PTA - November 2013

I always look forward to our monthly PTA meetings - such a fun and talented group. This month we met at the home of Janice M. It was very cold outside and Janice had some hot mulled wine waiting for us. After lunch it was on to Show and Tell - always a highlight. Usually my pics are okay but because of the angle I was shooting, many were blurred. So here are some that turned out.

 You can see the sleeve of a new piece Connie made - crocheted and beautiful. This is her quilt using a center panel that was quite old - really a nice piece.

 This is Kate's latest piece. Kate does a lot of marbling and loves working with the stones pattern. Her tiny circle quilting in between the stones is remarkable - wish I had gotten a close up. She also has a unique way of mounting each piece.

 These wonderful hand knitted socks belong to a pair of feet - either Barbaras or Gens - the 2 sock knitters in the group, they were fantastic. As I've mentioned before, not being a knitter, I would have to frame these and hang them on a wall.

 And I loved this piece by Janice - who is a great, great piecer!

 I know Mary showed this piece on her blog a little while back. What I didn't know was this was her design - a great way to use black and white prints. The binding is made up of all the colors in the splashes of color in the quilt - very cool.

 And still another one from Mary - busy lady..... She is the champion of hand stitching;  this is still in the working stage but looking great.

 We were all fascinated with the purse that Georgia made and brought. She started by making a square quilt - quilted and bound to finish 17". She then manipulated it to make a purse. This is the front - or back.

And this is the other side; it has 3 pocket areas. It was just darling and a great way to use scraps.
As always, great friendships, great ideas and great fun - a good day.

Puttin' Away the Rust

I like to create rusted fabric in warm weather when it's nice to be outdoors and the sun speeds up the process.

My rusting for this year has come to an end and I'm happy to move on to something else.

I did one last batch of scarves to put away for future sales - some with good results, others not so good.

I used a lot of my indigo pieces as I thought the white areas were a bit strong and hopefully the rust would tone them down.

This was done on a crepe du Chine which always gives good results.

The chiffon scarf is probably my favorite and enough rust to make it interesting.

Some scarves were just overdone with rust.

Like this one - way too much rust. I think part of the problem was I layered the scarves so they had rust touching them from the layer beneath and then more rust on top. Also, I scrunch them up and some parts don't touch the rust, I think it's going to be the right amount, but sometimes, it's just too much.

I think some of these will be good candidates for pieces in a quilt, we'll see, all is not lost.

Leaf Peepin' - Don't Think So

Last week, hubby and I went for a ride to see some beautiful fall color. The leaf color has been late in coming this year so we thought we might still be in for a treat.

Forgetting about the high elevation on the Blue Ridge Parkway, the beautiful leaves had come and gone, but what we saw was breathtaking in another way.

And it's the cold stuff, but what unusual and beautiful formations.

I love the long icicles on this rock. When I was a kid, we used to eat icicles thinking that was so cool to do.

The ground icicles were the most fascinating.

I think they formed around weeds which you couldn't see, but how cool is this. This is the photo I'm going to play with in Photoshop Elements and layer with another picture. I think it might be really interesting.

All that remained of beautiful fall leaves were under the icicles.

We drove a little further and came upon this scene. All the trees had ice on the branches so the tree shape was kept intact - It was a beautiful sight.

This was taken at Craggy Gardens which is very high up.

I particularly loved this bush; it looked like it had been spray painted white.

As we drove on further down, the weather was brighter, warmer and still some color. This little touch of winter was so unexpected and really pretty to see. I'm one of those rare birds who likes winter, I love the coziness of it, so this was a thrill for me.
Til next time...

Bamboo

At a recent Fiber Junkies meeting, we were working with fiber pastes made by Golden. One of the things we did was to use a stencil. 

I had a hand dyed fabric and thought it might work with this stencil of a Bamboo.

I did like the results but thought it needed more in the way of color. It was hard to see where the "Bamboo" began and ended.

I thought I would use some of the small leaf shapes as a pattern for orange and green fabric.

I used clear plastic with a leaf drawn in black marker to lay over the piece to see placement for additional leaves.

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I also wanted to bring some of the Bamboo stalks down to the bottom  - problem was I didn't have access to the stencil anymore.

I took Jane Dunnewolds workshop on Complex Cloth many years back. I remember we made stencils out of manilla folders. We shellaced them for endurance; I didn't with these, but would only be using them a short time.

I also wanted to do a little shading on the stalks to distinguish them from the background. So it's a work in progress - Please check back to see what comes next. I'm curious too.

Happy Halloween

I have always loved making Halloween costumes. I used to call it my "silly sewing" because I could make them quick and sloppy, no finished seams, no perfect fit, just some fun sewing. My daughter always wanted to be something that involved net - like a princess and my son always had a cape of some sort...so... easy stuff. This year I made my grand daughter's costume. She's 15 months old and my daughter wanted her to go as Tank - an adorable basset hound who lives across the street.  Audrey loves this dog and is always visiting over there. 

 Most patterns were so over the top and I just wanted something simple - Butterick had the one I was looking for - a dog with long ears and tail - no zippers, just velcro closings.

 We found the perfect fabric which was so soft, you wanted a "binky" out of it just for yourself but oh did it shred. I'm still finding pieces of fur fluffs on the floor and under things I think I will be for a long time.

But was it worth it? You bet, here's our cute little doggie.
Happy Halloween everyone.

Fiber Junkies - Paper Fabric

Tuesday, we met at the home of Val M for our monthly gathering of Fiber Junkies. Gen came up with the idea for this months meeting - a technique she had already tried and one we were anxious to experiment with - paper fabric -  collages built on top of a layer of fabric.

 We all contributed to the pile of supplies - magazine pictures, pretty napkins, maps, tissue paper, script and dress patterns to name a few. Kate had been saving tissue for years as a result of something her daughter needed years ago. It's amazing what collectors we become when we let ourselves get hooked on surface design. You'll never know when you can use it has become our motto and how often it has paid off.

 We worked on a base piece of fabric which could be anything as it was to be completely covered. The fabric sat on plastic for easy transport. Denny was smart and ironed her fabric to freezer paper.

 And Kate thought to bring some trays....Since our pieces wouldn't be dry when it was time to leave. This was really thinking ahead.

 We all did some previewing to get an idea of color and placement. Next, we removed all the papers and using a foam brush applied a very watered down solution of white glue and water on the fabric. Then back to laying the papers and applying more glue on top.

 It was better to start with the more opaque materials and do a second layer of tissue like materials. One of Mary's pieces was such a happy piece I loved the colors and especially the polka dot tissue.

 I think this was Gens. I liked all the text she incorporated in her piece.

 Denny used coffee filters which had some of the grinds left behind giving it a wonderful texture.

 We mixed up color washes using inks, dyes, paints - anything that could be watered down. This was applied with a foam brush while glue was still wet.

 I used a sepia ink and applied it to this piece....

 which looked like this after the wash. It will dry a little lighter but I liked the way the wash toned it  and blended it together.

 Kates pieces before the wash...

 and with a bluish wash of color on top.

 The last piece I did was after lunch and we were running out of time.  I put absolutely no thought into the placement of papers and decided to go for thin and use just tissue and one layer napkins.

 and then a sepia wash on top. I liked this one the best, so go figure. Sometimes putting no thought into something pays off.
This was the perfect technique for this time around. I was tired from doing the fair all weekend and this didn't take a lot of mental energy, just fun. I am linked to Nina Marie Sayre's Off the Wall Friday.
Til next time...