Book review: Quilting With Manhole Covers

When I went to Japan 10 years ago, one of the many artistic details that caught my eye was how ornate the sewer covers were. Each city has its own designs reflecting nature, local history and Japanese traditions.

Imagine my delight when I found this book, which holds the distinction of being the only quilting book I bought before I started quilting! Even though it has been out for a while (1999), it offers some unique, untraditional design ideas.

Author Shirley MacGregor presents photos of the covers with the history behind each design, as well as a line art version and photos of quilts inspired by it. There are no complete patterns included, but any quilter with a little experience and imagination should have no shortage of ideas after reading this book. The designs would even look good as digitized embroidery.

This is an unusual, older quilting book that is worth tracking down, even if just for the "eye candy" factor! It's still available on Amazon.

Be a man!

This is a lap-sized quilt I did a while back for a guy friend of mine. He has health issues and lives in another state, so I don't get to see him very often. I found some great fabrics with beer and camo guitars on equilter.com, and couldn't resist making something! Especially since he restores guitars and amplifiers. 

For some reason the repeating print made all photos of the whole quilt appear blurry, even though they weren't, but the close-ups came out ok.

needle artistry

Here's a roundup of quilting and sewing-related tattoos from across the interwebs. I have several tattoos, but none of this nature. I don't have any more planned, but I wouldn't be opposed to it if I could find or come up with a design I had to have. Enjoy!

(above: courtesy of Miss Sews-it-all)

Japanese Oni pillow

I have always liked the look of redwork embroidery, but I would never spend time doing a traditional Sunbonnet Sue or any other overdone country kitsch design. 

I am also a fan of Japanese artwork and mythology, and figured this Oni (demon) mask from Kabuki theater would look good in red! 

When it was done, I added red borders and finished it into a square pillow. The back side is Japanese tattoo print fabric I found on equilter a while ago. Super fun!