Be still, my heart

A friend and I stopped by a thrift store the other day as I was looking for some old books to add to my paper stash. Did I say OLD books?

I did indeed. This particular chain of thrift stores has previously recycled lots of old books using the covers, so there haven’t been too many of them available. I chose this book for the gothic letters,

and when I took a closer look back at home, I saw this inscription from 1874

and that the book was published in Copenhagen in 1789. My heart did a little jump; will I really cut this book apart???

Can you even imagine a contemporary book that will still be sold a 100 years from now?

And then I remembered – I do NOT need a new collection of anything, even if it’s only one book, so yes, this Danish book with the pretty gothic letters will have a new life in someone's mixed media art.

I also picked up a copy of Who What Where from 1965 (they didn't have my year).

It’s rather interesting to see what was considered memorable in the annual review part: disastrous weather (nothing new there, huh)

dead American presidents

and, of course, Miss World

And then we have a reprinted comedy from 1724,

also with those beautiful gothic letters

and a dictionary.

This is our second native language “New Norwegian”. Dictionary pages have such great texture with all those words in tiny writing, some bold, some italic, some phonetic.

I can still feel the want to spare that first fabulous book though; be still, my heart.

Mr Lovebird, I presume?

Back in September I hosted a giveaway celebrating 4 years 29 days and 907 posts on this blog with a couple of small mixed media pieces as the prize (post here). Later that month I did an update (post here), sharing that Mr Lovebird had made it as a finalist in a Cloth Paper Scissors magazine’s reader challenge.

Not getting where this is heading quite yet?

Well

here you go

Mr Lovebird did indeed make the cut and here he is in all his colourful and mixed media glory on a glossy, shiny page in Cloth Paper Scissors.

Now moving on with the rest of my Sunday with my favourite dude who’s playing on his DS while grandma is out bragging on her blog. Thanks for stopping by!

Whip card of sorts

I had to whip out a few more Christmas cards this morning. The deadline for mailing them in time for the holidays was yesterday, but having been a bit under the weather lately, I did not make it on time. It will be fine, they always set those deadlines with a few days to spare, don't they?

Even with an abundance of quilted cards (or so I thought), I ran out before making it to the bottom of The Not Naughty But Nice List this morning, so while chewing my way through lunch, I did a little light stitch & paste.

 

These are super simple: pretty scrapbook paper and leftover wall paper- and quilted fabric hearts from the quilted cards, stitched together with a button and pearl cotton floss. The Christmas greetings were written on circles of paper made with a paper punch, and glued to the back, covering the thread. Whip, whip and done.

 

I understand that writing physical Christmas cards is a becoming a lost art. Not so at our house, it is a tradition that I appreciate, and besides that, I love making little greetings when time allows, 'cause The Not Naughty But Nice List seems to grow each year.

How about you, are you keeping the Post Office in business this year (not counting online fabric shopping)?

Power stitching

Through how many layers of stuff do you think your machine can stitch?

Well, mine will handle more than I thought possible when creating my annual quilted Christmas quilt-cards.

Here we've got a 3 layer quilted base with a strip of linen appliqued in the middle, so that would make it 4 layers in the middle. Then we've got a piece of chunky hand woven linen. Then we've got a piece of highly textured wall paper. And to top it off - a little 3 layer heart cut from leftover quilted scraps.

Can it do it? Yes indeed, it can!

 

Fall Branch

A new sample for the Lag på lag Kvist (Layer upon layer Branch) class which I will be teaching at the Annual meeting of the Norwegian Quilters’ Association in March.

Being a diehard fan of fall colours, I have no idea why it has taken me so long to make a fall variation, but anyway, now it’s here.

I’m thinking of making it into a small cushion. My friend Laila made one with hers, and it’s awesome.

If you would like to take this class and are a member of the NQF , the registration will open at the NQF website on the 5th.

Clear enough?

A Sunday evening adventure started with this.

Well, actually it started on Saturday when I was browsing through the thrift store and spotted two off-cuts of IKEA panel curtains.

What to do, what to do with them. Hm, well, a fellow guild member of mine had made some cute woven fabric stars; I wonder how this material will weave out.

Some chop, chop, chop, and glue, glue, glue later and I got this.

My white glue says it dries clear. Right, I indeed hope so. Glue everywhere. What is the deal with glue and me, we are certainly not always on friendly terms?

It still looks quite fab, I’d say

even with glue everywhere

and when the sun shines through it, it’s clear enough.

Don’t you think?

You’ll find several tutorials for the woven star at House Revivals here; next time I’ll use a glue-proof material.

Thanks for stopping by!

Colour on a Sunday

With it only being 30 days until Christmas and I haven’t even started planning anything yet, I decided to do something useful like playing a little with colour today. There is a challenge in which I have wanted to participate, but time is becoming an issue. I have planned all the important quilty things out in my head like the design, the fabrics and the techniques, but not the time to actually do the work. Sometimes getting everything out and do the prepwork feels quite overwhelming, don’t you think?

Anyway, today I finally had a go at the first step: prettying up a few recycled tablecloths using a box of Neocolor II which I have been looking forward to try for a very long time. In fact I have two boxes purchased separately a long time ago and an even longer time ago, and was planning to make a third purchase of the same box when I had the brilliant idea of checking my paint drawer.

First out was a piece of polyester sateen from a repurposed bridal shawl. A fellow guild member of mine brought a car trunk full of them to a guild meeting after rescuing them from being thrown into a dumpster by a bridal store. My part of the loot, two shopping bags filled to the brim with luscious whites, has been waiting for their time to shine, and I am happy to oblige.

I made a little scribble with the crayons

and added a little water. The wet paint does not soak into the fabric at all, so that’s a big no-no. There may be some water repellent stuff in the fabric, but washing is not an option.

Next I ironed freezer paper to the back of strips of the table cloths and drew some simple patterns,

and then added water with a paint brush.

 It looked ok, but the paint kept on bleeding, so I tried to iron it dry. It was a mess, thankfully a rather bland mess as the colours faded away when drying, but still a mess.

I re-drew a new pattern while the fabrics were still damp, and that seemed to work much better, although I had to do them over again once more before I was happy.

Now they are drying properly so I can move on to step two tomorrow.

So, what did I learn today? First, Neocolor is not for polyester sateen, but I have some transfer paint that I picked up in Birmingham back in August that probably will do the trick. Second, when painting with crayons on coloured fabric, I should not paint it out with a wet brush. Instead I will try to dampen the fabric with a spray bottle and take it from there. And third, double woven, hand woven and linen table cloths may not be the most appropriate fabric for water-soluble crayons, and now I know.

Not much point in doing all this if you don’t learn anything, right?

Wishing you all a lovely Sunday!

"Red Movement"

This is the second of the new samples which I made for the Layer upon layer Movement class.

This quilt has less contrast between the background and the “paint”. The warmth draws me in and makes me want to surround myself with lots of warm colours.

One of the things that I particularly like about the Movement quilts is that the overall look can easily be adjusted to the students’ colour preferences. The warm colour kit can for instance easily be made more hot pink or warm orange.

I don’t usually finish off the edges of the Layer upon layer samples so that the students can see all the different layers, but the quilts can be made into pillows or bags or wall art with or without a frame. They would also look fab in a bigger quilt-as-you-go wall piece like this mock up.

The purple quilt is the first draft ever and will be remade before the next Movement class, but it still looks quite good I’d say.

Have a wonderful Friday!

"Green Movement"

I was writing this blog post on Monday afternoon, but then life came in the way. One of my family members broke an arm, and I have been spending lots of time with her at the hospital. We have had so much fun despite pain and nausea and deadly weapon hardware sticking out of her arm, but now she’s back home and I am quite happy to be out of those hospital corridors. Anyways, here’s Monday’s post - a little late.

Our house is quite silent today after a whirlwind weekend with the grandboys. There was a soccer tournament and grocery shopping and naptime and furniture painting and cooking and early mornings and everything else that goes with a weekend with two boys. I had cleared away my sewing machine to make room for some holiday crafting time with the oldest, and haven’t set it back up yet. It will still be there tomorrow.

The last month was rather productive though, and particularly the last week, so plenty to share.

I made a couple of new samples for the Layer upon layer Movement class before the class in Kongsberg, and here is the blue/green kit used with a green upholstery fabric. I quite like the rough texture of the background with all the delicate sheer fabrics.

The name of the quilt was a given with lots of repurposed and recycled fabrics.

Mother fell in love with this quilt, so I might have to make another quilt for her to frame as this one will be used as a class sample.

Thanks for stopping by!

Lovebird giveaway update and winner

Happy Sunday, everyone! This weekend wooshed by surprisingly quickly, and I’m finally getting around to do what I should have done on Friday – drawing the winner of my little Lovebird giveaway. The wi-fi was down on Friday night, and yesterday I spent too many hours in a tiny room with a copier, leaving me with a thundering headache. Then we went to a birthday party and came home with the cows (yeah, it's a Norwegian expression meaning coming home early in the morning), so I slept in way too late today, throwing me totally off my game. Although I did not have anything stronger than mineral water, I’m just not used to staying up that late. Oh well, lots of fun and totally worth it.
 

Anyways, by the magic of random generators, the lucky winner of young Mr Lovebird is Nicolette of Dutchcomfort whose blog I have been reading for ages!

Congratulations, Nicolette, you’ll receive an email from me. To the rest of you, thank you for playing along!

The other Mr Lovebird has already left the nest heading for the US. Remember I said I had entered him into a challenge? Well, he made it as a finalist into the Mixed Media stitched square  Reader’s challenge at Cloth Paper Scissors, and is heading over there as we speak to be considered for publishing. I’m not holding my breath or anything, but it was fun making it onto the finals list of my first ever reader’s challenge.

Wishing you all a fabulous Sunday evening!

Benefits of a test cloth

When you’re trying out paint and painting techniques for a quilt project, it’s just as important to see what doesn’t work, as what does, and you’ll never know until you try. An idea that looks good in your head, may not work so well on fabric. I’ll deliberately go too far every time, trying things that I think will look awful; this is why test cloths often are an important step of my process.

I prefer to make my cloths from the same materials and quilting techniques that I am using in my quilt. They are far from replica of the quilt, but they give me a realistic idea of how the final piece will paint out.

My quilt-in-process is rather dark-medium-ish, so I need to add light. I have a bottle of silver fabric paint, and I quite like its light reflecting qualities.

My first attempts involved Lutradur; painting onto the Lutradur and using it as a stamp (worked ok-ish):

and paining through it as a mask (result: ugly blob)

Painting lightly with an almost dry brush, leaving a layer of grey on top of the black (boring)

And using the paint brush as a stamp, going way too far, into a galaxy far, far away.

Stamping with angel weave (polyester table runner on a roll), but it was too fine, giving a blurry result.

The last thing I tried today was stamping with a fine gold mesh, and I love the grid effect. The only issue is that it’s quite flimsy, leaving me with little control of the result on a big project.

I’m not ready to go looking for stencils and stamps at the craft store just yet, so I’ll have another look around for the perfect supply here at home. Even with the silvery mess on the top,

I still have a blank canvas on the back. You've got to love a two-for-one test cloth, made bright and colourful by using up odds and ends of spools. If you have ever been in my Quilta Figurer free motion quilting class, you'll probably recognize the quilting patterns.

And, in case you haven't done so already, there’s still time to enter the Lovebird giveaway; you’ll find the post here. Thanks for stopping by!