MAIL!!!

I've got mail!!!! I LOVE this magazine published by the Embroiderer's Guild of the UK. The UK textile artists are incredibly talented. I signed up for a subscription several months back and recently sent away for several back issues. There are traditional needlework articles but there are also many articles using various mixed media techniques. Many of the completed pieces are stunning. If you would like to find out more about the Guild and Stitches, check here.

Just wanted those of you that leave comments to know how much they are appreciated. Back tomorrow with more goodies.

Last week I received a lovely parcel from Terri Kahrs at Pringle Hill Studio! We had agreed to swap a charm several weeks ago but I received TWO instead of one! There is a bit of glare on the photo above so my apologies - I am not a photographer. One is a lovely heart and the second is a wire birdnest with bead eggs. Terri is a talented photographer and collage artist. She creates the most vibrant collages! I just love all the colours in her work. AND she shares the most wonderful vintage images in both png and jpeg formats!

Just click on her name above and stop by her blog for a visit.

I thought I would share a photo of my very cool new scissors that I won as a door prize on Friday evening! I think I can manage to find these fairly easily. Managed to finish off another skinny yesterday.

Busy weekend - I went to an open house at one of two local sewing/quilt stores on Friday. Socialized with several ladies I hadn't seen in quite some time and chocolate fondue too! Discounts and numerous door prizes - I won a pair of scissors with polka dot handles! Saturday I spent quite a bit of time visiting blogs, catching up on what many of you have been up to. Inspiration galore! I played a bit with my new embellisher. Did various household chores on Sunday and painted some fabric for an upcoming workshop locally. Played around with some ideas I had in my head for new projects. Signed up for DesignMattersTV a newer venture last year by an extremely talented mother and daughter team in the UK. Go take a peak at their site, lots to see. I took my City and Guilds Creative Computing course with them several years back. You can check out my class portfolio here if you are interested.

The above photos are a binder cover I made recently with some fabric paper I was playing around with. I really like the bold colours (I do work BOLD sometimes). What an improvement to a three ring binder - much more studio oriented.

Not sure what I'll get up to today but I do need to take some photos for my blog posts this week, quite a pile in the studio.

Am off........

SKINNY!

This is my March skinny for Marsha. I really struggled with what to do for Marsha while maintaining my monthly theme for the skinnies. When I think of March, I always think of new growth in the garden - the daffodils are up, many of the shrubs are budding out so I went searching online for quotes, poems etc. Came across "from a small seed a mighty trunk may grow" - just loved this quote. I wanted to do a background that was bolder than my usual because Marsha works in bold colours so I used a muslin background and spray painted through a stencil with colour washes. I then applied some distress powders to add texture. I used wool for the branches and cut up some leaf ribbon for the leaves. A piece of a hand dyed doily is behind her head because I needed to have her face show up more. The image is from Lisa's altered art. The seed is in a small organza pocket.

The back of the skinny is a rendition of the front in digital format printed on cotton. Digital products are from Irene Alexeeva. Image is from Lisa's altered art. I'm SO pleased Marsha likes it!

I received a "Beautiful Blogger Award" from Sharon yesterday. Sharon was one of my first followers when I started blogging last May! She is a gifted embroiderer with various art interests. Thank you Sharon! The rules are to share 7 things about yourself so here goes.....
1. My blog design includes bees in memory of my mother whose nickname was "Bee".
2. I rarely listen to music while I am creating as I become very absorbed in my projects.
3. I like to clean my studio on completion of a project. This gives me a "fresh" palette to work with for the next project.
4. I like all colours not really having one "favourite" although interestingly, almost the entire main floor of my home is painted in varying shades of green. I am least fond of pink although I do use it at times in my work.
5. I have no formal art education, just a lifelong interest in various mediums.
6. I am VERY organized. Most of my friends think I should have been a professional organizer!
7. I love flowers!

So, there you have it......

STUDIO ORGANIZATION

I mentioned several weeks ago I had been doing some studio organization in an effort to maximize space. The top photo shows my trims now neatly wrapped. They are now both visually appealing and I can see what I have. The second photo shows some tulle I had in a drawer. Amazing how little space it takes up now that it is off the roll.

Not much art yesterday as I ran errands all morning. I did manage to start to experiment with some lace and fabric backgrounds. They were drying overnight so will look forward to how they turned out this morning. Today is an ART day!!!!!

Several weeks ago I was experimenting with painting deli paper. I used colour washes (upper right) and acrylic paints (other two). Since I got a bit carried away I decided to make some envelopes for future use. Deli paper is on the outside with an old bed sheet picked up from the thrift store on the inside that I hand dyed. These were sewn together and a decorative edge was cut. I was pleased with the results so think I'll end up painting some more paper.

Thanks to all those who commented yesterday on my new toy! Thanks to those of you who provided little hints too! I ended up practicing hand stitching yesterday but do plan to play embellishing today. Spring is here on the west coast - cut some daffodils from the garden for the house yesterday.....

This is my new toy! It is an embellishing machine. I had been wanting one for the last year but have been waiting for a sale. Picked this up several weeks ago! An embellishing machine needle punches fabrics and is usually used with a felt base and rovings, no thread involved!

Once I got my machine I had to go shopping for rovings. These are wool rovings with one bamboo and wool blend.

These are a blend of bamboo and silk rovings.
These are silk rovings which I'll likely use to make silk paper - lovely feel!
And these are silk sari rovings which I'll be experimenting with for silk paper as well as combining in my embellishing experiments.
As you can see, I had fun shopping! Now I'm off to experiment.....

REMAINS OF THE DAY JOURNAL 2

My second journal video to share today. If you would like to view the video in HD please visit http://vimeo.com/9984804. Enjoy your weekend!

Layers, layers and more layers! The background is part of an old quilt I started years ago and never finished. This is layered with dyed cheesecloth, a dictionary page and organza in various colours. Once assembled a heat gun was applied. I find I am really fond of the effects of using a heat gun to "melt" poly blends - never quite know how the piece will turn out. A small organza flower was added with a saying "flowers are the poetry of nature".

No studio time yesterday as I was in Vancouver for the day and what a lovely day it was - sunny! Hope you are able to enjoy some creative time today.

I apologize to the "Irish" out there - I have nothing green to post today - oh well, next year!

I mentioned I had been re-organizing in the studio. One of my thrift finds of late were a couple of bags of synthetic laces. I already had the pile above so in order to make more room have wrapped all the laces over old fashioned clothes pegs. My laces were already stored in the canister jar above but there are a lot more in there now! Now I can actually see what I've got - works great.

The last photo is my Marsha original that I forgot to share yesterday. Below that in the photo is my corset book, later this year to be joined by my skinny book!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

HAUTE FISH SKINNY SWAP

Something different this morning! I have more textile collages and bits and pieces to share but my mailbox has been very busy of late so thought I would take a break and show my most recent skinny from Marsha for March! "Haute Fish" - isn't it wonderful!? I love Marsha's work and in fact have a larger print and several cards as well. You can see more of Marsha's work on her blog so go take a peek! Marsha should be receiving mine any day........

Worked on a new collage yesterday which I'll complete today. Ended up organizing my laces and trims yesterday as these were overflowing from jars - amazing how much more space I have!
Off to see what kind of trouble I can get in today!

SCHOOL DAYS

Hope you all enjoyed your weekend and found some time for creativity. Intermittent rain this weekend here so good creative time here. Watched a couple of movies and ended up doing some fabric dyeing which I will be continuing today. Also am in the process of designing some new pieces.

So, continuing on with Ruth's techniques. This piece is entitled "School Days" and measures approximately 6x9". Textiles are layered and include commercial checkerboard, screen printed muslin, batting (singed), crocheted doily bits, ribbon and organza. Pockets are created with stitching and contain various small reminders of school. The image is from a collection I have from a CD purchased online some years ago. More tomorrow.....

SERIES COMPLETED!

My series is complete! I decided to create a wall hanging with the four textile collages. Each of the pieces are joined with painted and stitched felt. I had thought about using batting but felt this would not be strong enough. I had a very difficult time photographing this piece so my apologies for the quality of this. Please click on the photo for a larger view.

Thanks to all for your very positive comments on the series. I ended up enjoying the book so much that I have even more projects to share next week. Until then, enjoy your weekend.

DAY FOUR IN A SERIES......

This is the last in my series of four textile collages. All measure approximately 5x7. As with the others, I have used various bits and scraps. This one has muslin, crocheted bits, canvas, cheesecloth and some netting. All images are from Artchix. I have added recycled cardboard from cereal boxes between the layers to add stability.

So, want to see what I've done with all four.

Check back tomorrow!

DAY THREE IN A SERIES....

Day 3 of my series! Construction is the same as described yesterday. Dream with me includes screen printed muslin, hand dyed synthetic and cotton trims, hand dyed muslin and an old lace tablecloth. Also included is part of a hand dyed crocheted doily. The words are sewn onto a muslin backing that has been slightly raised with batting. This is my favourite so far.

Day 4 tomorrow. Enjoy your day.

DAY TWO IN A SERIES....

Day two in my series. I thought I would discuss a little about the process. ALL of the textiles I used in these pieces are leftover bits from various projects. There is a bit of an old lace drape, the kind our mother's (for those of us old enough) used to have hanging up! Some various bits of laces that were either cut or torn. The tag is fabric paper that I intended to use on another project but it was too large for that one. The word comes from some stamped muslin. Back is tea stained muslin and the bluish fabric is hand dyed from my vintage packs.

I like this better than yesterday as pinks are my least favourite colour. Interestingly, I do use pink in some of my work at times - go figure..... Day three tomorrow!

WORKING IN A SERIES.....

I don't know about you, but I have quite an extensive library of books for "reference". I recently added Ruth Rae's new book entitled "Layered, Tattered and Stitched" which you can find here to my ever growing collection. Many times when I purchase a book I review it then add it to the collection for the future. I decided this year when I purchase books I'm going to go through it and complete some of the projects versus just placing it on the shelf for the "future".

Over the last week, with Ruth's book open on my workbench, I started working in a series of textile collages using various scraps and experimented. Through the week I will be sharing the series. These were really fun to make and took very little time to put together as I worked on all at once. Hope you enjoy the ride......

Thank you to all who have left comments over the last several weeks, always appreciated!

PARIS IN SPRINGTIME

Today is a digital day! This project measures approximately 5x7. The majority of the elements are from Lisa's altered art Paris kit. Remaining elements are from Christina Renee Designs. I had planned to show my next journal video today but realized I've met my limit for this week on Vimeo so will have to share this in another week or so.

I taught a class yesterday on creating your own collage sheets and managed to make quite a dent in online shopping for a new purchase I've made. I'll share all this once it arrives. Think fibers..... I also managed to complete FIVE projects I've been working on, all of which you will see next week.

That's it for this week. Enjoy your weekend!