More Quilting-Liberated Style

I have been very busy this holiday season. I have challenged myself to, wherever possible, draw from my already rich craft cabinet to create many of this season's gifts. Over the next couple of weeks, I will feature some of my gifts here. My family rarely, if ever visits me here in blogland so I believe there won't be any spoilers.

A couple of weeks ago I mail-ordered (yes, there is still such a thing) two quilting books:
Liberated String Quilts and Abstract Quilts in Solids by Gwen Marston.

They're autographed too.

The colors are so vibrant and feature both vintage and newly created quilts. I love Gwen's eye for color and her willingness to go wherever the creative process takes her. The book inspired my participation in one of the several swaps this season.

Complimentary postcards! I've already mailed one off.

The quilters of the African American Quilters (yahoo group link), are holding a Kwanzaa block swap. The rules are, using traditional Kwanzaa colors and using any piecing method you like, produce five 9 1/2" squares. Drawing on inspiration from Gwen's books and other great quilting bloggers, I bellied up to the table and produced these two quilt squares.



It took me some time to adjust to flying without a net, and at least one of these squares was subsequently cannibalized for other squares. Any guesses which one? By the time I had produced my requisite number of squares I had gotten a flow for my process. Alas, I didn't take pictures of them all. When I get my swap squares back I will plan to make them into a table runner for my brother for his Kwanzaa table. ~ksp