Another UFO Completed

 A very long time ago, I took a Sandra Meech workshop in which, among other things, we worked with paper and fabric to create wonderful stitched collages.  I finished this piece, to the point you see here, about a week after the workshop.  It involved tearing and gluing the various painted papers to create the initial collage.  I then used various crayons to add some additional line and detail. The paper collage was then layered with batting and backing and stitched.

I have looked at this piece off and on for a few years, wondering how I wanted to finish it.  Enter our GOE challenge to complete a UFO (see a related post by clicking here) and out came this piece again.

I finally got the idea to paint a background on canvas and mount the quilted piece to that.  A plain canvas wasn't enough, so stepping way out of my comfort zone, I decided to get out the paint, mix colours and create a background that would allow the piece to seamlessly blend into the background.  Although this sort of painting is not something I feel very confident about, I'm pleased with the results.




When the paint had dried and I put the quilted collage on top of it, I decided that I wanted to echo the hand written text out onto the painted canvas.  Using a micron pen, I wrote random things about the origin of graffiti (the topic of the text on the original painted papers).





And, here's the end result:

Collaged Greeting Cards

This is just a short post today to share some new greeting cards I made using acrylic paint, some bits of old leftover pages of text from a previously altered book, tissue paper and a black sharpie marker.  I start by using a 9" x 12" sheet of watercolour paper which results in 6 cards since the window on my trifold card blanks are 3" square.

Art is the Answer

 I'm still working on my final journal for my Letter Love 101 class.  Joanne wanted us to do a page with this particular quote, and I decided that since it summed up the class so well I'd put it on the back cover.

Because I love using recycled book pages to achieve that extra layer of text and texture, I wrote the quote on a piece of such paper which I had first painted using watercolours.

I'm especially excited about the flower petals on this piece. Months ago I had used round stickers (cut from a sheet of address labels, using a circle punch ) as masks on fabric when I was doing some surface design.  I loved the random colour that ended up on the paper circles so I stuck them to a piece of freezer paper to keep them for "some future project".  We'll, that day had come! I added a bit of sketching with a Pitt pen to draw in the leaves and stems.

This wonderful quote came from Pippa, one of my Letter Love classmates (and a new follower of my blog).  Thanks Pippa.  I love it.

Take a look at the second line of text on this page.    I had made a mistake so I covered it with another piece of that painted, recycled book and rewrote the words.  When an eraser won't work, figure something else out. There's always a way to 'fix' a problem!  And, because I can't let anything go, the grid lines on this page are the tiny bits of torn off paper left because I had wanted torn edges on the page in yesterday's post.

Thanks for your visit today.

Things Are Blooming in the Studio

Yesterday I was back in the studio playing with some of the hand dyed fabric (read 'wipe up rags') I made the day before.  Hanging to dry, they look pretty messy, but there are so many wonderful treasures within that mess!  

I had prepared these backgrounds a while ago, and was planning to create some floral quilts similar to the one I did last year, but when I saw these pieces of fabric I was inspired to use it to make some flowers and leaves. I started with simple, rough circles (randomly cut by hand to avoid that perfectly round look).  

I drew one line as a guide for the stem and then went to the machine to start thread sketching.  I love how the black thread sketching just makes it pop.  I still have to quilt the background and then finish the edges.  This is the first in a small series of four.   

This morning, I finished another page in my 'Letter Loving' journal.  I really like the torn paper edges on this page.  

Zen Day at Sandra's

I enjoyed a much needed 'Zen Day' at Sandra's Open Studio on Thursday.  We made these wonderful little journals and I had a chance to just relax and regroup after a tough few days.

front

One of the inside spreads.

Sketchbook Challenge- June Theme: Pathways

This month's theme took me back to the road trips of my childhood.  We used to all pile in the Ford Galaxy station wagon and go on camping trips around Ontario.  Some of my best family memories are from those trips!  I was also brought back to the wonderful VW bug that my oldest brother used to have when he was in university.

This page started out as a paper collage that I then photographed and digitally altered before printing it on fabric and stitching it together.