Creatively Amused

Altered Tees

2008-07-04T11:02:00.004-04:00

I've been playing around with old Tee shirts, they are such fun to alter! The first one was a long sleeve slightly fitted tee that I cut the sleeves from, ending with a rolled and tied treatment. I have several more to go, and lots more ideas!
Is anyone interested in a Workshop on Tee Altering?? It would be for three different Tee treatments at a cost of $25. Let me know if you're in.
ALSO - re: the Renaissance Girl Challenge - we have a fantastic group of players! I'm very excited. The only guideline is a finish date for the end of August. Other that that you can go any size, or subject -the object being to work the piece with all of your different skills!

Felted Flowers

2008-06-13T14:40:00.004-04:00

I'm still enchanted with my needle felting machine and I have a new trick! You can open up silk carrier rods into flowers. You just peel apart the two layers and rub them between your fingers a bit to make them supple, then fold them into the fan shape. I used the inner and outer layers on some of these, you can tell the difference because the inner layer has more white on it. You have to sew the rod down before you felt the top layer, I used silk caps, (hankies), on most of them, I love the edge pieces.
What's also great about this machine is if you don't like what you've done, it's usually easy to cover it up, just like collage. Oh, also - this was a piece of white felt when I started, it's very easy to cover larger spaces. Does anyone have an inexpensive source for silk rods?

Renaissance Girl Challenge

2008-06-05T12:18:00.005-04:00

So I was just talking to Amy Munson
a multi-talented woman, who like me wants to try everything, and I was thinking it would be very cool to post a challenge for like minded souls to incorporate all their passions into one piece of art.
For example my piece might be a mixed media crazy quilt with silk ribbon embroidery, needle tatting, knitted accents, needle felting, vintage beading, and soldered charms.
If you're up for the challenge just post a response to let me know you're in, and if at least two or three of you Renaissance Souls are ready to play, I'll let Pokey Bolton of "Cloth Paper Scissors" in on it, I know she'd be happy to check out what we come up with!

Felted Piece

2008-06-03T13:32:00.003-04:00

Oh I love this machine! I can't wait to try new types of roving, silk, soysilk, wool curls, oh my!

Joined Strips of Fabric

2008-05-23T10:14:00.004-04:00

This is another other cool thing an Embellisher can do - I cut strips of fabric, overlapped the raw edges slightly, then ran the machine over them to join the fabric, it creates a lovely lacey join. I added ribbons of organza, (the poly type goes on with lots of thread pulling so it appears very gauzy), and nylon ribbon which joins to the fabric with a puckered effect, really fun. I'm going to use this piece as a background for silk ribbon embroidery and beading.

Huskystar ER10

2008-05-19T12:21:00.007-04:00

I've been playing with my new embellisher - trying out different fibers to see what will felt and what won't, it's fabulous! This is just some doodling i did yesterday.
So what works - you can join almost anything to wool - joining fabric edges to each other needs natural fibers - if it's synthetic organza you can stick some batting under the edge and make it stick, but silk and cotton join nicely, something with wool in it, or very fibrous makes the seam look gorgeously lacey, I couldn't find any silk organza at Joann's so I'm looking forward to seeing that, those colorful silk hankies that you can pull apart look fabulous, I'm planning a purse of wool felt with hankies and roving circles of bright colors, then beaded. This thing is going to keep me busy for a while. My friend Frances says she has to limit her time on her embellisher or she'll go without food and sleep. lol

Color Charts

2008-05-17T14:20:00.005-04:00

I played with different brushes on each chart also. The red chart in the post below was done with a sable brush which holds more water, (I've read sable is supposed to the best). It made big wash puddles even though I dabbed some of the paint off on a paper towel. The yellow chart was done using a synthetic watercolor brush, and the blue chart was done with a cheap nylon brush.

color chart

2008-05-17T10:26:00.004-04:00

I've been painting color mixture charts - they are so pretty.
Reds, greens, blues, and purples, just gorgeous!

Painting Lesson

2008-04-29T11:35:00.003-04:00

Jude gave me a painting lesson, (my first -I really needed one - check out her blog for my before pic). Anyway, she showed me how to mix paint for gradations, how to paint an eye, and how to shade. I love the results. My before painting really was abysmal. So these are the two Fiesta Ornaments I made from her designs.

Mitsuwa

2008-04-28T19:57:00.004-04:00

We went to Mitsuwa, (a Japanese Shopping Mall), the other day. What an amazingly colorful place. Here is Judy looking at the beautiful craft magazines.

These are the little goodies I picked up. In the center are candies shaped like mushrooms for my grandson, a gorgeous book of Japanese designs for embroidery, a booklet of little blank cards, (how much fun is that!), and some tiny little bottles that I plan to use to hold mixed paint colors. The caption on the bottles reads - "Pal Time; We had a good time today. If it will be fine tomorrow, let's play together. I wish everyday is holiday."
Sounds good to me!!

Painted Fuseables

2008-04-27T12:36:00.003-04:00

I used some painted Misty Fuse and Steam a Seam on these - what a great addition to a mixed media stash!
You can make up a bunch in advance and have it on hand for when you need it.

I love Chenille!

2008-04-26T16:21:00.003-04:00

It makes great ATC material. The background on the right is a newAmy Butler print, the designs are gorgeous as usual.

mixing it up

2008-04-25T12:15:00.005-04:00

It's great fun to mix it up, using my supplies complimented by bits of stuff from Judy's stash. That swapping factor is one of the cool things about art groups! I'll be seriously looking for one, either to join or to start when i get home so drop me a note if you're interested.

The fabulous seaweed, (or sweetpea), paper on the right hand card came from Paula's Kit Club. She finds the most gorgeous papers and ephemera.

Mixed Media ATCs

2008-04-24T10:11:00.005-04:00

One of the great things about getting together with Judy is that we can raid each other's stashes. Her first altered book was from my stash, and I raided her scrap bin for bits to use on these ATCs.
Both pieces have bits of her altered and stitched Peltex, and the one on the right has a bit of painted Misty Fuse. Way cool ideas I'll be incorporating into my art from here on out. The Peltex adds dimension as well as interest, the piece on the left card is left over from one of her houses.

Embellished Purse

2008-04-23T16:51:00.005-04:00

I picked up this nifty purse along with a bag of roving and some felting needles from the Art girlz at the Chicago show. After raiding Judy's wool stash and cutting out circles I started felting the centers and arranging the circles in groups, Jude suggested notching the top ones, which looked great of course. After adding leaves, embroidery and beads it looked way cute, so I just twirled up some yarn and felted it to the handles. Art girl Allison inspired me to try this out with her little free hand felted purses - I was a fiber artist before mixed media and I'm finding myself really jazzed about adding more fiber into my work.

Quilt Festival Treasure

2008-04-21T13:12:00.003-04:00

Here's a photo of my festival treasure. often the goods at these things are over priced but you can find goodies, The two cards of antique lace were marked down to two and three dollars, and the buttons were in a big package with some other not so great ones for five dollars. I paid a dollar for the beaded bodice and a dollar for the antique silk rose, and got a big bag of chenille scraps, I adore chenille! Also I discovered needle felting, I know you all have been doing it for ages but wow, it's very relaxing! So Judy and I have been busy. I needle felted a purse, and made a bunch of mixed media ATCs. I'll start posting them tomorrow but I had to show off my cool stuff first.

More Fun Artist Photos

2008-04-17T12:09:00.005-04:00

Deb, Laura and Judy in front of Laura's Quilt

Laura Wasilowski in her Art Fabrik Booth

And here is the Quilting Arts staff in their "Surviving the Runway" gear

Bernie Berlin, I love this woman, what a wonderful spirit!

Lynn Krawczyk, gorgeous work.

Frieda Anderson doing
her Open Studio.

The always smiling Bernie
demonstrating
LuminArte Primary Elements, they are brilliantly colored powders that you mix with different mediums, next on my wish list!

Tracy Stillwell of Artgirlz
Surviving the Runway

And Kelli working on her surviving
the runway creation

Beryl Taylor at Open Studios

2008-04-15T12:39:00.009-04:00

I adore Beryl Taylor's work so it was a treat to see it up close. It's absolutely gorgeous, as is she. She was demonstrating needle felting on an embellishing machine. I want one!

Open Studio post two

2008-04-14T20:54:00.006-04:00

The lovely and talented Kelli Perkins took this photo of me doing my thing for Open Studio.
Kelli is doing "The Hustle"in the photo of her, stop by her blog and ask her about it, (see I told you it was fun)~ lol

Open Studios

2008-04-14T12:24:00.003-04:00

The Quilt Festival was amazing, as usual. I have many, many photos of the action. But just to get things rolling, the first gals we ran into were the always fun and fabulous sister duo of the Artgirlz. So here is a group sister photo, Tracy, Me, Judy, and Allison.

ipod sweaters

2008-03-29T15:45:00.003-04:00

I've been busy knitting sweaters for my ipod touch - they're such fun to make I just can't stop so if you'd like to have one for your very own ipod make me an offer!
oxoo

Sedlec Ossuary

2008-03-26T19:42:00.004-04:00

I'm involved in a fabulous mixed media group project whose focus is body parts - I found the photos of this Ossuary very inspiring.

Make It University!™: Open Studios

2008-03-13T17:10:00.007-04:00

I'll be participating in Make It University™ with Cloth Paper Scissors®
Open Studios again this year at the International Quilt Festival -Chicago!
Click on the link to see who else is coming...

I'm going to be working on a re-bound altered book.
I had such fun last year. I'm so looking forward to seeing Frieda Anderson, Laura Wasilowski, Julaine Lofquist, Debbi Crane, Kelli Perkins and the lovely and talented Ms Pokey Bolton herself, (as well as the folks I haven't met yet)!

Also....
I found a really great flexible cover journal, (not spiral bound), with unlined pages at Borders. The cover is some type of textured vinyl so customizing wasn't difficult. It lays open well so is easy to write in, and the blank pages are thick enough for collage and paint - best of all it was only fifteen bucks.

And Then I Read the Directions

2008-02-23T19:53:00.004-05:00

Yes, I finally read the directions. Apparently you use the paper quilt stuff to cut into, how much fun is that!

New Paper Quilt

2008-02-17T17:00:00.005-05:00

I was wondering why Judy's Paper Quilt's were so different than mine when we both took the basic idea from the Quilting Arts Magazine Challenge. Turns out when I did my my usual quick skim of the directions I got them totally wrong and Judy didn't read them at all... I
guess neither one of us have ever been directions girls - but I like what we came up with, (she said modestly).