Shoes at a Quilt Show

My face STILL hurts from smiling.  This weekend was just fabulous.  Here is some background of my entries and how it all came together.  As I worked on the dress, I quickly realized they would require matching shoes.  So I went to the thrift store and picked up these navy ones.  They were the right design, but the wrong color, so I painted them!

I cut off the tags and the top foot strap too.  My plan was to re-make one and re-attach it.  This was the 'quilted' part of the entry.  I made some folded fabric.  I made new quilted straps with angelina fibres and some decorative stitches.

I glues then and stitched them on and there they were!  I was so impressed that by heating the fibres... they turned just the right color to match the dress.  (yesss!)

...and that is how you get shoes into a quilt show!  : )  I named this entry, "Knock Your Socks Off!".

The dress... ooh that was a big one.  It began with an idea to incorporate my landscapes onto a dress, which evolved to a few sketches, and then at one point I finally strip-pieced some jelly roll batiks. This became the fabric base from which I cut a corset-style pattern.  The pattern was heavily altered - used as a template.  I edited out a sleeve.  I added hip width, took the gaping neckline and ungaped it.  I added 2 inches to the length of the top and had to reformat the positioning of the loops on the back.  I also added internal hooks & eyes and got rid of the side zipper.  lol  Oh - and then I did it again for the lining, and then again for the batting.  So here are my 'quilt sandwiches' ready to be put together.

Next, I began the initial quilting.  Once this was done, I did some free motion cloud quilting, and lots of thread painting on the bottom.  Here's the backside.

that smudge is gunk from my iron.  Glad it's on the back!!

After adding the back panels, the insert, and all the little loops, I began hand embroidery: french knots and free-form grasses.

There were hundreds of yellow french knots put on this.  After, I added yet another liner, boning, the one sleeve, and I flipped the whole thing right-side out.  WOW.  Then I had to finish the edges.  The single sleeve was heavily embellished with blue lace, sequins, and beads.

work in progress

This blue fabric was hand dyed by Corinne Appleton by the way.  She passed away this past year and an estate sale was put on.  That's how I ended up with it.  After quilting it, I shaded with white and darkened with blue-grey pencil.  The iridescent brown bow helped balance the earthiness of the lower part of the dress.

When I though I was done, I realized that the body of the dress lacked sparkle.  So I hand stitched a lot of gold into the green grasses.  I also couched on some brown & gold yarns by hand.  It was all coming together!!

The last thing to do was lace it up!  I'm not sure where this blue ribbon came from, but it is very old.  It may have been from my friend Irene's grandmother's stash.  This blue was just perfect!!

And that skirt was quick to make.  Flo discovered that fabric and it was PERFECT!  My job was done.  This fabric required no extra anything.

So there you go!  It took weeks and weeks and my brain hurt much of the time... but I did it!  ; )

I'm linking to lots this time around!

The Needle and Thread Network

 Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday

Esther's Blog 

Show Me What Ya Got

Rachel's Celebrate Color Event

(I linked the dress, now I'm linking the shoes)