Last Day of February

Wow, I can't believe tomorrow is March 1 already. Spring is hopefully coming soon and I know I'm ready for it.

The photo above shows some progress on my latest quilt. I didn't get a whole lot done in the studio this weekend. It seems like it's more challenging to work on quilts or projects when hubby is home all day on the weekends.

I hope you had a lovely weekend.

In other news...I added some of my journal quilts to my etsy shop. Tomorrow (March 1) is the next Twelve by Twelve group quilt reveal. Our color palette this round was sage/blue/brown.

Have a great day!

Journal Quilt #8

Anemone Blossoms (journal quilt #8)

Commercial and hand painted cottons, painted paper towels, Mistyfuse, free-motion quilting, pre-programmed machine stitches

I'm so happy that I found enough time yesterday to get my journal quilt done. And did you notice? I didn't use any orange.

I'm Into Flowers

Yesterday I should have been working on this week's journal quilt, but I just couldn't motivate myself to do so. So I'm hoping to work on it today and share it with you tomorrow. Crossing my fingers...

What I did work on yesterday was a little sketchbook flower design, some ink work on a new quilt in progress, and I also have been painting on brown paper each day (not shown).

I've been averaging one painted brown paper surface every day. I'm working my way through a large pile, trying to get caught up with that. I also needed to use up some paints that were starting to age. It seems a shame to buy them and then let them go to waste. So I'm trying hard to not do that anymore.

I pulled out my Prismacolor colored pencils recently and have been playing with them in my sketchbook. That is what I used to add color to the page above.

Okay, I'm off to play in my studio....gotta make a journal quilt you know!

Zentangle Challenge #10

This week's Zentangle challenge from I Am The Diva, was labeled "The Space Between". Our challenge was to leave white space with no doodling. I didn't find this challenge too challenging and therefore I liked it. Tee hee! I like the white space and find that I don't have too many Zentangles I've created that are completely filled in with design.

But I have to admit that I found it incredibly difficult not to fill in those loopy loops in my design.

How I Use Brown Paper Bags

Read more here: 3 Creative Studios Tip Tuesday

Journal Quilt #7

I seem to be having trouble meeting deadlines lately. Even though these deadlines aren't super important. I guess they must be somewhat important though because it's been bugging me that I've been delayed in meeting them. Such is life sometimes and I need to be more relaxed and easier on myself. Hmmm, wonder if I'll take my own advice. My guess is probably not.

Here is my latest journal quilt. I've been trying to have these done and posted on Fridays and this one should have appeared here just this past Friday.

Spring Dreams (Journal Quilt #7)

Hand painted and commercial cottons, free-motion quilting, thread sketching, decorative pre-programmed machine stitching, wavy rotary blade cut around outside edge

As I was adding this photo to my file folder on my computer, I noticed that the last four journal quilts have orange in them. Orange happens to be one of my favorite colors and so I can understand why I've done this. I really should try to do something different for my next journal quilt, however. I do know that I would have no problem making an entire years worth of journal quilts in an orange theme. But they didn't start out that way and I'm not switching over now.

See all the other journal quilts in the Flickr Photo Album.

What I Did This Weekend

A few days ago the February Color Palette Challenge was announced over at 3 Creative Studios. Last month I made an art quilt for the January color palette challenge and so I decided this month to make something different.

I decided to make the Pocketed Notebook Cover free project that Vicki Welsh published a few days ago. Vicki also shared more thoughts and ideas about this project on the 3 Creative Studios blog here.

I altered the size of Vicki's notebook cover because I wanted it to fit a composition notebook. I really should consider my size-altered results my prototype since it was sort of an experiment on getting the measurements to fit my notebook size. The most obvious thing that didn't turn out well is that the little strap to hold something in the left hand pocket is not centered over the pocket opening.

front cover

back cover

embroidered detail on front cover

outer cover opened

inside

I didn't have the same interfacing/stabilizer that Vicki used and so I scrounged through my supplies and found something to use, although I have no idea what it was.  I'm disappointed in it because in the photo above of the inside lining, you can see it shows ugly creases.  Luckily that will be hidden when the notebook is inserted.

Here is a photo of the February Color Palette.  Gorgeous!  How did I do on using the colors?

LOOK! It's a Book!

The Twelve by Twelve group is definitely celebrating the release of our book. I received my copies a few days ago and I'm just thrilled with how it turned out, as are the others.

It was published by Lark Crafts and they did a magnificent job. Thank you Lark!

All 12 of us wrote a chapter in the book and other small tidbits here and there.

I wrote the chapter about our theme Identity.

The book is available online at Barnes & Noble and Amazon. And it might be in your local book store.

Lark Crafts has been featuring one of the Twelves on their blog each day, starting earlier this week. Today I am featured. See my interview here.

Dreaming of Spring

. . . flowers make me happy . . .

Weekly Zentangle Challenges

Eeek! I got behind on last week's Zentangle challenge. So my theory is better late than never.

Zentangle Challenge #8 - we were to incorporate two of the previous challenges into this Zentangle and also create a heart. My result is the heart below. I started out with orbs, which was challenge #5, and then I got stuck...hence my lateness with this challenge. So I am declaring the second part of this challenge as simplicity, which was challenge #1.

Zentangle Challenge #9 - we are to use a new tangle that our hostess created and named after her son. The tangle is called Artoo. My result is below and the Artoo design is the seed pod/leafy looking design on the left hand side.

Sometimes I have such a hard time coming up with these Zentangle pieces and then other times I just whip them out. Sigh! I guess that's why they are called challenges.

Painting With Dye-Na-Flow

Lately I've been playing around with inks and painting layers of them onto fabric and creating whole cloth art quilts. This paint layering technique works best with transparent paints and inks. I decided to try the technique with Jacquard Dye-Na-Flow paint to see how it would work. I have several colors of Dye-Na-Flow in my stash, so I didn't have to go and buy them.

I followed the same steps as I had previously with the inks. I first applied a few colors of Dye-Na-Flow onto a piece of white, cotton fabric, and let it dry. I usually dilute my colors a bit with water, anywhere from 10 to 50%, although I don't measure precisely. Then I added some flower shapes with white acrylic paint and some stems with a dark green acrylic paint. After all was dry, I added another layer of Dye-Na-Flow in different colors from the first layer.

Here is my finished quilt using the Dye-Na-Flow paints.

Free-Form Flowers

16.25" x 10"

I free-motion quilted the piece, hand embroidered the French knots for the flower centers, mounted the quilt onto a fabric-covered piece of Timtex, and edged the focal quilt with black/white piping.

All in all, I think that most transparent inks and paints will work for this painted layering technique and of the three that I tried (Dr. Ph. Martin Bombay India Inks, FW Acrylic Inks, and Jacquard Dye-Na-Flow) I think that my favorite was the FW Acrylic Inks.  Next I would choose to use Dye-Na-Flow.  And the India Inks would be my last choice only for the fact that they smelled icky when ironing and may scorch.  I imagine that many other products could be used, such as Jacquard Textile Colors.  Paints that are thicker will need some thinning.  I did feel like the Dye-Na-Flow wanted to seep and spread in the fabric more so than the inks did, so that is something to consider if you are wanting a precise design.

My suggestion....test, play, have fun!  I sure am.

Oh and Happy Valentine's Day to all of you.

Journal Quilt #6

Be My Valentine

I took the time yesterday to create this week's journal quilt. Some of the fabrics in this piece are leftovers from last week's quilt. And since Valentine's Day is coming soon, I thought I'd create a piece to go along with that theme.

The white stenciled hearts were something I tried as a test. I had a sticker sheet of hearts that I used up and as I looked at the sheet that remained, I wondered if it could be recycled into a stencil. The sticker sheet remains consists of two layers, the sticker layer and the backing sheet layer. So I took my craft blade to the heart shaped sticker sheet and cut through the backing layer.

The stencil worked great. It isn't as sturdy as a plastic stencil, and I don't know how long or how many uses I will get from it, but it did the job I needed and perhaps a few more.

The journal quilt group photo album is growing each week.  Check out all the great journal quilts.

This is So FUN!!!

The following photos show the progress of my latest project made with the FW Acrylic Inks.

White fabric painted randomly with about four ink colors (diluted approx. 50% with water).  I used a blue disappearing ink pen (see more on this pen below) to draw the design lines onto the fabric.  They are very difficult to see in the photo.

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Design was then marked with permanent ink.  I used the Pentel Gel Roller for Fabric.  I ironed a sheet of freezer paper to the back side to help stabilize the fabric while using the gel roller.

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More design lines are added with the gel roller.  I love this pen!  I need to get some more because after I completed this project I noticed that the ink level in the pen barrel is getting quite low.

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I accidentally skipped taking a photo before this one.  That photo should show the darkened areas on the design.  I painted those in with FW ink in black.  The black of the FW ink and the gel roller go well together.  So after all the black ink was on the fabric and allowed to dry, I then added another layer of diluted FW inks over the surface, but this time just in the background areas.  You can see how vibrant that second layer made everything by comparing it to the single layer that is within the flower design.  Because the inks were diluted, they were a little bit harder to control and I did get a little bleeding into the areas where I didn't want them.  I only applied two ink colors for the second layer.

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This is my original drawing in my sketchbook.  I drew this, oh maybe two years ago.  Silly me didn't date the sketch.

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And here are photos of the finished piece.  The size of this quilt is 14" x 14.25". 

 Doodle Flowers

I outline stitched the focal design with black thread and did an overall meander in the background with a variegated thread.

I used a wool batting and it really gives some dimension in the flower areas as you can see in the next photo.

I did a wash test on the FW inks.  Here is a picture I took before I washed the fabric.

And here is the result after washing. The lighting was different when I took the second photo, that is why the colors are much deeper in the photo above.

You can see that the left side, with no heat setting lost quite a bit of color.  While the side that was heat set is much better, compared to the original in the middle I am able to detect a small loss of color/vibrancy.  I know that I won't be using this product for anything that would need washing.  This test may have different results for you because there are so many factors that could change the results.  So if you want to know, I suggest doing your own test.

I mentioned the blue disappearing ink pen I used at the beginning of this project.  My favorite disappearing ink pen is the Jacquard Auto Fade pen.  The one thing that I really like about this pen is that you can iron over it and it won't set the ink.  You will still be able to remove the blue ink with water.  Cool.  I have only seen this pen at Dharma Trading here.

Playing with New Product

Last week I received the FW Acrylic Inks that I ordered. I ordered them online from Dick Blick. Here are the colors I got.

One thing I didn't realize with these inks is that some are more opaque while others are more transparent.  I'm a little disappointed that Dick Blick doesn't indicate anything regarding opacity.  I did find a color chart at the Daler-Rowney web site.  On the chart, the color numbers under the color swatch either end in a cross symbol  or an X.  The X indicates opaque, where the cross symbol indicates transparent.  On the bottles of ink themselves, there is a (t) or (o), which also indicates this information.

Out of the colors I ordered, the only one that is opaque is the turquoise blue.  Oh and I also happened to have on hand black and white which I had purchased about a year or so ago.  Those two are opaque as well.

Here is a color chart I made for myself with the seven colors.  You can see that I wrote the color names along the left side.  The lines of ink that run from left to right are straight from the bottle.  And the lines of ink that run top to bottom are diluted about 50% with water.  My test is on 100% cotton muslin and the pen I used to mark the color names and grid is the Pentel Gel Roller for Fabric.

I started on a project with these inks and I hope to share that with you in a few days.

Valentine's Day is Coming

Are you ready for it? I think I might be. I made a few of these postcard-sized Valentine's over the past few days.

It took a few days because I first had to make the fabric-backed paper for the background and that needs drying time. Then I would just work on them in spurts when I felt like it or had time.

The hearts are made from hand dyed fabric and I layered some hand dyed cheesecloth over part of it. Then I layered a piece of Texture Magic and following the package directions I free-motion stitched and then used my steam iron to add the texture. I had received the package of the Texture Magic from Angela Marcos, who is a Superior Threads rep in my region. I'm ashamed to say I've had this product for such a long time and am only now finally getting around to trying it out. Good intentions gone bad!

I was worried about getting the Texture Magic to "do its thing" with my iron because I hadn't been using the steam part of my iron for a while. It was always leaking like crazy on me. My friend, Angie, told me to only use distilled water in it no matter what the instructions that came with the iron stated. Also to only fill it a fourth to a third full. I tried it and it seems to be working....so far. Yay!

So after I had my Valentine's cards made, I decided I didn't want to send them in the clear plastic sleeves that I have on hand. I decided to make some custom envelopes instead. I made these from scrapbook paper.

Now all I need to do is get them addressed and sent on their merry Valentiney way.

Zentangle Challenge #7

This week's Zentangle challenge over on the I Am the Diva blog, was a little different. We weren't given a word/theme cue, or a Zentangle pattern to use. Instead, we were to just Relax, Breathe, and Smile. We were to just let the Zentangle flow from us, sort of like how our breathe flows, in and out in a controled, but relaxed manner.

That sounds easy enough...I basically had license to create anything, really. So why did I find this the most challenging challenge so far? I think because I wasn't given a word or theme cue. How about you...do you find challenges easier when you have a starting point, or you know there is some sort of element you are to include in your result?

The above design sort of reminds me of a couple things. In some ways it looks a bit bee like. The feathered shapes look a lot like the wings of an insect. I used the Betweed pattern to fill them and it was my first time doing that pattern, except in practice. I probably shouldn't have used it, because I found myself not breathing at times while drawing it. I think I was trying to draw it perfectly so my breathing sort of stopped at times. When I became conscious of that, I tried to loosen up. I think that part will take some practice.

Anyway the second thing the design reminds me of is a sort of weird flower and the feather shaped areas are the petals.

How about you...what do you see?

Journal Quilt #5

At one point this week I didn't think I was going to get a weekly journal quilt made. I had almost decided that it would be okay to skip it, but today I felt differently. I really wanted to do one. So I quickly found some fun and colorful fabrics and got to work.

I'm so happy that I just dove in and created this. I didn't put a lot of thought into it at all and I found my enjoyment factor was up in the high ranges. Usually I stress a bit more on how things work together and if the end result will look good. But when I started on this, I think I just pushed aside all the normal creative hesitations and went for it.

The stamped fabric across the lower third of the quilt and the Cape Code applique is something I had gotten a long time ago from Pokey Bolton from Quilting Arts. I can't even remember any more why she sent me this fabric, but I really like it. The colorful fabric in the upper section is one of those serendipity fabrics where you wipe excess paints and dyes off your brushes or rollers when painting on other pieces. Sometimes these clean-up fabrics turn out so beautiful.

A couple of new things I tried out on this quilt is the raw cut, wavy edge. I have about three to five specialty blades for my rotary cutter and I rarely use them. I really have no clue why. I also got out one of my twin needles for the sewing machine and used it to stitch a double straight stitch around the edges.

Fractured Cats and Other Progress

I've finished my latest art quilt. I'm calling it Fractured Cats at this point, not sure if I will change that or not. It measures approximately 12.25" square. I ended up quilting only the background areas and the dark lines of the quilt as I really liked how the cats and flowers appeared sort of dimensional after the background quilting was done.

One word of caution, and this is for those who use the Dr. Ph. Martin Bombay India Inks like I did on this piece, it smells when ironed and I imagine it may be releasing some fumes that are not good for breathing in, can't be sure on that but you don't want to take any chances. Do it in a ventilated space, use a cover cloth and don't iron for too long as I think it can scorch and change the appearance of the color. One thing I do like is that the hand of the fabric is not hard and stiff. You can tell it's not exactly the same as unpainted fabric, but it's not much change at all.

I got my FW Acrylic Inks in the mail yesterday and I'm anxious to try them and see how they compare to the Bombay India inks.

Overall, I'm very happy with how this quilt has turned out.

Up next is a before/after photo of my gourd progress. I'm still not completely finished with this project. I'm not sure if you can even really see much difference in the comparison. The differences are: I sprayed the gourd with a fixative and that added a bit of shine to the finish...but the main reason I did that was so that any of the dark lines I drew on wouldn't bleed or fade from further work on the surface. Then I added some shading on either side of the bolder swirly lines that run up and down the sides. I also added some white charcoal to add some highlights. Both the shading and highlights are to add dimension and at this point I'm not sure if they are too subtle or not. I may think on it a bit.