitch through the batting too, but there's no right way. Try both! Every layer adds stability, so I would definitely use a hoop if I had fewer layers. A hoop is the best stabilizer of all, so I do sometimes use one for dense stitching. 

    If you think you can't draw a flower shape, well, neither can I 😂 This is very sketchy, and as I always say, kindergarteny. I tried to vary the petals a bit, although that would probably have happened anyway😂, but otherwise, this is not a realistic flower drawing, just 6-7 petals in approximately a circle. I probably sketched it with a chalk pencil on my background, then outlined it with thread, using the outermost color. 

    Then I start coloring them in with thread. Think of your sewing machine like a pencil, only you move the paper instead of the pencil. I use the free motion foot, of course, and I like a topstitching needle, but really,  just try what you have. Most of my thread is 40 wt, which is average/most common. I'd love to collect more thinner threads, 60-80 wt,  because although it takes more stitching to cover an area, you also have more control. But again, just try whatever you have! 
    For the first color, stitch densely at the tip, then more loosely toward the next color. You want each color to overlap a bit for shading. The second color is more dense in the center, and looser at both ends. The third color is the most dense toward the center of the flower, but if you do beads like I did, or a button, you really don't need much in the very center. 

     Then I added beads and binding. (Binding video in the card workshop linked a couple of paragraphs up.) You can apply the same technique to other shapes too, of course! And if you try it, I'd love to see! Reply to my newsletter, or email me at beret@onthetrailcreations.com.
     Happy sewing! Beret