The Walnut Grove
Making art quilts that represent my heritage is one of my passions as I stitch something every day. In this first blog I share one of my favorite childhood memories of my grandparents farm.
The walnut grove separated the “home place” from my grandparents new home. Grandma always had a five gallon bucket sitting near the path through the grove, tossing in walnuts as they dropped. Grandpa cracked shells and picked nutmeats during cold winter nights. Black walnuts make my favorite oatmeal raisin cookies.
This small art quilt represents the grove as I remember it. The background was scrunched and fused to give texture. Trees are made with shredded fabric scraps of brown and gray. The basket for collecting the walnuts was thread painted in a hoop and then applied to the background. The dimensional leaves were also made in a hoop with stabilizer and tulle as the background. Beads were added to fill the bushel basket.
Your art quilts are amazing! Looking forward to following your blog.
Absolutely love this piece.
thanks Jeanne. hope you are staying dry down there. I will be having “sessions” at my new sewing room for small groups but would be happy to do demo/class at guild. had told linda s. that as i left and volunteered to do a session at quilt show. am doing a “leaf collection” series here using the leaf as the subject for several techniques and then ending with putting them together into small wall art quilt.