You Are Not Alone

SPOILER ALERT FOR GEN !!!

DO NOT LOOK!

My friend, Gen, had surgery recently. When my husband suggested to me that I make her a card, I decided to make her a post card instead. It turned out really cute!

I used a piece of rust fabric that my husband and I made for the tree and the back of it. Oh, and its the fabric that the words are printed on. I made the words the same way that I made the letters for the "Necessities" piece, with thin leather from a baseball coaster. The only difference is that I printed these words out on the computer instead of hand lettering them. I felt uneasy about trying to letter that small so I played it safe!

The birds have seed beads for eyes so they sparkle quite nicely.

I used Wonder Under on the fabric pieces. Then used a tiny zig zag stitch with mono filament thread around the pieces. I used the smallest needle that I had, a 60/8 one to try and diminish the needle holes in the fabric.

Then I used black thread to "sketch" around each piece, making it look like a drawing. I added some free hand embroidery along the bottom.

The words were not added until the very end.

I'll mail it in an envelope as I'm sure that the piece will not scan through the Post Office machine...

Hopefully it will brighten her day when she gets it!

Stage Two Rose Applique

I've been working on a small quilt for Fiber On A Whim donation/It's A Journey, to benefit breast cancer research. I posted a picture of the original sketch on my blog. Here is a picture of the actual piece in fabric.

I used hand dyed batiks on all the fabric. I utilized Wonder Under as my fusible webbing medium. I prefer this type as it is fairly flexible and doesn't show needle holes quite as readily as other brand names. Some of the cheaper ones really harden as they get older. I've had that trouble with Heat & Bond. I stitched the leaves & stem down with the smoke colored invisible thread and the rose petals with the light or clear invisible thread. I used a tiny Microtex Sharp Needle (60/8) to try and diminish the needle punctures as much as possible.
I then started out with Neocolor II crayons as my shading medium but wasn't pleased with how that turned out. I then turned to the Golden Acrylic Paint that I purchased at Random Arts (http://www.randomartsnow.com/). The Alizarin Crimson Hue mixed with Matte Gel worked great on the shading. I love how the Golden paints do not lose their pigment when you mix them with other mediums.I didn't have a green paint (in the Golden colors) so I just went with the Neocolor II crayons on the leaves. I did highlight them with Lumier Metallic Olive + Matte Gel. You can see the shimmer on the picture. It is also on the rose itself. I used the Pearl White mixed with above Golden Paint and gel.
Now all I have to do is decide on which letters to use...I have a bunch of leather coasters (made from actual baseballs) that I covered with gesso then painted with acrylics. I hand lettered each tiny little square with really beautiful font that is a mix of a couple that I have seen here, there and yonder. I also made a set out of tiny quilt sandwiches...fabric ones that I hand drew then filled in on the sewing machine. I don't have an embroidery module, so I had to do free motion embroidery. You can see a little bit of it in the above pictures. The one in the pictures hasn't been finished around the edges though.

Any creative feedback is welcome.

Rose Applique Design

Yesterday I drew out this idea for a Victorian Applique style quilt. This is a picture from my sketch book.

I originally thought of it for a piece of 5"x7" fiber art...we'll see what comes of it (if anything). But the drawing is done so that I can copy it, then cut out the individual pieces for applique work. It could also be altered for stained glass.

If you have never tried the Marie Seroskie method of applique, you should. It makes the stained glass method of applique sooooo easy! Check out her web site for samples http://www.katielane.com/. She has a really cute Big Mouth Fish Bag pattern too!