Beads! Beads! Beads!

Remember the stack of fabric/paper that I showed you several posts back? Well, that stack has been replaced by these beads!! I have several projects lined up for these beauties!!

Tomorrow I am off to Alexandria to take a class with the fabulous quilt Artist Laura-Cater Woods!! I am sooo excited! I love her work. Many of you may be aware of her pieces as she has been on the cover of Quilting Arts Magazine several times in the past two years. You can check out her work by following this link.

A New Matched Set

I used one of the sheets of fabric paper that I showed you in my previous post, to create more beads to finish off a set of jewelry for a good friend. Last Christmas for a gift exchange, I wrapped up one of my bracelets. My new friend and soon to be Watercolor Instructor picked my name for the exchange. Two weeks ago she asked me to create a set of earrings and a necklace to go along with her bracelet. She said that she wears her bracelet all of the time, gets lots of complements and wanted to know if I could complete the set for her.

The turquoise, green, copper piece that you see immediately to the left is what I used to create the beads for the new earrings and necklace.

Here is a shot of the original bracelet with the new earrings. I used turquoise beads from Pakistan below each fabric/paper bead (that had been wrapped with green fibers before glazing) and then placed a handmade recycled glass bead from Tanzania and two colored glass beads on top.

Here is the completed set minus a part of the toggle. I think that Ariel will be quite pleased with how these pieces turned out! Now I have aquite a bit of left over Fabric/paper in this colorway to create more beads for different projects.

New Projects Underway

So....... I have heard some grumblings that I have not been posting enough!! Sorry 'bout that but I have been busy!! Not sure doing what , but busy none the less. The age old dilemma of too much to do and far too little time!!!

I have some new projects to share and most of them are in progress!!

This is a piece of collaged fabric that will become a purse for a friend who is a weaver and a potter. We are going to trade for each other's wares. She has made some beautiful goblets that I want to give to a very special couple for Christmas and she has requested a purse large enough for her water bottle and her wallet, made with greens, blues and brown. Now that the fabric is complete I have to construct the purse, line it and embellish.

The next project involves making fabric/paper for bead making and for covering journals.

I have made three different color ways that you can see to the left.

The piece here at the bottom is collaged paper on fabric which I then paint scraped in turquoise , lime gree copper and gold. The scraped paint caught on the edges of the layered papers and gave the piece the terrrific texture that I love.

THese are some of my Scrappy Beads earrings that I have developed for sale to a shop in North Carolina. These beads are made from all silk fabric scraps and they are very light weight. Once I finish this order I hope to have some of these earrings available in my ETSY Store for the holidays. These are alot of fun to wear and always generate lots of comments as folks try to figure out what they are!!

I have to get back to work and finish these projects up and I will be sure to post again SOON to show you how things have turned out!!

Fabric Doll Pages.

I am in charge of a Fabric Doll Page Swap on one of my Favorite Yahoo groups. Nine of us are creating fabric based pages for a book that we will each create, adding our own covers. the template for the pages was identical to begin with and everyone has created their own versions of dolls to cover the template. The pages are stiffened with Tmtex interfacing and then embesslished and arted by each participant. We have been working on this project for most of the summer as we all wanted to ahve plenty of time to do wonderful, unhurried work! I ahve finslly finished my set of nine pages and now I need to begin to envision the covers of my book. This part of the project will probably have to be put o the back burner till after the holidays as I am starting to create art for Holiday shows and sales!

Here are my Doll pages!

I drew my own faces on these gals and I am slowly starting to believe that I can Draw!!!! I made the hair of strands of hand-dyed silk ribbons that I purchased here! Judy Gula, owner of Artistic Artifacts, always has the most amazing selection of trims and ribbons and hand dyed fabric bits that are perfect for collage. If you see them, you need to jump on them fast, as most of her items are one of a kind and don't come around again!!!! ( I speak from experience!!!) I stitched the ribbons down around each face using beads and mini daisy shaped sequins. Each Garden Girl is holding a bunch of flowers and on the back of each page, where I have my signature, I have placed the quote"Friends are the flowers in the garden of life".

Addendum !

Well, will wonders never cease! I had no trouble getting Blogger to load this photo in the correct orientation today!
There is a bit of glare on the glass but that's the way that it goes with framed glassed pieces.
This piece is approximately 11x14 and the blue background is the cover of an old book. The calender page is actually the inside cover of a journal from 1926 and the handwriting is an entry from that journal. The gal who used the journal talks about how she "ironed in the forenoon". On the far left you can see the cloth spine of the book . I used a page from a vintage photo album that held cabinet cards to frame the vintage plate of the birds nest and the Blue Jay feather was picked up on a walk with the dogs. I hope to do more of these sorts of collages and have them for sale in my Etsy store soon!
I hope that everyone had a good weekend! We managed to weather TS Hanna with little trouble. The forecast did inspire Tom to get up on the roof and clean out the gutters_ ha has been talking about doing this chore for ages!!!! Fortunately we won't be seeing anything of Ike up here but our thoughts go out to those in his path!!!

Art for OUR House

Lately I have been creating lots of art, but none of it is to be seen around our house. I have been creating for trades and swaps or for sale or for gifts for friends. Recently it has become increasingly difficult to part with certain pieces as I am really beginning to like my own work. i know that it may sound strange but certain pieces are really starting to speak to me- I guess that I am finally starting to tap into my "Muse".

So I have made two new pieces that along with some favorite pieces from friends , will become the center pieces of our new art wall in our family room. The framed prints that we have had since college days have got to go!!!!! Don't get me wrong, I love Ansel Adams's work but I am tired of these prints. It has taken a long time to get to this point because they fill a very large space. I am going to fill the space with a grouping of pieces rather than one big piece. Don't know what It has taken me so long to "Collage In" this big space; sometimes my "Ah Ha "moments are few and far between!!!

I seem to be having problems with Blogger as the program will not let me upload photos in the correct orientation. It keeps insiting that the photo be loaded on it's head!! ARGHHH!! So for now, I will just show you the floral piece and save the collage piece for another time.

This is a collection of my flower photos from my stationary selection (on sale in my Etsy shop) that i have placed in a neat collage frame . All of the prints are 4 x 6 so the whole piece becomes quite large.

Does anyone else have this problem with uplaoding photos??? Anyone have any hints???????

Gratitude

It appears that the people of New Orleans are going to be spared the worst of Gustav! What wonderful news!! There will still be some flooding but nothing compared to Katrina and the total ineptitude of the government during that disaster. It seems that plans were made and followed and that there will not be a repeat of the disaster. At times it is hard not to get very depressed about the human condition and about our lack of abilities to learn from the past. It seems that maybe this time, lessons were learned and I , for one am very grateful!

Now we must look on to the next storms that are coming our way and continue to be grateful every day for all of the wonderful blessings that we have all around us.

We are our brother's keepers and our sister's keepers and we must never loose sight of the difference that each individual can make to our world!!

"We must put our feet in the right place and stand firm!!" Abraham Lincoln