Jewels of Autumn - Art Pins Featured in Etsy Treasury....

My little purple art pins are featurued in a beautiful "purple" themed Etsy Treasury for the next few days. I do LOVE PURPLE!! Just click on words Etsy Treasury above to check it out.

Laugh as much as you breathe and love as long as you live.

Autumn Leaves......

I can't wait to get outside. The weather here in North Carolina has been so beautiful, but with yesterday being the first day I could use my studio again, I just had to stay inside one more day and honor the day by painting with Lumiere in fall colors, before begining the outside chores.

I made this journal (based upon Sue B's padfolio pattern) cover as a runner up prize for the Pink Artists' (Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation) charity drawing of the beautiful, Love Squared art doll. In addition to the grand prize of Love Squared, there are tons of cool runner up prizes also made by the Pink Artists. You can take a look by going here.

These padfolios go together relatively quickly, and depending upon how much time you want to put into it by handpainting, beading, embellishing, etc., come together quite nicely.

For this one - I picked out a wild fall batik for the lining, and for the cover, I took some fabric out of the "ugly bag" to paint. (it makes me happy to be able to use ugly fabric by painting over it!)

I painted the cover with Lumiere metallic paint mixed with some acrylic. After it dried, I loaded up a leaf shaped rubber stamp with a ton of paint and stamped it. I really like "loading up" the stamp because it leaves an "imprint," (rather than just stamping on the surface.) I like that additional textural element. Once that dried, I sewed the three sandwiches of outer fabric, Peltex and inner fabric (batik) together with a satin stitch. Once the cover was put together I stitched on a silk leaf I painted with metallic paint, layered that with a bone leaf button, and put a handmade bead on top of that. I then braided some yarn and secured it with a wire laced with beads. I've got a few more in the works wherein I'm piecing the covers, rather than painting - whole cloth.

Today I'm going to switch gears and begin working on Jean's big block applique piece. She picked the Alabama Cotton Boll block to be done in red and green on white. I'm really looking forward to slowing down (physically and mentally) and doing some hand stitching.

Locked and Loaded.....

No free time - with the exception of an hour or two at 6:00 a.m. a few days last week. So today - after all chores were done, I decided that it's time to load up the Gracie frame with the purple quilt. Typically this would be a great "hand quilting" project, but I've no time this week. This is one of those "Git 'er done" jobs.

After many (many) hours of fussing, rolling, re-rolling, pinning, re-pinning, shooshing Gizmo off the batting (he likes to lay and roll on it) and BLEEDING (yep - I kept stabbing myself whilest pinning the quilt on to the leaders) I finally figured out how to load 'er up- straight, tight, and even. It took me over 1/2 the day. Good thing is -- you do it once -- and it's much easier the next time.


Before now, I've done only hand quilting (which I seriously enjoy), and machine quilting by bunching and rolling the quilt under the neck -- which is very doable -- but NOT FUN. I know, I'm a whimp -- but I HATE wrestling with all that fabric. I think that's why I like hand quilting so much more.

Sad thing is - it's 5:00 p.m., and I have to call it quits for tonight. We're taking the girl out for dinner as a farewell to summer as she starts school tomorrow and we're going to spend some "quality" time together -- whether she likes it or not :) So I'll have to leave Gracie alone for tonight and hopefully get a chance tomorrow or the next day to work on this as it must be on it's way to Ohio very soon.

Oh so many things in progress -- more on that tomorrow.

Enjoy your week!