Project Quilting Challenge 9.2 ...Triangulation....Hidden Stars

I love stories! So when Project Quilting started this season I decided I would make quilts that had a story attached to them. The first challenge was easy, Hometown Proud, how easy it was to quilt a story about our little community of Dupree. This season was going to be a breeze and I was ready!

Then the second challenge came out and it was Triangulation. What?? I was completely blank. The rules stated that our quilt was to be as much as possible, primarily made from, and characterized by triangle shapes. So how was I going to create a story around a bunch of triangles? I want to say I don't even like triangles, but that isn't true, I think I just really wanted a challenge that I didn't have to think very hard about!

     As a preachers daughter...granddaughter...niece...cousin...mother AND mother-in-law, I thought maybe I should do something with the Trinity, but then I thought maybe that would be too easy or something everyone who knows me would expect.

Since my husband is Irish and I am Scandinavian, I tossed around the idea of doing something with a Celtic knot or Odin's knot, both of which are triangular in shape, but I scraped that idea too.

This was going to be harder than I thought, or else I was just making it hard and I needed to stop thinking about it. So I worked on a baby quilt for a couple of days just to clear my head and used a triangle ruler to cut my shapes, thinking if nothing else I could use it at the end of the week. Then I remembered my plan of incorporating a story into my quilt and I realized I needed to pick my negative thoughts up, toss them out and get busy!

So I started researching triangle shapes in nature, and found leaves, there are hundreds of different leaves that are triangle shaped, but the one that caught my eye was the Cottonwood Tree leaf. I knew I had found my inspiration! I love cottonwood trees as much as I love stories.

If you have never listened to cottonwood leaves sing in the wind then you are missing one of the most beautiful joys in life. If you have never heard the story about the stars that hide in the cottonwood trees, then it's time for you to hear it!

First things first, I needed to dig through my stash and find fabric, then come up with a design. Going by the rules, I created a rather hodgepodge bunch of triangles to represent my story. I chose of course stars and a fabric that looked like tree bark, then I picked a watercolor print that is supposed to represent the sunset along a river bank. I used a dark blue to represent the night sky, and then a batik to create the milky way. I added a cut tree fabric since part of my story is about the inside of the tree. When I had my triangles sewn together,r my quilt wasn't square along the edges so I added some dark brown fabric to make it even.

I decided I wanted to add stars to my blue night sky so I googled triangle stars looking for an easy pattern. What popped up instead was the summer triangle, which is the 3 stars Vega, Altair, and Deneb. These stars create an imaginary triangle in the summer night sky. Perfect! This fit right into my story.
     Of course by now it was Thursday, the longest day of my work week and I knew I was not going to sit down and sew together 3 tiny triangle patterned stars, I was going to be lucky if I made supper that night.
     So I decided to just cut some basic stars out of what I thought was celestial looking fabric and ironed them on in a triangle shape. I took some metallic gold thread and quilted around them then added the imaginary line of the triangle. I also made some little diamond shapes from the gold thread to add more stars to the sky. When this was all done and I stepped back to look at my creation all I could see was a dark blue wizards hat! LOL

Then the fun began, I wanted to make leaves and I wanted them to stand out from the quilt so they would look like real leaves fluttering in the wind. I picked a bunch of different greens I had in my stash, cut out cottonwood leaf shapes, added some interfacing and then quilted leaf lines on them. I then took wire and zig zagged green thread onto it to make the stems. I carefully sewed and glued them into the layers of the leaves. For fabric leaves I think they look pretty realistic.

After the leaves were done I needed to figure out how I was going to attach them to the quilt so I could manipulate them and they wouldn't drag the fabric down. I took a wooden skewer, cut it up, wrapped the wires around it and added some glue. I sewed the one skewer into the top binding of the quilt and the other one I created a fabric branch to cover it and sewed it down. It worked, but by the time I had added my skewer and all the seams, the wire had shortened considerably and I was wishing I had made the wire stems longer.

I painted a cottonwood tree into the sunset fabric, although when it was done, you really don't notice it. I bound the quilt with some of the tree bark fabric and the golden fabric I had made the stars with. The finished size is 13 X 17. It was done, quilted and bound and it was only Friday! It wasn't anything amazing but it fits the story I wanted to tell...

...imagine yourself around a campfire along the river banks, the breeze gently brushing the leaves of the cottonwood trees, causing them to whisper their secrets into the sky. Coyotes call and night birds answer. The milky way is bright in the night sky and the summer triangle can be seen overhead. Stories are shared about the great cottonwood trees that sing harmony to the laughter around the fire...there are many stories about the cottonwood tree, but this one is my favorite and the one I created my quilt around...

Many years ago when the earth was young, up in the sky were many stars. One little star was very curious and would come down to earth to look at all the amazing things here. One day it came close to a village and it heard the laughter and joyful voices of the people who lived there. The star thought this beautiful sound was the most amazing thing it had ever heard and it wanted to stay here forever. But the star knew it was a star and had to return to the night sky. After a long time the star started thinking about the sounds it had heard on earth and remembering how beautiful it was. It wanted to return but the other stars said no, those are people and we are stars. This is where we belong. If you are there you will disturb the people with your brightness and they will be distracted and not do the work they need too do. So the little star thought about it and one day asked the other stars if it could find a way to hide from the people could it go back and stay. The other stars said yes if you can find a way to hide you can go. So the little star went back to earth and looked around for a place to hide, it saw the great cottonwood trees that grew close to the village and decided to hide in the branches where it could be close to the laughter & joyful sounds of the people forever. That is where you will find the star still hiding today...

The cottonwood tree is a sacred tree to many Native American Tribes, it is used for many different ceremonies, medicine, for ceremonial items, and even as a food source. Cottonwoods are drawn to water, so they are usually found along rivers, creeks, where there are springs in the ground, or in low spots where there is moisture. Where there are cottonwoods you will usually find water. Cottonwoods are associated with spiritual growth and awakening, prayers, blessing, purity, creation, truth, endurance, higher communication, hope and rebirth. They are considered the Tree of Life and carry wisdom and the ability to see the truth. If you look at the branches of a cottonwood tree they are covered with eyes, these eyes are said to be able to see truth and are ever watchful.

I decided I had better have proof there are stars in the cottonwood trees so I went on a foraging mission to find stars. The first branch I cut had a heart in it....lol...I guess it is almost Valentines Day!

 But after a couple of attempts using a rusty old saw and branches from an older tree, there they were, the hidden stars!

Some of my favorite memories are of camping along the Grand River under the giant cottonwood trees that grow along the river bottoms. There is something magical in the sound the leaves make as they sing like raindrops in the wind. I have two cottonwood trees on the edge of my yard, I love listening to them and watching the leaves dance and flutter in the wind.

My goats love the dried leaves in the fall so I don't have to worry about raking! I don't have any photos of goats eating leaves but I do have these adorable pictures of two of our grandsons playing in the cottonwood leaves along the Missouri River.

Project Quilting Season 9 - The First Challenge!

The 9th Season of Project Quilting started this week & I was so excited to find out that the first Challenge was going to be Hometown Proud. We were to create a quilt that was inspired by the best of our community, or something that makes our town special.

I thought about doing something that had Tigers which is our School Mascot, and then I scratched that idea, mainly because I didn't have any orange fabric in my stash! LOL

After thinking about it for a couple of days I changed direction and decided to do something that incorporated the history of where our community got it's name & the Native American culture that has lived here since before the beginning of time.

I live in Dupree, SD which is a small town on the prairies of western South Dakota located on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation. We are the county seat of Ziebach County & the town was incorporated in 1910 when the Milwaukee Railroad was built through the territory.

Dupree was named after the family of Fredrick Dupuis a French Canadian Fur Trader who came from Lonqueil, Quebec and settled in the Cheyenne River area in what was then Dakota Territory. He was an employee of the American Fur Company. Fred married a Minneconjou Tetuwan, Good Elk Woman, who was from the Cherry Creek area, after her marriage to Fred she became Mary Ann Dupuis. They raised 10 children in their home along the Cheyenne River about 35 miles west of where it empties into the Missouri River.

Fred and some of his sons were instrumental in saving the Buffalo from extinction. In 1883 or possibly earlier, they hunted and captured 5 young buffalo calves (some reports say 9) and these were loaded into wagons and brought back to the Cheyenne River where at the time of Fred's death in 1898 the herd had grown considerably, and was purchased by James (Scotty) Phillips of Fort Pierre.

The name Dupuis was changed to Dupris, and in some cases to Dupree. The descendants of Fred and Mary Dupuis still live on the Cheyenne River Reservation and throughout the United States.

I decided to use their story as the inspiration for my quilt. After drawing out an initial idea on paper, I went through my stash and thought about what fabrics I would use to tell the story. I used a reconstructed screen print as my background to represent the prairie, I chose to put Thunder Butte in the background of my quilt because it is a well known landmark that is northwest of Dupree.

I used a piece of batik fabric that I cut up to make a strip of "beadwork" along the bottom of the quilt, I attempted to quilt it to look like beads and after I was done wished I had used a darker thread.

I added a strip of red fabric with a floral fabric over the top of it, to represent the French Canadian Fur Trade and the red sash that was used to tie their jackets on.

I put an eagle feather and medicine wheel to represent the Native American culture.

I then decided to add a star quilt because the star quilt is so much a part of the culture here. It is given as a gift at honoring ceremonies, give aways, as baby gifts, graduations, weddings, and as a draping on the coffin at funerals. Everyone I know has made a star quilt at some time in their life, or received one as a gift! The star quilt on my quilt was painted on and then I quilted around the diamonds.

I added the teepees along the top of the beadwork to represent the Dupuis family home place along the Cheyenne River. After each child was married a log house was built for them in a row beside the main house, these houses were called tipi's by the family.  In addition to these homes other relatives lived in actual tipis which were pitched nearby. I just think that had to have been an amazing sight in the cottonwood trees along the river! I used a piece of muslin to make the tipis and then painted them and did some outline quilting to

I used batik and dyed fabrics to create the 5 buffalo from the original herd. I quilted texture to them and added "beady" eyes to them to help make them look at least like animals and define their faces!

I added a shell button and a piece of leather to the medicine wheel and because I had nothing but red Christmas beads I made a couple of beads from red felt to give the medicine wheel some depth. I love quilting feathers  so I really had fun with this part of the quilt.

All of the information I found about Fred Dupris, his family and the history around the saving of the buffalo I found in the Blue Ziebach County History Book which is pretty much the bible here in Ziebach County. The book was written in 1982 from oral histories of the families who call this part of the prairie home.  You can see the piece of horse fabric I used for the backing in the background of the photo.

A brighter picture of the finished quilt. The quilt (wall hanging)  is 15 X 24 for whatever reason I could not get these pictures to rotate.

Thunder Butte in the background taken from my sewing room window! 

I had nothing but computer issues when I was typing this blog post so some of my photos won't rotate, I lost whole paragraphs of typing and can't remember what I typed, it has just been a mess! 

But it is done and I am happy with the finished piece :)