All A-glow!

I am working on a special project for my 16 year old neice Mali, who lives in Tanzania! I am making her a Padfolio as a Christmas gift. In March she is off to The Hague in the Netherlands, as she has been chosen to be the Environmental Chair for the International Young People's Government Project for this year. I am so proud of her and excited for her! She is a very thoughtful and smart young lady and she is on a glide path to really become a chnage agent for her generation. I had this idea to make a padfolio for the notes or papers that she might collect from all of her various organizational meetings, whether she takes it with her to The Hague, is up to her.

I am making the piece from fabric paper, as a foundation. I started with lots of different text pages in as many different languages as I could get my hands on. I wrote to my brother to get some phrases in Swahili that would be particularly meaningful to her. The text pieces were put down int he first layer. Then I added the color layer. I used napkin tops, painted paper towel and more text. After the whole thing dried, I have coated it with 3 coats of Matte Medium to protect it. I was walking by the kitchen window and the sun was shining and the whole piece just lit up!! HAD to take a picture!!!! Because the sun was coming thru from the back, you see the outline of the text pages that were applied first. When not backlit, you see more of the text thru the color with no page outlines.

Now I have to decide how I am going to cut this piece up to create the padfolio. This is always the hardest part!!

I suppose that one could cover windows with this medium! But I am sure that fading would be an issue. I think that I will stick with my real stained glass!

Here is a picture of teh sheet of fabric /paper as it appears withoutt he sunshine. I will be sure to post pictures of the finished project. I need to get a move on to get this in the mail so she gets it along with her other gifts, before she leaves for her trip in March!!!!!!!!