Sort of a Valentine heart

Everyone is posting hearts on facebook and on their blogs today, so I thought I'd start another of my yoga mat quilts using heart cutouts. I dutifully pulled out some red fabric, but I'm not really a red person. So I put it back and got what I really wanted: Purple, orange and green.

I fused Wonder Under onto the back of a piece of my hand-painted purple, then folded it in half and started to draw hearts. But I'm not a heart person, either, so I switched to a plantlike form and circles. When I cut it and unfolded the piece, I did have a heart! The top photo is the leftover purple background, showing a purple heart. This next photo is the intended shape:

I fused that down and then added some circles ...

... and some other pieces:

I may add a few more shapes, then I'll begin outlining and embellishing everything with hand embroidery and beading. I like to use hand-dyed pearl cotton embroidery floss from Artfabrik (click here to see the threads) because the colors are so luscious and because I like Laura Wasilowski, the quilter behind Artfabrik.

This is the leftover pile, which I'll use to start a few more yoga mat quilts:

I came up with the name "yoga mat quilts" a few years ago when I was inspired by the design on my yoga mat to make quilts using symmetrical plantlike, unfolding forms. Then I realized that the hand embroidery and beading were very meditative, continuing the theme. One of these days I want to get around to writing an article about them, but first I have to actually finish one. Here's a post about the technique: http://sherriequilt.blogspot.com/2011/08/yoga-quilt-3-and-wisdom-teeth.html

I've linked this post to Nina-Marie's Off the Wall Fridays http://ninamariesayre.blogspot.com/, where you can see what other fiber artists have been up to this week.

Have a colorful day