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Fabric stacks

As I “spring clean” the studio, I enjoyed seeing my stack of fabric from the fabric printing exchange earlier this year. Wanted to share these fun prints with you. How to use them? I have an idea for a bag that some might be a good addition to, I’m working on a table runner using some of my fabrics, and these could be an excellent addition, or ……… the ideas just keep coming.

from my fabric exchange partners – what fun!

Take a look below, and you can tell these are right up my alley! Or, take a look at the previous post and realize that maybe I could have used several in the quilt I’m working on. Here are the fabrics that came in the mail (and from our new fabric store in Ann Arbor) as possibilities for Taylor’s quilt (or maybe my stash).

just arrived in the mail except the elephants that came from Pink Castle in Ann Arbor
(yeah! a new fabric store in town pinkcastlefabrics.com)

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Creative energy

design wall – lap quilt in progress

Today in worship I was reminded of why I love to create so much. The communion table cloth was part of a multi-generational community art project we used as part of our learning and musing on wisdom. The original project was an installation (see here) but today the brightly-colored, quilted circle was on the communion table with a beautiful silver chalice, pitcher, and plate with rustic bread.

When projects seem to continually stall, I find myself re-energized when I remember that I can do this! Sometimes working on more straightforward projects helps me get back in the groove. The quilt above is one of these projects. Right now it is in the design phase – I mostly like it, but can’t quilt decide……… but, I’m getting back in the groove, and hopefully the creative energy will get me past the block I’m having with a mini-wisdom quilt I’m working on.

Blessings on the week.

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Fabric love

Kelsey and Taylor are having an adventure in Italy this month. As I was packing away Taylor’s fabric to make room in the studio for a few of my projects I fell in love all over again with the fabrics she has collected for a bed quilt. The fabrics we’ve been laying out for her quilt are fun, but the fabrics which aren’t finding their way into the quilt are also just happy fabrics … I particularly love the grays in the “no” pile.

currently favored for a quilt for Taylor’s bed

out of favor for Taylor’s bed quilt

out of favor for Taylor’s bed quilt

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Graffiti into thankfulness

As I created cards from graffiti cloth this week, I remembered people who have encouraged me and Taylor this year, a blessing of good memories and time to be thankful.

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Holiness is a way of life

My blog thoughts have been more art and less musing since my favorite daily thoughts from minEmergent slowed, and I’ve had to replace my morning musing with other sources. I’ve enjoyed the blogs of both Kathy Escobar and Rachel Held Evans, and the phrase that caught my attention this morning was

“wisdom isn’t a single decision; it’s a path, a road, a way. 
Holiness, too, isn’t a single decision, moment, position or thought; it’s a way of life. “

Read more here. This dovetails in less-than-obvious ways my recent thoughts on grace – how creating a Sabbath day helps us soak in how much we are loved even if we are not “working” to “do” something, how radical grace is in our world today, how grace starts within myself towards myself, and how living in grace means following a daily path of life with God, journey of wisdom, way of holiness.

Grace,
Jen

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Do art every day

Sara Groves wrote a song that I love called “Add to the beauty” (saragroves.com/lyrics/addtothebeauty/addtothebeauty). Life has been a beautiful kind of crazy with Taylor graduating from high school, I’ve been trying to catch up on gardening before the mosquitoes get too large, and I haven’t found much time for doing art. I love Sara’s song’s message wanting to “add to the beauty. Tell a better story.” We each have the opportunity to do that in every moment of our lives.

I’m hoping to turn pieces of this fabric into thank yous for the people who have walked with Taylor through the years to her high school graduation. She’s been surrounded by wonderful folk who have encouraged her to thrive and bring her own contribution of beauty to this world. If you are one of them, know that you are appreciated. (and that I am really slow at getting cards out)

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Beach anyone?

Life has been crazy with a high school senior. Not enough time to sew lately, but I’ve been designing a couple of things. Was hoping for a calm, serene beach feel to this quilt. I like it, but I’m not sure I am there with the feel – seems more wintery than springlike, and having been pulling weeds all weekend, it seems a little cold! Ah well, I can keep pondering. Taylor graduates this week, so I’ll not have much time for sewing.

PS I incorporated some of my fabric I printed .. enjoyed this part!

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handprinted fabric swap finale

Sorry this has taken so long – Holy Week/Easter/Spring Break came hard upon the heels of my finished fabric. I had a great time creating fabric for the fabric swap that Kelsey encouraged me to join. I counted, I have 8 yards of dyed and/or printed fabric to add to my stash. Yeah! I liked my fabric rubbings better than my screen printing, so I picked my favorites to send, and also included a sample of my screen printing which turned out rather subtle gray and white/light blue and felt like it maybe wasn’t quite done. Watching the progress of the swap gave me the courage to keep trying.
I received a really fun set of fabric from my swap group. You rock! I loved the background/print color pairings. Karen posted a fun picture of her collection – great idea. I will try it tomorrow when there is a little more sunshine.

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Screen printing

Saturday morning I dove into screen printing with some help from my daughter Taylor. I used painting on fabric interfacing to create the screen (in “Screen Printing: Layering textiles with colour, texture & imagery” by Claire Benn & Leslie Morgan). I painted the screen using the pretty yellow sample from Taylor’s walls.

creating the screen

screen printing in progress

This kind of screen took a while to saturate with print paste, but by the end of a sample piece of fabric I had the hang of printing the design. Interestingly, I chose an interfacing from my box of scraps that had a regular circular pattern of dots rather than the unstructured diagonal fibers. This meant that with thick print paste the design has tiny specks of non-color! The colors look reasonably bold when wet, but once they dried they were rather quiet.

final results and a work in progress

The final results are even more subtle, and the design seems a little sparse. Taylor was printing with red this morning, so the designs under plastic are a few more tries at different printing patterns.

Still pondering if I want to try a little bit more this afternoon ….

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Rubbing

Decided to experiment with rubbings using dye paste over a foam grid of circular openings and a metal mesh. Tried various combinations of dry fabric/wet fabric and thinner/thicker paste. The circles were a lot of fun. My favorite is the most dramatic mauve/khaki one in the center (I love the grunge look and the thicker paste which gave crisp lines), but I will use the more subtle fabrics, love the caramel versions too. The mesh was harder — rubbing was trickier, and dye paste consistency mattered quite a bit in terms of the final look.

Next up – screen printing with dye paste and/or ink on the ~10 fat quarters I have left. (or if this doesn’t work, I have a few mono-print ideas in mind)