Dyeing Day

Posted on by under Dyeing, level 2 stitch class

 I spent most of the day yesterday dyeing 24 scarves to sell at the store. I used Procion MX dyes and actually they were a bit old. The colors were not quite as expected but still nice. I like to use fiber reactive dyes because you don’t have to steam them but I don’t like how much you have to rinse them. The acid dyes are really nice because the dye exhausts and you don’t have to rinse out all that extra dye.  And then of course there is the ironing part…

The other thing I did yesterday was to free motion machine stitch this tree on tulle. I then cut it out and stitched it down to a piece of linen. This is part of my homework for stitch class. We have also been working on “botanicals”, sketching flowers and leaves and then stitching them on the machine. I’ll show you  more soon. Hope you have a wonderful weekend and thanks for stopping by.

Ann’s Abstract Challenge

Posted on by under free motion machine stitching

I finished a piece for Ann’s abstract challenge. There’s a longer post over at the Fiber and Felting Studio. I don’t think I’m very good with abstraction. I do much better with representational pieces. This piece is stitched on a thin cotton fused to a heavier Kona cotton with black thread. I then colored the piece with permanent markers and colored pencils. I like how it came out but it’s not very abstract. Do you do abstract work? Do you base your work on something and then “abstract” that idea? I’d love to hear how you work abstractly.

Book Making Session

Posted on by under book making
Our local fiber group met on Friday and Jan taught us several methods of making books and binding. We had a great time and ended up with some really nice books.

 This is an accordion style book that Jan made. Isn’t it cute?

 Here we all are in Carole’s garage coloring our paper with stamp pads.

 We each made an accordion book. I made several in different sizes. You have to be very careful with your folding and cutting for these books to come out even.

 Here’s a smaller version.

 We then worked on a stab binding. Bunny had some really cool wall paper books and the cork cover is made from wall paper.

 Here’s Louise’s book.

 And this is Bunny’s.

Here is Carole stitching her book. I didn’t manage to get a photo of Sally’s creation.

 Next up was a book with signatures and a hard cover. We used various fabrics for the cover.

 Here Bunny is folding paper for her signatures.

 Here is my hard covered book. I used screen printed fabric we had made with paper scraps and thickened dyes.

 Here’s the inside of the book. It is glued together with the end papers holding everything in place.

 Here’s a view from the top of the book.

 I used several different painted pages for the first page of my signature.

And here’s the cork book standing on end. I have lots of ideas for making other books but I’ve got to get going on my stitch class homework. I’ll show you what I’m working on soon.

Back from NYC

Posted on by under journals
I’m back from NYC. It was a great trip and I had a wonderful time. I wrote a post about my travel journal over at the Felting and Fiber Studio. Go check it out.

I have been trying to catch up at work and you should see the weeds that have grown in my absence at home! I am meeting with my local group this Friday so I’ll post soon about our book making session.

NYC Travel Journals

Posted on by under book making, journals

 I had great fun today making these little travel journals. We are going to New York City next week and meeting up with my sister and her husband. We’ll be staying at my parent’s time share in downtown Manhattan. I thought it would be cool if we each had a little travel journal for our trip.

 So I made them out of the hand made paper I made last month and added painted paper inside. The pages are 8 1/2 x 11 paper cut in half and then folded. I then found a few photos online of things in NYC.

 My sister got us tickets to be on the TV show The Chew. We’ll be in the audience and might get on TV. I’ve never even watched the show but…

 My husband got us tickets to go to the Mets game. One of his friends knows a player. So a baseball game is in my future. Hopefully, I’ll survive 🙂

 We’re staying at the Manhattan Club which is right across from Carnegie Hall.

I made a little pocket for the back cover to keep tickets etc. that I will be adding to the book. I’ll show you the finished results when I get back. I’ll also post a mini tutorial on how I made the books on the Felting and Fiber Studio blog next week. See you soon!