Hearts and Flowers for All

PINK_ Cyclamen, Orchid and Hyacinth

Happy St Valentine's Day ALL! I would send you flowers or take flowers to your door if I knew which door, but in lieu of that, here are some romantic pink ones growing in the sunshine in our house. I hope you will enjoy them as if they were your own!

Tangling again- especially for you.

Here is a heart especially for you. I have not done many Zentangles for a while so I am a tad rusty, but I did it from my heart to say thanks to all of my kind, loyal followers and to wish you all a very happy Valentine's Day, 2013!

DH kindly drove me to Toronto today- the big city. I know now what a country girl I am! Holey molly- what a wild place!! The traffic is horrendous. We drove along the Lakeshore highway looking for a legal left turn to go north into the city and it seemed we were half way to Kingston before we found one. In the end, we DID get where we were going- to G&S Dyes on Dundas Street and I was able to get my chemicals and dyes AND I found that they also carry a wide range of interesting looking fabrics for dyeing and screen printing. Yummy! Must look into that :-) I was so grateful to DH for this huge sacrifice on my behalf ( he does NOT do Toronto !) that I treated him to a Tim's on the way home. He seemed happy, bless him.

Well, Happy Valentine's Day all. This is neither Needle nor Thread but I am posting it anyway to the needleandthreadnetwork.blogspot.com I wanted to do that because there are so many kind folk there to whom I wish to give hearts and flowers too. Enjoy!!

Dyeing to get started

I have a couple of projects I am DYING to start on but have decided to use my own hand dyed fabrics this time, exclusively if possible. To that end, I have been down in the cellar in the cold getting covered with pretty coloured splashes here and there. Old clothes make that not a major problem. I just need a few more pieces , some paler greens and yellows and maybe a reddish orange, not too intense- and I am away to the races. This is what I have done in the past few days . Now, I am DYEING to make a start. If I can get paler bits done overnight, I shall begin on the first one tomorrow. I am excited about this as I have not dyed my own stuff for YEARS!!! Good luck to me :-)

There are lots more colours involved than appear here as the fabrics are folded up, but you get the idea.

Urchin continuing

The piece of cotton I dyed. I like the colour intensity and am going to iron the cotton and try to find the perfect place on the cotton to use for my background. I do like the gradation of colour!

Same thing, different shot .

I am finished all of the burning and cutting and now need to decide where to go and what I want from here. The little centres of the spots where the spines attach on the urchin are so beautiful and I want that 3D , textured look. What colour should the background be? I had thought of using some silk and dyeing it but I have a piece of nice fine cotton I did a couple of weeks ago that I kind of like. I want enough contrast behind the open holes to let them "talk". I DID try this on a piece of plain white Dupioni silk. Pretty, but it did not really say much. So, here is the tentative plan. Remember I said to stay tuned re: the centres of the holes? Well, I have been experimenting. I cut them smaller than they were when I removed them from the main piece, but now, I think I shall make them smaller again , just the very centre of each cut out hole and shade them with pencil crayon to make them more three dimensional. Before I attach them to the background, I plan to do some stitching in the holes to add texture and then attach the hole centres. Each little section has a wee hole right in the middle so when I am all done , I will add a bead to each centre. I have some gorgeous ones that are pinky, iridescent, goldy- perfect colour and large enough to make a little statement. That is the plan....Now, let us see how that goes. Here are a few trial pics to see what things look like so far.

Just playing around with pencil crayons to see what the finished piece may look like. The paper pattern  a little off now as I improvised in a few spots as I cut.I

Same as above but the mask has been shifted a little

Two things

I have been messing around again ! In light of the Sketchbook Challenge, I had a look at Zentangles. If you are not familiar with the term, Google it! It is GRAND fun - IF you like to doodle- and I do. I have been Zentangling a little bit and find it relaxing and it is getting my right hand limbered up a bit for drawing. I have included a couple of closeups and you can see how wiggly my hand is. Hopefully, it will improve. This is REALLY fun. Try it! You'll like it!

 I told you that I had a wiggly hand- BUT it is improving. Who knows where this madness will end?

The second thing I have been working on is this-

The beginning of this piece- almost. I painted the reemay with Setacolor paint . I then ironed Wonder Under onto the back side before I began cutting. Once the Wonder Under was cool, I began cutting with my soldering iron. NOT as easy as it looks!

Apart from some more roundish holes around the outside, through the blue and green, this is the main piece all cut and ready to fuse to the background layer. It will be hand dyed . Stay tuned!

I would strongly urge everyone who quilts or who does Fibre Art of any kind, to look at the blog and website of Betty Busby. If you do not know her or her gorgeous work, you are in for a huge treat! It was Betty's beautiful work with Reemay that got me interested in trying it. I have used Lutradur, Tyvek, Evolon and lots of other industrial fabrics but Betty's use of Reemay is stellar and REALLY lit my board. Having cut this one small piece, ( 18inches square) I can REALLY appreciate Betty's work. It is so delicate and so controlled - and huge! Mind you she does quilt on a longarm, but even so....

I plan to dye a background for this , layer and quilt it and decide what to call it. It makes me think of a composite flower like Coreopsis or a sunburst but I shall await the outcome to decide on a title. I told you before I am the Queen of Serendipity!

One more shot on a background of plain white Dupioni silk.I MAY try dyeing it but it is not so easy and looks grainy, OR I may just go with some nice white cotton lawn to dye. It will take the colour the way I want it to. Watch this space!

By the way, you can find Betty Busby at bbusbyarts.com and her blog is bettybusbyblog@blogspot.com
                                                                       ENJOY!

More of the colours of winter

Berberis fruits like brilliant carved rubies

A MUCH happier Rhododendron in the mild temperatures of this day

Flower head of Hydrangea Quercifolia blown off by the strong winds

Hakone Grass all blowing in the same direction

Things happening indoors too. The Poinsettias are dropping leaves and bracts.

 So pretty curled and twisted like little shells in lovely faded colours.

Buds of helleborus - the early red one.

That surprise I mentioned earlier at our front door. Snowdrops, undaunted by cold winds and freezing soil are pushing through valiantly. See the little "beaks" on the leaves ! Like the sharp little beaks wee birds use to peck through their eggshells as they hatch. Life is never easy, is it ?

It was mild today and all sorts of things were happening in the garden. Some interesting things were happening indoors too.Here is another drying poinsettia leaf. I LOVE them . They are my favourite part of having Poinsettias!

Orange, purple and black. Nice blends.

Indoors and down in our cellar , interesting things were happening too. I have been dyeing . Great fun and only minor mishaps which I may , some day, confess :-)

Chino and black on white.

 Another interesting colourway. I have missed dyeing! Once upon a time , I used to do a LOT!

My favourite bit of this piece!

                              It has been a good, productive and very interesting day at our house.

Photo to follow

I was asked the other day if Setacolor Transparent paints would work for heliographic prints in colder weather. I did not know for sure but here we are today, at 13C with not much sun, and I am getting nice little prints !! So...the answer is YES, it WILL work. The problem is at the moment that the back garden is full of jays who seem to settle any old where so I am hoping they will either NOT settle on the dyed fabric and mess it up, or sit there long enough to leave nice little birdy feetprints? AND, it is windy so the leaves I am printing are blowing away . I did weight as many as I could, but they are still blowing off. Stay tuned .

Just plane gorgeous

Dave's plane tree bark.

 Look at that purple - and the fantastic textures!!!

I think I have found my next project! I have been photographing tree barks and the colours and textures are stunning. Today though, I found the piece de resistance on my brother's lawn!! It is a young plane tree and the colours are fabulous. The texture is exquisite. I am thinking hand dyed fabrics and machine quilting with hand embroidery.

Watch this space - but not for a little while.