It’s pretty much a given that we must sometimes go through much turmoil and anxiety before we reach a highly desired goal. That’s life.
Rod and I decided to make a move to the city; a dream we’ve had for a long time. In order to sell our current home of 25+ years we needed to stage it. That involved dismantling my sewing studio: uninstalling lights, the design wall, and moving my longarm quilting machine to a friend’s home. The studio was turned back into a master bedroom for potential buyers.
I now am quilting in a spare bedroom with no design wall. I also must not make any messes which I cannot clean up quickly. You never know when a potential buyer will request a showing. I now drive to my friend’s home every time I need to quilt on my longarm. It’s not a terrible thing, it just takes some planning.
One day, as I was approaching her front door I saw this lovely Luna Moth!
It was so striking with a lovely minty color and distinctive markings. I somehow felt this creature was a spiritual symbol for me.
It turns out that the Luna represents rebirth and new beginnings. It also represents the quest for truth, knowledge, the gift of intuition and heightened awareness.
In the middle of all the turmoil and uncertainty of preparing to sell, buy, and move this was a welcome symbol of hope.
I loaded that photo into my Photoshop software and did a lot of experimenting. I came up with so many versions of the moth that I simply had to make more than one quilt. The resulting quilts are below. I won’t go into all the technical details of layers and filters. I’ll save that for a class to teach in the future.
I purchase Inkjet Printable Silk Fabric Sheets and print the images with my home Epson printer. It’s important that the printer use a pigment ink like DuraBrite. This is colorfast and won’t fade. Then I simply quilt it, face it and glue it to a stretched canvas which is painted black. This is an 8″ x 10″ canvas.
I made one with a natural unaltered moth superimposed on a teal background, as well.
I had so much fun with all my digital experimentation. The following quilt was the result of my favorite versions.
I did very little quilting on the moth and used straight line quilting with monofilament thread for the background. I used a couple of clamps to create a channel lock on the longarm measuring approximately 1/2 inch intervals.
I love the mystical colors and effects of filters, adjustments and layers available in Photoshop. It’s a whole new palette available right at your fingertips and no mess to clean up. How perfect is that?
You may find the listings for my Luna moth quilts here:
We look forward to living in Philadelphia and have much hope for a new chapter in our lives. We just need to stay focused on the goal. My Luna moth is a reminder to not get too bogged down in the details and anxiety of the move. There will be a day when we can breath freely again. We’ve purchased the new place and upgrades have begun. I will have a nice new studio in my new home again.
One more positive thing that has happened as a result of the need to make fewer messes: I’ve started practicing the piano a lot more lately. Those Beethoven Sonatas and Schubert Impromptus, are amazingly fun and it feels great to get back in shape again. I just started working on some Brahms Intermezzi and a Rhapsody. New rebirth.
Please join my FREE Facebook Group, “Artful Quilting and Sewing”, to find like minded supportive people who love to quilt and sew.
Rachel, these are beautiful. Your creativity is amazing. How do you have time to quilt in the midst of moving? I guess creative minds can’t stop creating!
Thanks, Diane! We’re just in limbo waiting for the house to sell and renovations to be done on the new place. Very hard to be in the “in between”. Creating and practicing help me feel more sane.