Saturday, February 23, 2013
Photo Transfer at Pat's
We had a wonderful time, printing photographs onto fabric, at Pat's on President's Day. A nice group got together, and brought their photos to download into Pat's new Laptop computer. I had a handout on preparing treated fabric, printing from Windows Photo Wizard, and printing from Adobe Photoshop. We mostly used the Photoshop program, because it allowed us to enhance the photos, kick up the color and contrast and otherwise play with them. We also wanted to print 8" x 10" to save fabric. Dorie and Meredith were impressed with how it could make an average photo (or photographer)into something special. We printed several photos for each person, and played with cropping and flipping images. By lunch time we were ready for a fabulous potluck, taco soup from Pat, homemade bread from Amy and brownies, banana bread and various other desserts. Really good cheesy-melty french bread from Landreth. After lunch we mostly talked about printing options and what to do with our photos, and called it an early day. I am looking forward to seeing what people make with their prints. For more info go to FyberCafe.blogspot.com
Sunday, February 17, 2013
Looking forward
I am anticipating fun tomorrow at a Play Day at Pat's. The Fyber Cafe group is going to work on printing our photographs on to fabric. Pat has a new laptop and printer, so I went out to her place yesterday and we checked to make sure we knew what we were doing. It's a good thing we did, cause the new printer kept wanting to steal our photos from Photoshop, and we couldn't find the Windows Photo Wizard for a while. We also figured out how to download my photos from a flash drive and hers from her camera card. We printed onto fabric from Photoshop and Windows, and the fabric went through her printer great. So we are ready for about 8 ladies to join us on Monday. I got several quilts out for a trunk show of my photo-quilts, to demonstrate what can be done with photos on fabric, I also have several wonderful books to share. I updated my handouts for printing on fabric, and printing from Photoshop, so it should be an informative day. We are also going to sew projects from our photos.
Sunday, February 10, 2013
Fun with T-shirts
I made two t-shirts for friends who are getting married on Valentines Day. Just for fun, we have been teasing them about playing in the shower and she fell and cracked her ribs on the side of the tub. So the shirt I made for her had s fused light blue fabric that says "Slippery when wet!" I drew the pattern calligraphy, it is stitched with blue rayon in a machine blanket stitch. I used a stiff fusible interfacing on the inside of the shirt for stability. I added several cutout-fused tropical fish to finish off the design and make it colorful. I stitched them with a clear nylon thread and a zigzag stitch.
For him I painted a quote, when he got down on one knee to proposed, he finished with "Now, help me get up?" more teasing! I ripped freezer paper into letters with a raw jagged edge, ironed them in place and used Shiva Oil Sticks to paint around the letters. This left a negative image of the words on the darker blue t-shirt. My teal frosted Shiva stick was rather dried out, and I had a hard time using it, I kept trimming away the dried areas, but it did not want to work. It was a lot of waste for an expensive art supply. The silver metallic worked a bit better, so I went over all the teal with the silver. At the lower part of the "T" I used two masks of hands, to paint around, after I adjusted one of them so the finger and thumb touch, to make an "OK" sign. I am going to embroider a gold wedding band with rhinestones fused on it held between the fingers. I used only the silver Shiva on the hands.
For him I painted a quote, when he got down on one knee to proposed, he finished with "Now, help me get up?" more teasing! I ripped freezer paper into letters with a raw jagged edge, ironed them in place and used Shiva Oil Sticks to paint around the letters. This left a negative image of the words on the darker blue t-shirt. My teal frosted Shiva stick was rather dried out, and I had a hard time using it, I kept trimming away the dried areas, but it did not want to work. It was a lot of waste for an expensive art supply. The silver metallic worked a bit better, so I went over all the teal with the silver. At the lower part of the "T" I used two masks of hands, to paint around, after I adjusted one of them so the finger and thumb touch, to make an "OK" sign. I am going to embroider a gold wedding band with rhinestones fused on it held between the fingers. I used only the silver Shiva on the hands.
Sunday, February 3, 2013
Play Day with Paints
My friend Peggy and I had another play day at my house last week, I needed a break from taking care of my husband after surgery. I did not realize how stressed out I was, until we were back from the hospital. So just to have some fun, and not be too serious for a while, we played with acrylic paints and stencils and foam stamps. I also invited my neighbor Betsy over to play, she is very crafty and had the day off of work. We started by painting in a light multi color background, and then using the foam stamps to print large images onto the wet fabric, in a darker contrasting color(s).
Betsy made hers with a light green background and large blue dragonfly images, she added orange leaves to fill it in. We were too busy playing for me to take photographs :( Peggy did a lot of just painting a set of sky/sunset fabrics and other pieces. Next I made a ghost print from the left over paint on my plastic wrap, and started adding small areas of sequin waste stenciling in different medium colors, I also printed in rug grid, I filled the whole background and it was colorful, but a little too busy. So I used a large rose stencil and mauve paints, I added purple to the outside edge of the petals. Next I made one with pink and red edges, and orange and rust edges, the acrylic paints were opaque enough to go over the printed dots from the sequin waste. Next I added green leaves around the trio of roses, with my hand carved linoleum block. The leaves came out very well, the veins I had carved in came out very crisp in the printing.
I really liked the roses just the way they are, so I machine free motion quilted them in rayon threads, to match the roses. The background got quilted in a small stipple around the dots with an off white cotton thread that blends into the background, and adds texture without adding color. It is a small 11" x 16" wall hanging, but it is just sweet, I call it "Fiesta Roses." Another piece of fabric I painted was a stencil of maple leaf veins with blue/purple paints put on with a small foam rubber roller. I added a lot of texture with a rubber gripper pad and silver metallic paints.
It was a lot of fun to spend a few hours just playing around with friends, I highly recommend finding the time to do it.
Betsy made hers with a light green background and large blue dragonfly images, she added orange leaves to fill it in. We were too busy playing for me to take photographs :( Peggy did a lot of just painting a set of sky/sunset fabrics and other pieces. Next I made a ghost print from the left over paint on my plastic wrap, and started adding small areas of sequin waste stenciling in different medium colors, I also printed in rug grid, I filled the whole background and it was colorful, but a little too busy. So I used a large rose stencil and mauve paints, I added purple to the outside edge of the petals. Next I made one with pink and red edges, and orange and rust edges, the acrylic paints were opaque enough to go over the printed dots from the sequin waste. Next I added green leaves around the trio of roses, with my hand carved linoleum block. The leaves came out very well, the veins I had carved in came out very crisp in the printing.
I really liked the roses just the way they are, so I machine free motion quilted them in rayon threads, to match the roses. The background got quilted in a small stipple around the dots with an off white cotton thread that blends into the background, and adds texture without adding color. It is a small 11" x 16" wall hanging, but it is just sweet, I call it "Fiesta Roses." Another piece of fabric I painted was a stencil of maple leaf veins with blue/purple paints put on with a small foam rubber roller. I added a lot of texture with a rubber gripper pad and silver metallic paints.
It was a lot of fun to spend a few hours just playing around with friends, I highly recommend finding the time to do it.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
"Handmade"
I finally finished my challenge piece for the Fyber Cafe group. It is titled "Handmade" and is created with a basketry theme for the "Weaving" challenge. I used my original photographs for the background of the small quilt, and embellished it with acrylic paint printed grids, then I sewed on pieces of rug grid with cross stitches and beads. Then I used cross stitches to attach four sections of basketry I cut up. The words "Handmade" and "non-machineable" were rubber stamped on to the background, as I have never seen a machine made basket, I think a basket is something that has to be handmade.
Before I cut up the baskets I used superglue on them, so they would not fall apart when I cut them, I also coated them with matt medium to preserve them a little bit better. It is my first real abstract piece and I am very happy with the way it turned out. Each step/layer that I added just came to me as I was working on it, I just had to keep going and it all came together.
Before I cut up the baskets I used superglue on them, so they would not fall apart when I cut them, I also coated them with matt medium to preserve them a little bit better. It is my first real abstract piece and I am very happy with the way it turned out. Each step/layer that I added just came to me as I was working on it, I just had to keep going and it all came together.
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