Holiday Open House at Artistic Artifacts

What a great turn out yesterday for the holiday open house and pop-up market at Artistic Artifacts!  It was a very busy day as we, along with a few other teachers did demos and make & take downstairs, while other creative minds displayed their wares in the pop-up market upstairs.

Here's a shot of the market space, courtesy Artistic Artifacts, before the crowd.

StitchesnQuilts booth, knitting and quilts by Christine Vinh.

 One of our participants adding some embellishment to her screen printed tree.

Sue helping Beth choose screens to use on her bookmark.

 Julie Booth with her book and other display items.

Julie brought along some of her carved vegetables for printing.

The make & take project, an angel tag, was a big hit.

It was a fun day with other like-minded creatives and visitors from far & near.  We met a couple visiting from Wisconsin and introduced them to the thermofax printing process.  Even saw some friends we hadn't seen in years - so all in all, a great day!

Searching for Roy G Biv - Brown!

In search of Roy G Biv, it is time this month for BROWN pictures. We are linking to Julie Booth's blog and her friend Jennifer Coyne Qudeen in finding the colors of the rainbow.  Since the colors of the rainbow were finished in July, they are extending through the rest of the year with other colors.  Check out their blogs for more examples of brown.  Most of these pictures were taken in New Hampshire.  Enjoy!

An assortment of rolling pins in various shades of brown.

This pretty brown house caught our eye while driving near Wolfeboro.

Who doesn't love an old brown tub full of violets?

A typical New England barn, with some comical additions.

A rusty brown tricycle has seen better days.

This log cabin houses a quilt shop.

Homemade shoo-fly pie!  Yum, yum!

Searching for Roy G Biv - Violet!

In search of Roy G Biv, it is time this month for VIOLET pictures. We are linking to Julie Booth's blog and her friend Jennifer Coyne Qudeen in finding the colors of the rainbow.  Check out their blogs for more examples of violet.  A couple of these are from last summer's quilt camp (2014) in New Hampshire, which is where we are now. Not sure where the flower photo is from, but the sunset is one from this summer.  Enjoy!

 

The piece of fabric above was dyed using a pole-wrapped shibori technique.

Purple (violet) cauliflower - a farmer's market purchase this spring.

A violet hand-dye that was printed with our birds-on-a-branch screen.

Isn't this a gorgeous sunset?  View of Lake Winnipesaukee, NH, taken sometime in the last few weeks.

Go Indigo!

In search of Roy G Biv, it is time this month for INDIGO pictures. We are linking to Julie Booth's blog and her friend Jennifer Coyne Qudeen in finding the colors of the rainbow.  Check out their blogs for more examples of indigo .  Last summer we spent some time with an indigo pot and tried out various methods of Shibori, so these pictures were not hard to find.  Hope you enjoy our indigo pictures!

Although it looks more purple here, I think that is just the lighting.  This is one of Elizabeth's beautifully crafted pieces.

This is a rayon infinity scarf that Sue made by twisting and tying with thread.

This is another scarf Sue made using flat wooden discs and buttons tied with rubber bands.

Here are some of our pieces drying on the line.

Beautiful indigo wool from the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

Elizabeth's Blog Prize

Recently Elizabeth was lucky to win a drawing by playing along with a surface design challenge on the blog of Julie Booth.  The prize was three books from Quarry Publishing.  One was Julie’s fantastic book Fabric Printing at Home: Quick and Easy Fabric Design Using Fresh Produce and Found Objects.  Julie shows you how to use found objects from around the home, particularly the kitchen, as well as fresh produce to print on fabric.

Another is Playing with Surface Design by Courtney Cerruti.  This looks like it is right up our alley here at PGFiber2Art!

The third is Tangle Stitches by Jane Monk.  Hand stitching is enjoying a resurgence lately, so this looks interesting too.

We will have hours of fun playing with the ideas in these books this summer!

Feeling Blue

Feeling blue?  In search of Roy G Biv, it is time this month for BLUE pictures. We are linking to Julie Booth's blog and her friend Jennifer Coyne Qudeen in finding the colors of the rainbow.  Check out their blogs for more blues. This month's finds are contributed by both Sue and Elizabeth.  We thought blue might be a little challenging, but as it turns out, there were more than enough to choose from.  In fact, it was hard to narrow it down to just these 7!

 Delicate blue blossoms.

 Blues at the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

 A hand-dyed blue drying on the clothes line last summer.

 A perfect blue sky with a gaggle of geese.

 A felted flower pot cover.

 A view of Lake Winnipesaukee from the restaurant deck at Castle in the Clouds.

 Yarn bombing the fence at Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival.

Rubbings

For the fourth challenge, Julie chose rubbings.  Think about elementary school when you laid paper over a textured object and rubbed across with a crayon.  Same idea on fabric.  Except that Sue stuck with the color catchers she used for textures.  This time she used Shiva oil paint stiks instead of textile paint.  The search was on for objects from the kitchen that would work for a rubbing.

First was a grater.  The marks from the large and small size holes have potential.

This is a circular gripping mat.  It's texture is more subtle, so gives a softer look to the rubbing.

Next was a cheese slicer.  Not bad for creating lines.  Hmm, could have used this last week for lines!

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This is a jar gripper.  We like how the flower pattern comes through in the rubbing.

This last is a favorite; it is a woven trivet, and makes a nicely ridged texture in a radiating circular pattern.  We can see this used to create a background texture on fabric.

Texture Prints

Challenge #3 from Julie Booth was to find objects that would create texture, so we pulled out some household objects that we've used in the past for gelatin plate printing.  Part of the challenge this week was using a brayer without getting too much paint on it.  Because some of the textured objects did not have a lot of depth, too much paint would obscure the texture.  We put the texture under the fabric, and in Sue's case, dyed color catchers that she used for printing.  Here's what we came up with.

Large bubble wrap.

Rubbery drawer mat.

Covering from a box of clementines.

A gridded mat.

A mesh bag from produce, or maybe a turkey?

A round gripper mat.

Are you familiar with Color Catchers?  They are a laundry product made by Shout to put in the washer with clothing you think might bleed.  We use them when we wash out dyed fabric to absorb excess dye.  They are a non-woven fabric kind of like interfacing, and are great for printing on. They work well for fusible applique (no frayed edges) and are perfect for mixed media project too.  They were handy to pull out for some quick printing.

Printing with Lines

Elizabeth played along with challenge 2 from Julie Booth to find objects that would create lines and print with them.  These are the pieces she came up with.  Can you guess what she used to print with?

The first was done with straws - multiple straws glued to a piece of cardboard.

The second piece came out of the pantry cupboard.  Pieces of lasagna, also glued to a piece of cardboard.

What can you find in your kitchen to print lines with?