Artquiltmaker Blog

Fabric Paper

The CQFA workshop for May was doing the next part of the Fabric Papermaking process that I described last week. We painted our pieces. I tried not to obscure the work I had already done, but it was very clear to me that the first step should just be done as fast as possible so that you can make a lot. The paint can obscure beautiful compositions, so I tried to use light washes. Julie was sitting next to me and we discussed using watercolors, but we weren’t sure if they would adhere.

Above (and perhaps to the left on your screen) is a picture of my workstation. I wasn’t sharing a table with Rhonda, which made me sad, but I was sharing with Friend Julie, which made me very happy.

You can see my high tech palette (the paper plate) filled with aqua, pink and lime. I also found some Sparkle Glaze in my cabinet of wonder in the fabric closet. I brought that along and all of my pieces have a slight glittery look to them, which I like.

The piece next to the palette is one in which I used a blue fabric. I wanted to tone it down a bit and, I think, if you look at the edges, you can see that I succeeded.

The lime paint wasn’t so successful. It made my pieces look yellow, so I added some aqua to it to get rid of the yellow cast.

Julie was not able to join us for the Between Meeting Meeting at Sue’s to make paper, so she made some at home on her own. She has an excellent collection of stamps and brought a bunch. I just painted my pieces and didn’t use any textures on them. When I saw this piece I wished I had. She used a Duplo (the big Lego version they make for toddlers) to make the dots. I think it looks fabulous!

The reason I only painted my pieces is I wanted to do the simplest steps so I could see how they worked. I don’t know if I will do this again, but I like to have a good foundation. I think to use stamps successfully, I will need to make much simpler foundation paper/fabric.

I may ask Julie if I can print out her fabric paper on TAP or on fabric and use it that way.

The pink/green/netting piece (below) was out in the hallway drying, so I don’t know who made it, but it was another really good one.

This is a technique with so many opportunities for creativity, because of all the layers.

I look forward to making more of it. I think I will try to convince Angela and Rhonda to get together with me at A Work of Heart one day and work on a bunch of new pieces. I suggested to Sue that she should propose a class to Andrea. Once I figure out whether this fabric-paper works for the Remains of the Day type journals, that might be another draw. Sue has a full-time job, so there may not be time in her busy life for such an endeavor.

Show & Tell
There were some ‘Tells’, which was interesting and a lot of Shows. I showed the Food Quilt as it will be firmly ensconced on the Young Man’s bed by the next meeting. 😉 I hope I can drag it away to show at the next BAMQG meeting.

Angela showed her Travel journal, which is similar to my Red Journal, but a new class iteration by Andrea. I took very few photos of show & tell.

ATCs

Thanks again to Maureen who organized us to make more ATCs. I haven’t gotten back on my series of inspiration cards, but perhaps I will again?

Mine were more using TAP. I did 8 or 9 last time and finished up the last 4 for this meeting. I should have done something new, but didn’t make the time. I won’t be at the next meeting, which means I have 4 months to come up with some spectacular. Perhaps I’ll use some bits of silk to really make them sparkle?

I really love the different looks that come together when we put our ATCs down on the table. Look how vibrant and bright and crisp Mel’s ATCs look compared to the rest of ours? I think I need to play around with color a bit more on my next ATCs.

Under the Sea Challenge

I didn’t do this challenge even though I took the pieces. My excuse is that I couldn’t find them. Truly, I didn’t have time, though I do appreciate the organization that went into the challenge.

Mel’s piece (above) was inspired by the paintings of dogs playing poker. She has fish playing poker. Not only do I love the humor, but the workmanship looks wonderful, too.

I was so impressed with the quality of work that people showed. I am kind of glad I lost the pieces (they will turn up, I am sure), because I am not sure I could have come up with something to rival what others did. I know I shouldn’t compare my work to others, but it is hard when I am in the company of greatness. You know now why I drive to the back of beyond to hang out with these wonderful women.

Maureen made a zippered pouch. She used some of the vinyl for the front. Remember my clear tote? She said she wanted to see how her new machine handled the vinyl. I didn’t hear the details on that, but will have to ask her.

There was a lot of discussion of creating depth using fabric and I was interested in the different ways that people achieved that look.

Sonja (piece on the left) created depth by using different layers of tulle and adhering the fish and other critters to the different layers. You can see that some look more obscured than the others. I really like this look and it made me think of the undersea piece I did in Pamela Allen’s class and whether tulle would be appropriate.

Ann’s piece is on the right. I noticed that she is attracted to plants (the motifs seem to show up frequently in her work), so I wasn’t surprised to see a lot of plants in her piece. She had a piece in the Olive Hyde Gallery recently.

I was shocked SHOCKED! to learn that this was the first time Rhonda had used fusible. I have not yet begun to plumb the depths of Rhonda, that is for sure. She really did a nice job on her pillow. A number of the motifs looked painted to me, but I didn’t have a chance to explore further with her. I’ll have to ask her.

Another thing I think worked very well is that people did not feel the urge to use all the pieces they selected. There were a lot of minimalist pieces. I know I felt overwhelmed trying to think of how I could make a cohesive piece out of all of the different styles and colors. Why didn’t I think to select certain ones? I guess it is a good day when I learn something.

Virginia, always clever, was even more clever this time. The blocks were from a previous challenge that she has stashed away. She remembered them and pulled them out for this challenge. They really make a perfect ocean looking background.

I know Virginia is working on finishing up some of her UFOs. this seems to be to be the perfect confluence of such an endeavor.

 

 

 

FabMo

As I may have mentioned, we meet in FabMo’s classroom space. Bron, is on the FabMo Board and will sometimes open up the fabric space for us to gather supplies.

She said they had received some donations of buttons, so I went to look and picked out a few (left). I have an idea to make a fabric card holder (as opposed to felt like the ones I made in 2010) and I need a few more buttons to replenish my stock. I thought these would work for what I want to do and they are larger than the ones that TFQ bought for me as a gift, so I am not duplicating efforts. We’ll see if I actually do it.

The red buttons just appealed to me. I am sure I can find something to do with them.

I also plan to use them to continue embellishing the Christmas stockings. I started on it last year as a sort of in between project with no real deadline. I think there is a lot I can do to make those stockings look prettier. If I were to do them over, I would definitely use wool felt.