Presents for boys

 

I would not have thought that I could be inspired by a football strip - in this case Norwich City, however the design elements are all there waiting to be used in (dare I say it) a more creative way than on a t-shirt. This is part of a  present for a great nephew whose christening I will attend in late July in needless to say - Norwich.

I made the letters first on a heavy watercolour paper, I used a big brush fibre tip pen to colour them in with canary yellow. Then using a selection of fine tipped pens I zentangled them all over. This doodle kind of art is so soothing that meditations have been based on them. Next I cut the letters out and blackened all the edges. Using a large piece of watercolour paper 22"x15" I stencilled on the lion motif and when it was dry I applied a procion dye wash to the paper. Then it was a case of measuring up and laying out the design before finally gluing every piece down.

At this stage I was going to give the whole piece an acrylic wax seal but I just spotted in time that one of the pens wasn't waterproof. This will not be a problem as the finished piece will be under glass in a simple frame. Note to self - check labels on all pens in future, I could have easily ruined a piece of work I had spent several hours on!

Samples

A pleasant day spent doing more of the same - trying different ideas and colourways for this lovely stencil. Photo's look a bit flat but some sense of depth is being achieved. Yesterday's work was on heavyweight cotton rag paper and todays is worked straight  into my journal.

Tomorrow I shall start experimenting on fabrics. I have in mind some of my French Linen.

Back in the workroom

It's so good to be 'making' again after the Christmas break. Very soothing and calming to be playing with some rich colours.

On our way back from visiting our daughter and a wonderful lunch in Fortnums in  London last week we called into Artvango at Knebworth, as always we had a really warm welcome from Kevin (and a welcome coffee). It's a dangerous place to visit  especially when basking in a glow of Christmas largesse. I came across some cotton rag paper which I often use as it takes paint and stitch so well. I usually use the 210gsm weight but just had to try out some 640gsm I found on the shelf, it's practically a board so it should take a lot of  abuse with paints and dyes and stitch.

I have had this copper stencil which I found in an antique shop in Cromarty during my last Visit to Scotland. The very knowledgeable owner thought it may have been applied to linen that was imported into Cromarty from Eastern Europe at least a hundred years ago, may be more.

I have used procion dyes, Golden iridescent acrlyic, Inktense and gel crayons to create an image from the stencil. The next part will be to challenge my much abused sewing machine to sew around the edges of the design.

This is all part of my explorations for an Emb.Guild challenge for an exhibition in the coming year. So I really am doing some proper work and not messing about with 'eye candy' although it is a teeny bit glitzy.

Happy new year to all those people who have looked at my blog during the past year I hope to make it a more exciting affair in the coming year as I get to grips with posting and adding a bit more interest and gadgets to the presentation.

Happy crafting to all!

More Prevarication

On Monday whilst cleaning up from the grandsons weekend visit I got way laid by the papers we had been painting together. Given wax crayons, texture plates,stamps, punches and Koh-i-noor paints and a little bit of subtle direction  they  always produce wonderful papers for me to play with - which is what I've been doing in between other arty things ever since.

Children always make the most wonderful papers - they are not concerned with producing anything arty or limited by what they can or can't do. Paint is sploshed around by the gallon and when it all eventually dries some lovely effects are achieved quite accidentally.

Add a little bit of stitch and ideas happen.

I photographed every pleasing combination  and then bundle all the pieces into the box marked 'painted papers'.