Screen Printing

I've been wanting to do some screen printing lately but haven't really had the time to do it. But I decided I would make the time no matter what especially since I had recently acquired two new Thermofax screens from my friend Margaret Applin. I now own three screens that Margaret designed and hope to add more to my arsenal over time. I love her designs. You can see them in her Etsy shop <click here>.

I had these two pieces of cotton canvas cloth already painted with background color so I added screened designs to them. In all, I screened five different designs onto these pieces of cloth. Three designs by Margaret and two by me. I also added some stenciled spots using some punchinella (sequin waste).  I may turn this fabric into composition book covers, but I'm not totally sure about that yet.

Here's a recent doodle I made in my watercolor paper pad. I purchased some pads of watercolor paper last year and have found they don't work very well with watercolors or acrylic painting.  The paper warps and buckles and won't lie flat for me after I paint on it, no matter what I try.  So I've designated the paper for use with doodling only.  I need to make sure I use another watercolor paper or other kind of paper when I want paper for painting on.

I've done some more work to the thread sketched girls I shared with you in my previous post.  I'm pretty sure I have a plan on what will happen with that project, but really don't have much to share here with it for now.  I don't think I'll be able to work on it too much in the next week or two since I leave for Houston on Thursday.  Have a wonderful weekend.  I'm baking bread today.

On The Design Wall

Here is what I currently have on my design wall.  I've been working on these over the course of a week or two and I'm almost done with them.  I feel like I want to do something more with these but right now I'm not sure on which direction I want to go.  So they will just sit there and look at me and hopefully soon they will tell me what more they want.

They are thread sketched faces on a neutral pieced background that was free motion quilted.  I then added color with Neocolor II crayons.  They currently measure around 8 x 10" but they will probably be trimmed down a bit for finishing.

Hope your Monday is most stupendous!

Breakfast Love

Most mornings I eat a hard boiled egg as part of my breakfast. This morning my egg surprised me when I sliced it.

This egg was one of those that cracked open while boiling and it formed an odd shape. Needless to say it gave me a whimsical boost to my day.

Here is a doodle that I've been working on in the evenings. I'm thinking about cutting it into ATC-sized pieces when I'm done with the page. We'll see.

Please check out my guest post over on the Lark Crafts blog <click here>.   And be sure to watch the Lark blog in the next few days as more of the Twelves will be featured there.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend!

Kitty Litter

Around mid September I shared a couple of paintings I was working on. Well I have now finished those two along with three others in the same grouping.

Each of these is painted on a 9"x9" piece of watercolor paper and then they are adhered to a 10"x10" gallery wrapped canvas. I got a little bit of glare on a couple of them when taking photos, I hate when that happens.

I haven't mentioned here on my blog, but two weeks from today I will be flying to Houston to attend the International Quilt Festival. I'm looking forward to it. This will be my third time, I attended in 2007 and 2008. The Twelve by Twelve group is excited about having all of our 244 288 quilts on special exhibit at the festival. We will be signing and selling our book. If you have a copy of it and would like us to sign it, bring it with you (if you are going to festival). Nine members (eight besides me) from our group will be attending festival and I very much look forward to meeting all of them. To date I've only met one other Twelve and that is Deborah. I'm also anxious to connect with other friends (new and old alike). Are you going to festival?

Before and After

I rarely use the strap that came with my camera. The reason for this is because I mainly use my camera for taking photos of my artwork right here at home, so no need to leash the camera to my body. But recently I took the camera on an adventure and so I used the strap. I found that after wearing it for a while it started to become quite uncomfortable around the back of my neck. I'm not sure if it's the material of the strap that I was uncomfortable with or the weight of the camera pulling on it or both. Whichever it was, I decided to change the strap to something homemade. I am hoping it will be more comfortable and it's definitely much more attractive.

Before

After

I searched online for a camera strap tutorial and found many that were just a strap cover. I didn't want to do a cover, I wanted to totally replace the strap that was there. I found just the tutorial <click here>.

Here's my latest sketchbook doodle that I finished recently. I always seem to make these a little too large for the page.  I should try and make the next one smaller.

Invitation to Listen In

Fellow Twelve by Twelve member, Gerrie Congdon, is a guest on the American Patchwork & Radio show hosted by Pat Sloan at 4pm (ET) on Monday, October 17. Click the following logo to access the show's web page.

Gerrie says -- I am so excited to represent the Twelves on the American Patchwork & Quilting Radio Show with Pat Sloan. I will try not to embarrass the other eleven.

I know I will be tuned in to make sure she does not embarrass us. Tee hee!!! Have a great day!

Good News

Walking Along a Sandy Beach
Commercial cottons, free-motion quilting, water-
soluble crayons, water-soluble pencils,
textile medium, acrylic paint
9.5" x 9.5"

Back in January....gosh that seems like forever ago...I made this quilt and shared it in this blog post. It was made for This is a Quilt!, SAQA's 2011-2012 Traveling Trunk Show.

Yesterday I received some wonderful news. This news was quite a surprise to me as I had totally forgotten about this aspect of this particular quilt exhibit, or maybe I didn't even really know about it. Out of all 268 quilts that were submitted for this Traveling Trunk Show, 50 were selected to be included in a permanent collection at the Michigan State University Museum. AND MY QUILT WAS ONE OF THE 50! WOO HOO! Here are the details that I received in an email message from SAQA.

As part of the planning for This is a Quilt! SAQA arranged for 50 pieces to become part of the permanent collection at the Michigan State University Museum. We engaged gallerist Michael Solomon to select those pieces. The pieces will go to the Michigan State University Museum at the close of the trunk show travels.

Michael Solomon wrote:
When Kris Sazaki first asked me to be the juror for a collection to go to the Michigan State University Museum, I willingly accepted, thinking it would be a piece of cake. After all, I had owned a fine art gallery in Sacramento for over 10 years, and I had certainly chosen art and artists for many gallery exhibits. I faced a slightly greater challenge with group shows as opposed to solo exhibits, but I felt I had a pretty good grasp of the contemporary painting and sculpture we exhibited. I have also juried shows outside of my gallery, as well as my own photography exhibits.

For the SAQA show, I came to realize that my mandate would limit and challenge me when I faced the prospect of selecting just 50 pieces out of 268 submissions. I have spent many hours in art museums around the world, I am an avid collector, and I have formulated some ideas as to what constitutes "great art." While the quality of art may be subjective, great art is simply that which compels one to look at it, again and again and again. This is the truth, if not a truism. And that's the reason museums full of art that visitors repeatedly visit, contain great art. I can't stop looking at and admiring the art on my walls and pedestals; if I do, I end up replacing it with something better, and then repeat the process.

In jurying this show, I looked for aesthetic design, shapes, color, composition, texture, and subject matter. I am somewhat partial to figurative subject matter, so that may have affected my judgment in some respects. All of the work I viewed exhibited high artistic quality, and I found myself initially choosing way more than my allotment of 50. I then faced the agonizing task of deselecting many pieces I appreciated. In any event, I hope you enjoy my selections.

Artists whose trunk show pieces were chosen to become part of the Michigan State University Museum's permanent collection:
1. Affolter, Regula
2. Branjord, Sandra
3. Bruvry, Patricia
4. Carrigan, Sherry
5. Chen, Yeu-Chiu
6. Chuang, Huei-Lan
7. Clover, Jette
8. David-Cohen, Yael
9. Drucker, Tamar
10. Ecob, Aileyn
11. Filatoff, Julie
12. Fingal, Jamie
13. Fitzsimmons, Micaela
14. Fricke, Rebecca
15. Henry, Susan Elaine
16. Horne, Connie
17. Huang, Ming-Mei
18. Jensen, Jill
19. Jurgenson, Jean Renli
20. Lachman, Mary F.
21. Law, Catharina Breedyk
22. Limmer, Andrea
23. Lin, Hsin-Chen
24. Lin, Mei-Mu
25. McClean, Sarah Louise
26. McLaughlin, Linda
27. Milholen, Vivian
28. Miller, Linda
29. Ortelle, Cathy
30. Owoc, Pat
31. Pal, Mary
32. Phillips, Margaret A.
33. Pixeladies
34. Puetz, Casey
35. Read, Priscilla
36. Robertson, Ruan
37. Robertus, Linda
38. Rushbrooke, Rose
39. Simpson, Gayle
40. Smith, Catherine Whall
41. Smith, Lura Schwarz
42. Stegmiller, Terri
43. Stoltz, Heather G.
44. Tateo, Tiziana
45. Themel, Kate
46. Thomas, Rosalind
47. Tunnell, Karen Reese
48. Wambaugh, Debbie
49. Wanner , Dwayne
50. Watler, Barbara

I am very excited that my quilt was chosen for this permanent collection and very honored to be among all the wonderful artists listed here. Have a fabulous Friday!

My Crazy Obsession

I think Project Runway must be rubbing off on me. I've been watching it for the last few seasons and while the show is not totally focused on sharing fashion design tips and techniques, I still find it intriguing that these designers can whip out a garment in basically 24 hours or less without a pattern. So lately I've become interested in sewing clothing and also about how well it fits. I never had an interest in sewing clothes my whole entire life....until now, that is. Now I'm wishing that I would have learned when I was younger, I'd maybe feel more knowledgeable and/or confident in sewing clothing. I've been soaking up information from all over the Internet, pretty much like a sponge. And yes, I'm spending way too much time on the computer. More than I'd like to be. But that is what happens, I guess, when you become obsessed with a new interest. I have bought a few patterns to try (Etsy is a great resource for buying pre-owned patterns that have never been used), and I've shared a couple of tunic tops that I've sewn here within the past couple of months. About a month or more ago I bought this book:

The book is all about creating your own basic clothing patterns. Patterns that are customized with your own body measurements. I followed the guidelines on measuring my body and created a basic shirt pattern following the instructions in the book. I really liked this dress design (shown below), but I'm not really a dress person. So I decided to make a short version, like a tunic top.

Here are my results:

I didn't pose very well in the photo above, so let's try that again with a little more style:

In my research around the web on sewing and fitting clothing, I have learned so much about what to look for when determining what areas need adjustments. In the photo below, I need to work on fixing the shoulder area. I'm getting a lot of excess near the sleeve seam on the back and the top shoulder seam doesn't look like it's in the correct position. I did make a test garment out of muslin and lo and behold I didn't see this problem area when I tried the muslin on. See! I'm learning to see!

At some point I'd like to try making some pants similar to these in the book:

Oh if only I could look like that in them.....sigh!

I'll continue to share my exploration and experimentation on making clothes.  I don't seem to get tons of time to do it, so I won't be posting about this subject too often.

Oh and I got a new toy in order to take pictures of myself.  I bought a wireless remote for my camera.  Cool!

Hope you are having a thrilling Thursday!

Beware of Tiger

Here is the completed painting I shared sneak peeks of yesterday. Doesn't he look ferocious? Okay, maybe not.

He is painted with Caran d'Ache Neocolor II crayons and the black lines are ink. There's little bits of acrylic paint here and there as well. It is painted on 140 watercolor paper and mounted on a gallery wrapped canvas. The measurement is 10" x 10". I painted the stretched canvas black and added accents with a white pen. All I have left to do is add the sealer/varnish.

We are having a lovely fall day here today and I think I will go out and do some fall clean up. Have a terrific Tuesday!

Peeking into My Monday

Have a marvelous Monday!  What did you do today?

Tote/Pouch Set and The Sketchbook Challenge

Here are photos of the latest tote/handbag and coordinating zippered pouch that I have completed. I worked on these this week and they are currently on their way to the lovely person who ordered them.

Have you heard about the Sketchbook Challenge? If not, I encourage you to check it out <click here>. There is a lot of inspiration, information and ideas to be found there and today I am featured as a guest. I share a few of my sketchbook pages with readers and answer some questions on sketchbooking.

Have a lovely weekend!

Bluebird Pouch and a Giveaway Opportunity

I've been working on several things lately, most of which I'm not done with and there's not much to show in photos yet.  I did finish this cute, little zippered pouch last week and finally got around to getting a good photo. This pouch is part of a commission project that goes along with the bluebird tote I shared recently.

Hopefully I will have more to share with you later this week.

But here's something I want to share with you...

Go over right now to Margaret Applin-Happ's blog and enter her wonderful giveaway <CLICK HERE>.  Margaret is giving away a free Thermofax screen with one of her fun designs, AND she will also design a custom screen with your own personal design on it.  Can't beat a deal like that I say!!!  Quick, go there now and enter.  Deadline to enter is October 15.