Using the embellisher

I am making quite good progress with this felted piece.

This is where my embellishing machine becomes really useful.  I am trying to build a really thick and textured background.

The initial work was done with a hand felting tool adding wool rovings to the grey/blue background and then some pieces of nylon/chiffon scarves.  I have left the rolled edges of the scarves on to give some extra interest.  
There is also some machine stitching and some couched yarn.

I have gone all over this with the embellishing machine to make it more secure and to create some more texture.
 
The tree trunk is black/green silk fibres (silk hanky) applied with the embellisher and I will build this up a bit more.
I used some spotted tulle to create the little white "flowers" in the foreground.

 

fabulous peacock

Today's op shopping was a real success.

Look at this gorgeous peacock plate from Japan.  

 This little travel iron made its way into my bag.








                                          At only $4 it was a real bargain.  Will be good for ironing those little bits of lace etc.

As well as these goodies I managed to find a small electric beater for $5.00: the one I currently use was a wedding present many years ago.


There were other things that came home with me but I haven't photographed them as yet.

 Finally I couldn't resist a small collage of the colours and textures of Autumn.  It has been especially wet and we have many different kinds of fungi and toadstools in various parts of the garden.  The one in the centre picture is on a tree stump just outside our back door.  

 

Needlefelting workshop

Yesterday I went to a workshop at the Peninsula Arts Society.  The workshop was called Fast and Furious Felting and  the tutor was Tina Whitely.

I was not sure if I wanted to attend because I already do a bit of needlefelting and feel quite comfortable with the techniques and of course life is busy.


After giving it a lot of thought I decided it would be good to spend some time with other like minded people so I went.


Tina is an accomplished textile artist and does amazing things with felt.  I learnt lots of new things and came away inspired.  The pic shows some needlefelting I did while I was there:  building up the background is slow work and so I did some more last night.  As well as wool and silk rovings  I have used some pink and yellow chiffon which I just cut up roughly.  This will be a slow building project I think.

evelon leaf and soldering iron

At last I have finished my leaf: it has turned our much as I had planned which is unusual.

You can see from the pic on the left that I have burnt small holes in 3 places. 

The small soldering iron is ideal for cutting the evelon.

As you can see of what is left, the cutting is clean and there is no fraying.

This pic shows the leaf on a piece of machine made lace.

This pic shows a the back of the leaf and two of the holes are clear to see.

I intend to use this as part of a collage on a mirror.


The next step is to make some gum blossoms.







 

Bendigo - Grace Kelly

This morning we set off early to travel to Bendigo: three hours drive from here.  Bendigo is a beautiful city which was settled during the gold rush era.  There are beautiful old houses, elegant civic buildings and impressive churches as well as lovely gardens and lakes.  

 It was raining when we left home and continued to rain for the rest of the journey.   I had hoped to take lots of pics but it was just not the right day.  

I did however attend the Grace Kelly Exhibition.

The electricity is off at present so I have limited power on my computer.  I did take a few pics while standing in the rain and I will attempt to upload them. 

Vintage china

I did go op shopping yesterday but was too tired to write about it yesterday.  Suffice to say most of my purchases were for the little ones I mind.  I have not taken any pics  but over the last few weeks I have bought some pretty vintage china from the op shops.
 
The design on this little plate would make a beautiful embroidery.  The plate is from  Cornwall in the UK.

This tiny dish featuring pansies is quite old I think and is from Staffordshire in the UK.  


Again a lovely design for satin stitch.

Finally this gorgeous fan shaped dish is from Japan although I have no idea about it at all.  The stamp on the back is in Japanese.


The peacock looks so elegant.


It really is amazing that people dispose of such pretty pieces.  Surely family members or friends would appreciate such treasures.

shaving foam paint

Today I found time to experiment a bit with the shaving cream and paint.  It worked out well but I have had a bit of trouble with the pictures so I have collaged some of the pics in the hope that they will be helpful.

For those who might like to try this I will explain the steps.  
First you need Shaving cream, paints, inks or food colouring
 a plastic tray to work in, spatulas, skewers or other tools, fabric/paper to dye and some clean bench space with a piece of plastic to protect the surface.

 I found a shallow plastic tray was ideal for this.  Shake the can of shaving foam and squirt as much as you want on the tray.  It looks a bit like meringue.  You need to smooth  it out a bit.  It should be about and inch thick. 

Now the fun starts.

 I used water colour paints I bought at the hardware store: the colours are bright and clear.  As you can see in the top pic in the collage I dropped blobs of paint randomly on the shaving cream.  In retrospect I could have used more.


Once you are happy with the position of the paint take a skewer or some other tool to move the paint around to create a pleasing design.  Next select your piece of paper/fabric and lay it over the shaving cream/paint.  Don't move it around but do press the fabric into the tray to ensure the paints adhere to the fabric.  A lot depends on the kind of fabric you use.  Some fabrics are more absorbent than others.


Carefully lift the fabric off the tray and lay it down on a clean flat surface with the paint upermost.


Taking a scraper or piece of hard plastic scrape the excess shaving cream and paint off the fabric.  This is the scarey part but it is also the most exciting part.  Once you have removed the excess your design is revealed.  


Just leave it to dry and then iron to heat set the colour.


That's it.

You can add new colours and continue to use the same shaving foam as long as it is clean enough.  Today I returned the excess back to the tray and as you can see by the last pics it was becoming quite muddy.  I love muddy colours so I am happy with that.

You can use this technique on paper, evelon, fabric, vilene or anything else you can think of.  I have used it to colour Tyvek but of course you cannot heat set the colour on Tyvek. 



There are lots of links to this technique on the web.  Just google "Shaving cream painting".