The Tutorial - AT LAST!

At long last, here are the instructions for how I paint up paper lunch sacks to make a really cool background that you can use in collage, or to cover a journal, or to make just about anything. The end result is a very sturdy paper. You can see the samples in my earlier blogpost here.

So first, gather up some paper lunch sacks, or better yet, buy a bottle of wine and save the brown paper sleeve that you carry it home it. Anything much thinner than this will not hold up well through the process. Cut the bag open at the seam, discard the seam and the bottom of the bag.

Now mix up some white glue and warm water until the glue dissolves. I'd say about 4 parts water to 1 part glue, but I'm not sure it's that important. Take your bag and crumple it up into a ball and submerge it in the glue/water. Remove, squeeze, open and crumple again to repeat the proceedure. Twice is fine, do it a third time if you want extra wrinkles AND if your paper is holding up well. Open up the bag and place it on top of a protected surface (I put it on top of a plastic trash bag so it doesn't stick).

Next take acrylic paint (I use craft paint at this stage) and paint your wet paper bag. Paint it however you'd like. You don't need a thick coat of paint, a little goes a long way. Think about the colors you want to end up with.

Once your paper has dried, iron it front and back (between pressing cloths or parchment). This will seal in the wrinkles and make it easy to work with.

Finally, I like to dry brush accent colors on top to highlight the wrinkles. On this piece I started with the yellow (craft paint) and then added silver metallic highlights with Lumiere. If you want to, you can put a glossy acrylic glaze over the whole thing when you're done.

I hope you get a chance to try this. It's a lot of fun!

What I'm Doing with What I've Got

I've got several projects in the works - nothing new for me given that it is two.something weeks before Christmas. I am working on a few last minute gifts and an ATC for a trade (which I don't have a photo of yet). I have also discovered that I am nearing my 200th post, so I will have to start thinking of a little giveaway to celebrate.

I am planning to post the paper bag tutorial that I promised ages ago, in the next few days, so stay tuned for that. Meanwhile, here are some things I am working on:

I have turned the above, uninspiring brown calico into what you see below ... using molding paste, dynaflow paints and lumiere paints. Messy but fun. No word yet on what this will become, but it's turning into something!

I participated in a project several years ago (need to pull out my journal to find out just how many) with my local quilting group and the quilt top pictured below was the result. Now that I have a nice machine, and have located black batting, and purchased ungodly expensive variegated thread, and pieced a backing from the leftover solid fabrics ... I am finally qulting this piece. My local group meets in one week and my hope is to take it with me and sew the binding on while I'm there. I have another top from the same group that I'd like to quilt as well, just not sure it will be happening this week!

And finally a closeup of my third piece of ice-dyed fabric. This one done in raspberry, orange and yellow. I ordered a few new dye colors and will make more once they arrive. I'm hoping to make some drawstring totes for my nieces for Christmas, so we'll see how that goes.
Well, I am up early for a Saturday. Someone (not me) accidentally set his alarm to go off at 6 am and someone (not him) could not get back to sleep. Ahhh well, I am enjoying the quiet (and a rare second cup of coffee) and Rosi is happy to be out of her crate. Have a wonderful day!!!

Freeze Dyed Fabric - Southern Style!

Look at this bit of lusciousness! And with any luck I'll have another piece by the end of the day.
I don't know if you've seen or heard of snow-dyed fabric. It's gorgeous, but you need, um, SNOW to make it. Well, we don't get much of that here in North Carolina and I was getting jealous. So ... I put the fabric in my kitchen sink and used ice instead, and look what happened! I love it. I can't wait to make more. This might actually help me keep my sink clean! I call it Freeze Dyed Fabric - Southern Style!

This is a closeup of a particularly lovely area. There is too much raspberry in this piece, so I've still got some experiementing and learning to do (oh, darn!).

This just in! Here's the blue/green one I made today. I'm likin' it!

This Time, Last Year

Here we are at December again. Last year, I vowed to blog everyday for the month of December. You know what they say - another year old, another year wiser! But I will try to make an appearance more often than lately, especially if my computer hangs on.

If you are interested in the Cranberry Apple Bread recipe, it is at the end of this post. If you try it, let me know. I hope you enjoy it!

Marloes asked, via comment, about whether or not I can change out the inchies in my display from a few posts back. The answer is yes. They are attached to lanyard hooks.

I took a look back at my goals for the year - some I did well with, others not so much. One goal was to read a book a month. I think I've accomplished that, although I stopped counting. I seem to have hit a non-fiction spurt, although it is purely coincidental. Here's what's passed through my hands the last couple of months...

My son actually found this book, and the next, at the library and checked them out. He didn't read them, but I did. I found both books, but especially the first one, fascinating. I could not have read the book above, if I did not know going in that the dog survives (hence the opportunity for book 2). A captivating read with incredible insights into the lives of our service members overseas.Isn't he a beautiful dog? The second book was not quite as captivating for me, but I was still glad to read it and thank the author (Jay Kopelman) for his honesty in writing.

I pulled this off the library shelves one day while I was waiting for a computer to free up. Cesar Millan is the "Dog Whisperer" (of National Geographic channel fame). His insights into dog psychology are fascinating. He truly has a gift.

Finally, this is on my nightstand now. I have never read Anne Frank's diary in its entirety, and it wasn't until recently that all of her writings have been published (in this edition, which is the one I am reading). What can one say about Anne Frank that hasn't been said before? But it is heartbreaking to know that of the 8 people that hid in the secret annex in Amsterdam, only 1 (Anne's father) survived. I think that fact is what has me dragging my feet as I read. It's March, 1944 and they were arrested in early August 1944. What a tragedy war is; how unnecessary hate is.

Back to fiction after this.

And finally, here's the recipe. I never really cared for cranberry bread - it is usually made with orange juice and always so dry. One year I switched it up, and this is the result ... an incredibly most sweet/tart bread. Yum!

Cranberry Apple Bread

1 cup fresh cranberries, coarsly chopped

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 granny smith apple, chopped

2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 Tbsp butter, softened

3/4 cup apple juice

1 egg, well beaten

Preheat oven to 350. Grease and flour one large or two small loaf pan(s). Prepare cranberries, nuts, and apples, combine and set aside. In large bowl mix together dry ingredients. Cut in butter. Stir in apple juice and egg, mixing just to moisten. Fold in cranberries, nuts and apples. Spoon into prepared pan(s). Bake 60 minutes, test with toothpick for done-ness before removing from oven. Cool on rack 15 minutes, remove from pan and cool completely. Enjoy!

Curlicue

I probably won't have much to show this week, with Thanksgiving and all. I baked some bread today ... maybe I'll share my recipe for Cranberry Apple Bread, if you'd like. Let me know and I'll post if there's interest.

I did manage to complete and ATC for Carol in Wales, who is the owner of the Textile Challenges group. She chose the motif of "curlicue". Well, I always thought a curlicue and spiral were the same thing, but that wasn't what she had in mind, so here is my interpretation. The background is layered and fused, and the motif is hand beaded. I hope she likes it.

I thought you would like to see my hanging mechanism for my inchie display. I can't take credit for the idea, because I read about it on Ami Simm's Alzheimers Quilt Initiative site. An excellent place to find art and support alzheimers research, by the way. Since I used foam core, I glued two pop top pieces (from soup, I think) to the back. They make excellent hangers!

We are dog-sitting for a friend this week. It took about 24 hours, but Rosi and Angel seem to have finally wore each other out. They are both sound asleep at the moment. I'm sure I'll have some pictures for you before long!!!

A Long, Long Time Ago ...

Back when inchies (little one inch pieces of fiber art for my non-fiber art friends) were all the rage, I participated in a swap. Shortly thereafter I began to make this display for 25 of them. Today, I finally finished it. It took me about 15 minutes to finish ... don't ask me why I waited so long. It's hanging on the wall now.
It was very hard to photograph. I'll try to get a better picture when it's daylight. I started out by covering a piece of foam core with copper leaf. I cut a piece of peltex to size and cut windows into it. I used eyelets and hung hooks and put an inchie on each hook. I used balsa wood around the edges to give some depth, so the inchies would hang free, and then I used decorative upholstery tacks around the outside. I like how it turned out and the little bits of art are unique and fun.

So last Saturday it was 76. There were a bunch of tornadoes about an hour east of here. We just had some wild clouds. Yesterday we had flurries! Craziness. Well, the only one home besides me, was Rosi, so we popped out onto the deck and I took this photo. Not a lot of snow by any stretch of the imagination, but any snow in November is pretty rare here.

And since you're still with me, even after another photo of Rosi ... here she is all tucked in. We had the sleeping bag out and Rosi thought it was wonderfully cozy. She sacked out on it and Joseph covered her up. She slept there for a loooong time!

Well, then.

So I haven't posted in a month. Well. First, when the computer's not working, I can't load pics, so I can't share. Computer's been out for most of the month. Finally is working - who knows how long. I'm sure you are as sick of hearing my computer woes and I am experiencing them, but that's how it goes ...

Anyway, now that I can post, what do I have to share? Well, I made some ornaments, but I can't show you because they're a surprise to the recipients. I also worked on some complex cloth for a trade, but I can't show you that either. I made tons of bottlecap stuff for a fair at a local preschool, but you've seen that already. So, lucky you - here are pics of life over the past month, more or less. They're mostly pics of the dog. lol.Meet "Fitty Biskitz" - she's such a patient animal. The kids had fun with her costume. This was just a test though. She wore a witch's hat and helped me pass out candy on Halloween.

This is my favorite Hickory tree in my front yard. It was a really pretty yellow this year. The fall color came and went quickly this year. Most of the leaves came down this weekend in the wind and rain.

Our Rescue (Palisades Animal Rescue) had a "reunion". Here's a pic of Rosi with her mama. I was shocked that Rosi is taller than her mom. I knew she wasn't nearly as fluffy! Actually, mom was starved and she looks so different now I never would have recognized her. Rosi got to reunite with one of her sisters and two of her brothers as well. We also got to see Cassie, the dog that we fostered briefly last April. She is doing great. It was wonderful to see all the dogs happy and doing well.

Last weekend we drove to Charlotte for a soccer tournament. Jenny's (DD) team played and Tom (DH) coached. Well, never in a million years would we have predicted it, but the girls won the championship! It was amazing and we were all so thrilled. The girls worked really hard to overcome some challenges this season and it was so nice to see their efforts pay off.

And finally, Rosi turned one year old on November 7th. Here's she's enjoying her Frosty Paws doggie ice cream. She loved it. You can sort of see the jute necklace Jenny made for her, and PawPaw bought her a bully stick. Birthdays are a good thing!!!