A birthday card

A birthday card created in Photoshop, then sewn with tulle entrapping some tiny beads.

Metal play

A couple of pins or pendants made in a HAFA (Houston Area Fiber Artists) workshop, focusing on bending, distressing, and embellishing metals. (That's a typewriter key embedded in a bottle cap on the right.)

ATC's

Here are just a few of the ATC's I made during the course of Rachel Kitterman's "Daydreams and Doppelgangers" workshop. It was lots of fun, very freeing ... and I discovered that I like working in a small scale.

Book Girl

I've always loved reading, but only recently discovered hand-making books. This is one of my first ones, taught to me by my good friend Martha. This was so much fun, with its own hand-made envelope.

Photoshopping

A collage that I played with in Photoshop ... one of my favorite pictures of my Mom, when she was 11 years old.

Devoted Sisters

A small collage that I created, then reduced and made into "nametags" for Christmas gifts for my sister this year. The quote "there were never more devoted sisters" is from an old song our mother used to sing to us when we were fighting!

Some previous stuff

Now that I'm playing on the blog, thought I'd post some pictures of a few other things I've done in the past few months. These are the front and back of my first journal, done with fabrics, shredded papers, paints, and gel medium, with a few beads thrown in.

Day 5 - again

"Random Flora" ... imaginary flowers.

Day 5 of the Daily Devotions challenge

"Haunted" ... lately I seem to be fascinated with the cat/girl blend.

Day 4

"Half an Education". A sketch of half of my bookshelf in my living room. Not very inspired, I must have been tired. (That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!)

Day 3

"Empty Archway". An attempt at creating a realistic-looking archway ... not at all successful. Proportions are all wrong, but I'm determined to post something every day anyway, as a matter of self-discipline. I actually worked harder on this one, and like it less than my previous sketches. I think I concentrated too hard on the stone texture and not enough on the overall structure.

Day 2

"Girl-Cat-Girl" ... cats seem to me to be inherently female (even the boys, sorry!), and there is a blurring in my mind of their separate personality traits. This sketch is really just a mixture of a few dreams I've had lately.

Daily Devotions 365 Days ... Day 1

A little belatedly, I've signed up with the "dailydevotions365days" yahoo group, in an effort to goad myself into concentrating on art every day, even if in a very small way. I'm just glad I found this group before the year got too far along.

This first sketch was done with a fair-to-middlin' sized cat on my lap, alternately purring and biting me to get attention. I was trying to achieve the illusion of transparency in the bowl.

A Discharging Experiment

Thanks to my friends on the QuiltArt list, I gathered the courage to discharge (bleach) a rayon shirt that I really liked, but was too bright for me. I prefer wearing muted colors, so wanted to overdye it. Here's the result of the bleaching step ... before and after pictures. (Excuse the rushed ironing job!) So far, no holes in the fabric ... I did use Anti-Clor after rinsing out the bleach, followed by a thorough hot-water wash with Synthrapol. Now I just need to overdye it ... maybe a coppery color.

This is a piece of rusted cotton ... an experiment. The fabric was soaked in a vinegar-water mixture, and placed between two pieces of sheet-metal, with some washers, nails, and "thingies" from the garage. I love this effect! 

A tiny piece made spontaneously from leftover batiks, while at a Retreat with friends in Livingston, TX. I just couldn't let those gorgeous fabrics go to waste. It is named 'Migrating Batiks" because of the flying geese border. 

Another silk painting from a later Ginny Eckley workshop .. thread painted but not yet quilted in this photo. 

This was a silk painting begun in a Ginny Eckley workshop, finally quilted. 

Book It!

I picked this up from Teri Springer's blog:

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the sentence in your journal along with these instructions.
5. Don't search around and look for the coolest book you can find. Do what's actually next to you.

"Still, at that age, few things can provoke more wonderment than a mirror."

-- from "West with the Night" by Beryl Markham

I'm also re-reading "The Last Ship" by William Brinkley.

Commit random acts of literacy! Read & Release at http://www.bookcrossing.com

YIKES!

I can't believe I quilted FIVE ... count 'em, FIVE ... little art quilts today. Not to say they are finished, by any means, but at least they are started and quilted. Now I get to do all the fun stuff, like painting, distressing, embellishing. One is a Tyvek piece, one is hand-painted silk, and the others are more traditional cotton. Since the lighting in my house isn't too great (OK, maybe it's my Old Eyes), I'll have to wait until morning to start playing with them.

Today is the 2nd day I've devoted totally to art quilting ... the most fun I've had in ages. Yesterday was spent mostly in preparation, and today was the (partial) payoff. How can 14 hours fly by so quickly?

Tomorrow I'm "supposed" to clean house ... but WAIT! I live alone, WHY do I have to clean house tomorrow? After coming off a 3-month desperate race to complete customer quilts in time to meet several deadlines, I finally have some breathing space. Maybe I'll just let the dishes stack up a little higher, and play again tomorrow.