Raquette River Oxbow

Blogiversary post 4 of 10

I love this quilt! It depicts the oxbow on the Raquette River in the town of Tupper Lake, NY. My family has been there several times, camping, canoeing, kayaking and visiting the Wild Center. My daughter was an intern there through the summer of 2015. So this spot holds a lot of memories for us.

I couldn't wait to take a class with Timna Tarr to make this map quilt. I used a topographic map from the US Geologic Survey and had it enlarged at my local copy shop. I built my quilt from the river up. Cutting out the yellow layer was intense! What you see below is a layer of heat & bond with the mirror image of the river traced on, then adhered to the back of the yellow batik. I cut out the little ponds first with an x-acto knife.

It was a little unruly. I needed to use a light box with my map under the blue fabric to line up the yellow just right.

I changed color to correspond with the lines on the topo map. The greens were a lot easier to cut!

If you click on this picture, you might see the weird lines and texture from the fusible. Apparently, heat and bond reacts funny with batiks, which I did not know before this project. Next time, I'll try a different brand.

I used Sue Cleveland's 12 weight spaghetti cotton thread in black to quilt a line between each color. I love the way that looks! Then I used matching 50 weight to add echo texture.

We had a discussion in class about legends and scale. Without them, it's not a map, it's just a pretty picture. I had my husband do the math and calculate the scale for me.

The texture looks amazing on the back!

I had to include a flange in the binding. It's a phase I'm going through! To stitch down the binding, I used the 12 wt black thread again. I think it's a cool effect.

The free motion quilting was done on my trusty old Bernina 153.

 

Raquette River Oxbow
33.5" X 23.5"
October 19, 2018- Workshop with Timna Tarr
October 20, 2019- top complete
October 25, 2018- quilting started
October 27, 218- quilt complete