A feather from a crow

Continuing on with trying to keep with a routine....
Most of my morning is taken up with tidying up, journaling and email, but once it becomes a habit, I am hoping it will be quicker??
Here is my unfinished Daily drawing

Sometimes I choose a very detailed drawing, and in these cases, I allow myself to complete it over a few days.  This is a very intricate shell, which I have only just started.

My warm ups for today, both collages and not much paint today, which is unusual, and even more unusual, my journal page for today

A landscape collage from magazine pages.  It took quite a while to make, so I have just left it simple like this, but I expect I will work back into it with pastels and paint at a later date.

 And here is some stitching.  This is a feather using free motion on water soluble stabilizer.  It will probably go into my challenge piece for Tangled Textiles, which is due on 16th November, so you will probably see a bit of this work in the next few weeks.

Happy Creating!

Escaping the weather

I have been hiding for a few days, trying to keep cool, but  today the weather is a bit cooler.
Something I love to do is free motion embroidery, and I love making things out of just thread.  A bit like stumpwork, but with the sewing machine.  Most of these little things will end up on my crazy quilt,  but they are so lovely, I keep making them.

This little butterfly is about 2 inches square.  Basically, I just scribbled to create this one.  But it is done with some gorgeous new metallic threads I got recently - a bit of a test run.

This pansy is about the same size, perhaps a little smaller.  With this one, I made all the petals separately the sewed them together and added the yellow by hand.  This one has already been pinned into place on one of my crazy quilt blocks.

If you have followed me for a while you will know that I have a crazy quilt in process, but I put it aside so I could participate in CQJP2014, so I will have my January block finished soon.

Happy Creating!

Free motion grid

I started this free motion motif a week or so ago and haven't got around to finishing it until now.

I put some organza and satin  bits on a piece of bond n stitch (This is a water soluble stabiliser I got from the Thread studio) This stabiliser actually allows you to iron the pieces on like a fusible.

I free motion embroidered a grid and some circles

I also added a second grid and circles

this is the back (as you can see my tension was a bit loose)

And here it is after being washed out of the stabiliser and dried.  This was a lesson on checking tension and going slowly, but I still like it and it will probably go into something.

Happy creating!

A miss and a hit

Yesterday was one of those awful days and I was so exhausted I forgot to blog, so today I have two things to show.

Another painted face .This one has hair painted in bronze which really shines.

And another leaf stitched on water soluble stabiliser.  This one is based on the leaf I drew in my sketchbook on sunday.

And here it is after the water soluble stabiliser is dissoved and it had dried.  Another great motif for my crazy quilt!

Happy creating!

A little bit of lace

So, day four for Art every day November.  
I felt like a bit of lace.  something I read last night prompted me to get out the water soluble stabiliser today, but of course I can't remember what.

I put two layers of light solvy in a small six inch hoop (upside down for free machine work)

Then I traced a design from a vintage DMC needlelace pattern book with a permanent marker.

Then I put it under my thread painting machine and started stitching. As you can see, my machine has been through a few woes and had to have a band aid, which is nearly falling off.  It also has no feed dogs or foot (I removed both)  This is the way I thread paint, but of course I do not recommend it to anyone else as there is a slight danger you might skewer yourself with the needle.

And here it is with the stitching done.  As you can see I did not always follow the lines and I added the edging myself because I felt the edge needed a bit more.
The next step is to cut it out of the hoop and wash it in running water to remove the solvy and dry it.

Here it is after washing and drying.  I love the imperfect, old look of this type of lace.  If I wanted perfect, I suppose I'd buy it.  But this will be perfect for my crazy quilt, which is on hold until next year, when CQJP starts again as I have joined it so that I will get my quilt finished.

This challenge is certainly helping me to work every day!

water soluble stuff

As usual, I have been busy, but not blogging.  Mostly, I have been running classes at the community house and trying to look after my DH who is in a lot of pain and finding it hard to be idle.
I did, however find some time to make a few little motifs using soluble interfacing and free motion.

The butterfly is a bit tatty because I only went over it once, and I wasn't wearing my eye glasses!,  I used a metallic thread in the top and bottom, so that they would look the same on both sides, but overall I am happy with the effect.  The gold thread is from a large cone which I picked up at the recycle depot, but it sews really well and I love it.  A little bit of bling goes a long way!
I have also been working on my journal quilts.  I have been making journal quilts from random drawings and sketches.  Obviously, the drawing is quick - it takes a little longer to interpret them in thread, but it also gives me something to work on when the muse is not cooperating.

Some I like, some I don't, but it's just some playing, really.
I had my old flag book (or here) with some of my old journal quilts at the gallery on the weekend, and decided to make a new book to hold all of them.

It is quite a bit larger than my old book and I have made the accordions quite wide, so I have room to write what each quilt is about.

Stitched house and a butterfly

"Once upon a time there was a Little House way out in the country.
She was a pretty Little House and she was strong and well built."
So begins Virginia Lee Burton's classic The Little House, winner of the prestigious Caldecott Medal in 1943.

 This ATC was stitched with wool on water soluble stabiliser and then needlefelted, this was from an article by Jan beaney and Jean Littlejohn, the stitching queens in " fabric from cloth" Quilting arts 48 and also here.
I used my prompt cards for this one and they were
Use heavy stitching
Add a charm
I had recently read the article in QA and decided this was a great way to use heavy stitching.  I selected a little charm of a house, which inspired the design ( but forgot to add it in the photo.

Here it is with the charm added with a brad.

Remember this digital projection of a piece I started using prompts?
Well I have done a little bit of work on it after a lot of thinking.  My work often takes a lot of that before I find what I want to do with it.

Here is where I am at the moment.  I was inspired by Melanie Testa  "Inspired to quilt" and using sheers, to add a sheer layer and as I was about to stitch it, I thought of using some black sheer and reverse applique to outline the butterfly.   I like the effect, however I couldn't solder the edges of the black because I already had a sheer beneath it, so I have a few problems with the black sheer fraying as a result.  I have stabilised it, but it looks terrible close up, so I am bow going to do double sided blanket stitch around it to make it look better, I will do some free motion embroidery over the sheer, then I will create sheer flower silhouettes with the soldering iron and sew them down.

Let life inspire you.

Serendipity and a peek

OK, ATC number 2.

Serendipity, because mine is shiny and molding paste, too.  See Lisa's here.
Playing card, molding paste through a stencil. Starburst moonglow spray (I got it here) and silver marker

Also, today, a peek into one of the projects I am working on.
You may remember these sketches

Which ! posted recently.
Well, they have multiplied and are fast becomming thread paintings

these are simply what i call underpaintings, or sketches.  At this stage I am just sketching in colours and getting even stitches to cover the stabiliser.

And a new one.  This one I did not even sketch in my book!  I just sketched it straight on the stabiliser from a photo taken by a friend.  Not quite sketched out yet.  some water, sky and trees to go

Now this one, I did consider asking you guys if you could work it out, but I decided that right now it is a bit too hard.  It looks like an aerial photo, I suppose, but it will actually be a cross section of an opal.  the centre strip will be full of all the little coloured bits and black and dark blue lines.  The orangy bits are the rock the opal is living in.

Leafy Lace

On Saturdays, I will endeavour to post something to do with stitching, whether hand or machine.
Today i am posting about another WIP which is a piece of thread lace.
It is quite a large piece of lace.  The leaf measures about  11 or 12 inches from the tip to the end of the stem.
I started by laying out some heavy water soluble stabiliser and placing knitting ribbon on that in the shape I wanted

I hate using the plasticky stabiliser as it sticks and does not feed nicely.  I solve this problem by laying some more light water soluble stabiliser of the non woven type top and bottom.

In the picture above, I have also stitched the main ribbon lines down.

Do any of you out there have this problem?

or even this one?

Then you know why this post has taken me over an hour to write.  Hopefully tomorrow, Tammy will find another place to fall asleep, lol.

be creative every day!

Entrapped Fibre Films - Samples

Here are a few samples from my last tutorials on  creating fabrics and foundations by entrapping them using sheers and using water soluble stabiliser.

This sample used a number of yarns entrapped between two layers of tulle and free machine stitched with silver thread.

This sample is made in the same way as the sample above, but used ripped up pieces of paper, and also a few scribbly flowers in the free machining.

This sample had tulle on top, but had a layer of black velvet underneath and entrapped silk  tops.  You can see the velvet fibres comming through where the stitches are.

This sample had a layerof bronze shot satin underneath, and water soluble on top, with a few yarns entrapped, the free machining was with a bronze metallic thread.  Yummy!

This last sample had a huge variety of scraps entrapped between water soluble, top and bottom.  Free machining was with a lime coloured embroidery thread in a geometric meandering.

These samples show only a few of the wide variety of items which can be used to make fabric films in this manner, from paper, to scraps, to sheers, to luxury fabrics, yarns and fibres.  These pieces are destined to become notebook covers and I will show that in a later blog.

The next technique I will be looking at when I get my studio organised again, will be bonded fibre films.

Happy stitching