TBT - Thread Painting

At one time, BB (before beading!) I would play around with thread painting!  I thought for this TBT it would be a good time to show one of my quilts I thread painted.  This piece is 20" x 24" and were made for the Michigan Quilt Artist Invitational in 2009.

Who's Watching Whom?

Theme:  Art of Nature

My inspiration came from a photo my daughter took at a wolf preserve photo shoot she went on back in 2008-2009.  I loved this picture so I scanned it in and then printed out (poster printing) , then traced onto a piece of cheap fabric!  I don't remember but I'm sure I put some type of stablizier on the back!

I started the thread painting trying to follow the picture o ensure I got the movement of the fur.  I don't remember the number of different color threads I used but there were a lot!    All thread painting was free motion quilted...I don't have an embroidery sewing machine.   

This is the piece in progress and it was so cool to see them come alive!

  



Once I finished all the thread painting, I cut around the stitching and then attached to my hand dyed quilted background by going over some the areas I already stitched. One the main piece was attached I cut close to the edge (yes, scary!) and made sure the edges were all attached securely as well. 

I have over 80 leaves, some fused but most dimensional that I attached to the piece. 

So that was my first 'real attempt' at thread painting!  Next week on TBT, I'll show some other pieces that were semi thread painted or thread quilted!  I've not done anything to this extent since the wolves were finished.  Just never found the right subject matter.  Hope you enjoy seeing my piece and my process.