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ICAD Week One

Seven days, seven little index cards, so far so good in my index-card-a-day challenge attempt!  I’ve already slipped a bit behind for this week, but I know what I want to do for the two not-yet-started cards, I will catch up.

ICAD Week One

 

On Day Seven, the prompt was “stencil,” so I played with my stencils from TSC Designs and Mayco Ceramics.

The yellow stencil is from one of the big box craft supply stores, and while the design is lovely, it has a sticky back that has been causing problems,  It sticks to everything, and the bond is stronger than a lot of the tapes I use.  It is starting to pull itself apart.  The sticky back is a great concept, makes sense to have a stencil that doesn’t slip while you are using it, but I’m concerned about the self-destruction of the stencil , and the potential damage to the artwork that I use it on.

The colors are the Tsukineko inks from TSC, applied with Fantastix fillable markers.  I like the look achieved by overlapping layers of color and shapes or lines.  I will be exploring this technique in fabric, and I already want to try quilting the resulting fabric with a different design, not trying to follow the stencil patterns.

Over the past weekend, I took an inspiring class on making felted wool flowers.  Check back on Thursday for the more on that.

 

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Little by Little

My self-imposed 8 X 10″ challenge continues to elude me.  Earlier in the week, I was playing with my Tsukineko inks , and successfully attempted the shaving cream marbling:

The piece on the bottom is the result of mashing the excess shaving cream and ink, scraped off of the marbled pieces, into another piece of muslin.

Today, while dinner roasted in the oven, I pulled a few pieces of fabric that matched the ones I used for the marbling, and quickly pieced an 8 X 10″ top.  Here is where I get bogged down on finishing things – embellishing.  Not that embellishing causes any sort of fear or anxiety that stops me from working, oh no… it is just that embellishing takes so much time.  Take a look at the fun threads I have pulled:

The threads are from Rainbow GalleryHouse of EmbroideryWonderFil Eleganza and a few others.  I haven’t pulled out any yarns or trims yet, will this little quilt get finished by the end of next week?

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Shopping Spree

I just returned from my annual trip to the Original Sewing & Quilt Expo, and as you can see, I had a lot of fun!

The best find of the day was four back issues of Uppercase Magazine for $2.00 each from a local guild’s used book sale booth.  I really must subscribe to the magazine one of these days, though it is quite expensive for a quarterly magazine – however, if you make something, or want to be more creative, it is well worth the price.  Uppercase is an eclectic blend of artist profiles, inspiring ideas collections of interesting vintage items and histories of craft, design and manufacturing processes.  Highly recommended!

Other stuff that I couldn’t resist: a complete collection of House of Embroidery perle cotton threads, a Dia de los Muertos decorated spray bottle, a set of Tsukineko inks and supplies, a funky sewing machine clock, a thread stand from Superior Threads, several small packs of funky yarns that I have never seen before and a few more yards of fabric that will go perfectly with some collage series of mine.

Check back to see what I have done with some of my new “toys.”  I am taking the inks to my art journaling group tonight, and I will have more to say about the House of Embroidery threads later in the week.