Summer of Color (Brown)

I am finally getting around to posting my brown week items.  I have had a lot going on this week, so even though I finished early I just didn't get around to posting.
I want to say thank you to everyone that commented last week.  It is nice to be encouraged and appreciated.

This is my first brown piece.  I decided to use all the colors of hand dyed brown fabric to make a collage.  I used pieces of old watches for interest.  The green watch part is my bold color.

This is the next brown piece that I and my sister have been working on for my niece.  She loves horses so we are making her a horse shirt for her fourth birthday.  This is a great way to use brown with a bold color. 

 We put a small applique of cowgirl boots on the back of the shirt.

The next two items are my daughter's submissions. 

 A friendship bracelet made from brown and pick yarn.

Her first ATC.  The saying by Dr. Seuss is:
You know you're in love when you don't want to fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.
Have a fun time creating for red week.

Zoe

Here is a small wall quilt that I have been working on for a couple of months off and on.  I made it for a friend, who really loves her dog Zoe.

 Here is what it looked like before I quilted it and after the thread work was done.

 Here is what it looks like after the quilting.

This is the first time that I have done a mitered binding.  It was quite an experience putting it on.  It should be easier next time around.  The fabric I used for the border is some of my hand dyed fabric.  Making this quilt was an enjoyable experience all around.

Summer of Color (Yellow)

I enjoyed seeing everyone's pink pieces.  There was so much variety and so many wonderful art pieces.  This challenge has been a great inspiration to me.  Once again I want to thank everyone for all the great comments. This week I made two atcs.  I took my inspiration from all the flowers blooming at this time of year.  I love seeing all the flowers during the summer. Here are my yellow pieces:

 The idea for this atc came from a flower that is blooming in my garden right now. I first made a pale yellow background using wax pastel crayons.  Then I thread sketched the flower in black and added color with wax pastel crayons.  I had to add a bit of orange as well as yellow because the two go so well together. I added some ribbon on the edge with gold in it for my metallic accent.

For my sunflower I used the same method as my first atc.  I added some colored fabric scraps to the edges.  I wanted it to look like a window that you can see the flower through.  I added gold paint to the middle of the sunflower to give it a bit of metallic.
I got the idea for both of these atcs from Quilting Art Magazine.  I loved the article from the latest issue about thread sketching flowers and adding fabric scrap borders.
Here are some pictures of yellow flowers that my daughter took this week.  Enjoy a bit of my summer.

Now off to find inspiration for brown week.

Summer of Color (Pink)

I finally have time to post for Summer of Color Pink week.  I want to say thank you to everyone for your comments and encouragement.  It is nice to find out that people like my art.  It helps me to keep going and to improve my work.  This challenge is great for giving me inspiration and new ideas.  All the varied art is wonderful to see each week. 

I did two different projects for the pink challenge.  One piece was paper, water soluble wax crayons, and beeswax.  This was my first time using beeswax in art work.  I wasn't completely happy with the results, but I know some things to change in the future so it will work better.  I found out that I really love the way beeswax smells.  I will try it again, I'm just going to change my methods a little.

 The next piece that I made was another fabric ATC.  I used some of my snow dyed fabric for my ACT.  I used water soluble wax crayons to write the words and draw my shore before I stitched over them.

Here is a picture of the larger snow dyed fabric.  I love the beautiful patterns that snow dyeing produces.  I did put a picture of this up already, but since it was taken inside the fabric looks much darker.  Here is a picture taken in the sun.

My daughter also wanted to make a pink piece this week and play along with us.  She made a card for one of her friends.

Now for yellow.  I already have some ideas.  Have fun creating.

 

Pink

I am working on two pieces for the Summer of Color Pink challenge.  The fiber art that I am making is going to come from a piece of snow dyed fabric that I made last winter.  Here is a look at the fabric a bit early.  Come back next week to see what I did with it.

Summer of Color (Green)

Here is my entry for Kristin's Summer of Color week two.  I made another fabric ATC this week.  I didn't have a lot of time this past week, so I kept it simple.  I plan on mixing things up a little so I don't do the same thing every week, but this week that didn't happen.  I think of growing things trees and flowers when I think of green. What better to go with these than a fairy, so I used a fairy stamp that I already had and fabric paint to add her under the tree.  I did all the painting on a piece of green fabric that I dyed earlier.  It had a bit of citron in the fabric, but when I dyed the batting the paint flowed a bit farther than I wanted it to and it covered up most of the citron.   Next time I won't paint the batting at the end of the project.

I colored in the fairy using NEOCOLOR® II  Watersoluble crayons.  Next week there is a bonus for using wax in for the pink challenge.  Maybe I will be using these again, but I also want widen my wax exploration.

Motherhood

I am feeling a bit conflicted today.  I sent my oldest daughter off for a two week visit to Germany.  I know she will have a lot of fun and it is going to be a great learning experience.  I am always a bit concerned when my children are far away and I have no control over their decisions, even though there are people taking care of them on the trip  She is going to graduate from high school next year, so this is a small taste of the future.  I think that is hard to let the first child fly the nest and be on their own.  These feeling are something that I am going to have to deal with  over the next year so I can let her go blossom on her own.

  The dark haired girl is my oldest.  Her younger sister is the blond.

Summer of Color (Blue)

Here is my first project for Summer of Color.  I made a fiber ATC.  I mostly make small art quilts or other fiber art, so I want to build up a collection of ATCs to show people my work.  With this piece I wanted the batting to show so I painted it and then frayed the edges.

I was happy that the first color we worked with was blue, because it is my favorite color. I had to add touches of gold just to jazz it up a little. 

Playing with filters

I took a photo and applied three filters to get different looks.  In one I added canvas texture, another is the watercolor filter, and the last is a sponge filter.  I did all of these in Photoshop.

Summer of Color

I plan to participate in the Summer of Color as much as I can this summer.  I want to make some ATC's so I can start to have something to give away when people ask me what I do.  I also want to work on an altered book, but that project will probably go on for a long time. I don't have more than a small chunk of time to work each day, something about having a three year old and a one year old will do that in my house.  I mostly want to have fun and try out some new techniques.  I am mostly a fiber artist, but I dabble in other forms just to broaden my horizons and practice techniques. 

Pictures

I wanted to put up some pictures of recent work that I never got around to posting.

 

 This is a piece of snow dyed fabric that I made this winter.

 This is a bookmark that I made from a small part of that snow dyed fabric.

This a a fabric collage that I made for my sister.  I stitched a photo transfer of her and her horse in the middle.  It was a fun way to use up scrap fabric, and my first attempt of using gel medium to transfer a photo.

Photoshop Flower

Here is another Photoshop picture.  I haven't put a lot of work into this one, just played around with filters.  I like the watercolor look lately, so I have been playing around with it.

Photoshop background

This is a piece that I'm working on in Photoshop and Illustrator.  I scanned into the computer a piece of  my snow-dyed fabric then I layered text and some simple drawings on top.  I am still planning on playing around with the layers and then printing it onto fabric to use as a background for a new art quilt.

Photoshop practice

This is a piece that I have been playing around with.  I used Citra-Solv on an old National Geographic magazine and got some cool dissolved images.  I then layered them in Photoshop and added the words.  Now I get to use the images over and over in different art.

handmade sketchbooks

I have been experimenting with handmade sketchbooks recently.  I started with my hand dyed cotton fabric, then I stamped layers of different stamps on the fabric.  Half of the stamps I carved myself.  After I had the layers built up I thread sketched some of the stamped designs and then quilted the fabric.  I used poly felt as the batting for a bit of stiffness.  I used purchased fabric for the backing.  I sewed the cover inside out and then turned it for nice smooth edges before quilting.  I used waxed thread to sew the signatures into the cover.  Here are pictures of my first two books.

 I still need to practice picture taking so that all my pictures come out with good color.  I will continue to work on the lighting.
 

Spring Break

Spring Break is almost over and I haven't gotten much art done.  I have had time to work on one project, but nothing else.  I haven't taken pictures yet, but I will soon.  This is just a little project that I had my niece help me with for her mom's Mother's Day gift.  Maybe when the  weather gets nicer I will get some more dyeing and painting done.

"Lil Blue Boo / Dharma Trading Design Challenge"

I designed this quilt using all hand dyed and tie-dyed fabrics.  I wanted a fun way for my nephew to learn his ABC's.  Using this quilt he can have a tactile experience while staying warm and learning the ABC's. I bought all of my cotton fabric and fiber reactive procion dyes from Dharma Trading Co. I used a variety of tie-dyed fabrics to make the letters and a separate hand dyed piece of cotton for the background.  I love all of the vibrant colors that you can get with the fiber reactive dyes, and how easy they are to use.  I was comfortable using the cotton dyed with the fiber reactive dyes for a baby because they become part of the fabric.  I don't have to worry about him getting unsafe chemicals if he decides to put the quilt into his mouth.  I am entering this piece into the "Lil Blue Boo / Dharma Trading Design Challenge".

www.lilblueboo.com

Musical

I have been working on my daughter's musical for a couple of months now.  This is show week.  It has been tiring, but fun.  We are doing Wizard of Oz.  I have had something to sew, hot glue, dye, or cut almost every day.  Next week I can get back to my art, which I have only been working on in small bits here and there.  I am committed to the success of the show, so I don't mind delaying my work for costume making.

These are a few of the costumes in the early stages.  I will have more pictures later.

snow going away

Thanksgiving week

The last couple of weeks I have been spending my sewing time hemming dresses for my daughter's choir.  When I get those done I am going to work on some gifts for Christmas.  I am going to work on a canvas memory book for my niece.  I also have to finish up some scrub tops that I am dyeing for my mother.

I have been trying to get my oldest daughter to work on some simple art projects.  She is completely resisting all my attempts.  She is 16 almost 17, so I know some of it is her age.  Some of it is her personality.  At least her sister will happily do any creative thing with me that I suggest.

 Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

I have been busy with my daughter's Kimono project,  I need to spend some time sewing today.  I started some silk scraps with rust dyeing yesterday, so I will see how they turn out today.  I have also been working on making hand turkeys with the kids.  We are going to make a wall hanging for Thanksgiving and submit them in the Dharma Trading Company contest.

Busy fall

I have been busy the last several weeks with my kids school functions and family stuff.  I have been able to create something about half the days.  I have been dyeing fabrics, including rust dyeing, parfait dyeing, and marble dyeing with shaving cream.  Someday I will actually try regular marble dyeing and get better results, but for now the shaving cream method is easy.  I also dyed some silk to use as a lining for a kimono that my daughter is using for a history project.  It turned out beautifully.  I haven't taken any pictures of it yet.  It is hard to get much done with a six month old baby who likes his mother's attention.  I have also been experimenting with painting dryer sheets to use in mixed media projects.  I plan on continuing this until I get the results that I like.  I hope to get some projects finished this week, but I will have to see how it goes.  I need to spend time helping my daughter sew her kimono and hemming dresses for her high school choir.  There aren't that many parents who know how to sew, so I always volunteer to help out.