Spool Story workshop

Last Saturday, was Carol Wingert's "Spool Story" workshop.  Patty Fleming and her husband opened up their beautiful home for 16 of us to participate in this workshop.  Carol always creates wonderful projects.  She fills some kind of large container for each of us and decorates it.  Inside we find a treasure chest of fabric, trinkets, ribbon, trims, and the bits and pieces to complete the entire project.  These workshops are great fun!

Each one of us found our own special box with a lollipop flower on top and a fabric name tag.  Carol always packages up many treasures inside each box for our projects.

There was a burlap bag inside full of French ribbons and trims.  You can see some of my completed pieces on the right.

A bundle of beautiful fabric pieces ranging from canvas, to cottons, to silks!  The parcel contains some rubons, labels and bits of wire for the project.

Here you can see my spool that is awaiting my finished strip of squares.  You also see more trims and stuff that came in those two brown envelopes.

The inside of the box has black and white gingham fabric lining.  You can see the metal top that goes on the spool, makings for a tiny nest, and the strip to attach all the little squares for the story.  In the bag is a pocket watch that we can fill with a small collage and attach to our finished spool.

Late in the afternoon, Patty prepared a selection of desserts for all of us.  She made these cute teacups that held two of the most scrumptious chocolate chip cookies!  Isn't this just the cutest thing?  Patty made enough for every one of us!  How special!  How wonderful!

A wonderful time was had by all!  Thanks to Carol, Vern and Ashley Wingert for all the prep work!  And thanks to Patty and her hubby for opening their beautiful home to all of us, for cooking the most scrumptious foods (the gumbo was fantastic!), and for being such welcoming and delightful hosts!

Fabric finds yesterday

I was looking for some birdies yesterday.  Finally found what I wanted, but also stopped in a thrift store and scored these wonderful fabrics:

Every piece in this picture is Waverly except the blue ticking.  I was so excited to find these pieces.  The one on the top left is actually a pair of curtains made by Waverly.  They are tattered and faded -- all the better!  The top right piece has the prettiest little roses on it.  Great piece for covering a bench or for a pillow.  The piece in the center has large handwriting in French.  There were several strips of this fabric in the bag along with one large square.  I have seen this fabric on pillows that cost a small fortune!  Think I will be making one for moi!  The cowboy themed fabric is something I am always on the lookout for -- Kim, we can share some of this!  And the ticking is always appropriate for cowboy/cowgirl collages or altered books.

Here's my little flock of birdies.  Way cute!  Should I paint them a nice light ivory?  Think I will do that to a couple of them and see how I like it.

A new project. . .

During the One World One Heart giveaway this month, I discovered a lot of new blogs.  One in particular gave a tutorial on decorating a wire lampshade, you know, the wire frame that is left after the fabric is removed.  This tutorial set off a project which I started today.

I found three small lampshades at the thrift store.  They were all covered with various materials -- fabric, paper and some plastic.

I stripped them all down to the wire frame . . .

And then I wrapped the wire with white floral tape because there was some glue residue on the frames.  Tonight I will finish wrapping all the frames while I watch TV.  Tomorrow I hope to get one decorated to share with you.  Be sure to come back for a visit to see what I did.

While reading the blog Dollybelle's Peepshow today, I saw her fabulous fabric finds at her local thrift store.  If you sew, decorate or use fabric in your artwork, check out her mother lode of a find!  How lucky can you get?

More blogs you might enjoy visiting.  I discovered these through Etsy Cottage Style blog.

Some Place in Thyme

For Heart and Home

Idyll Hours

Cowgirl Up!

Here is the next fabric book that I have completed. This one is going to be a class project. All cowgirls of the West.View of the bottom. This one is filled with lots of fringe, denim ruffles (found on a denim skirt in the girls section of Goodwill), and plenty of cowgirls.

I am going to offer this as a class. No date yet. The class will have plenty of techniques (learned in KC Willis Collage Camp -- I have permission) in it to satisfy even those who have done fabric books before. Time to Cowgirl Up!

Having fun!

Since I signed up for the collage camp with KC Willis, I have been scouring my stash as well as many thrift and craft stores. My friend, Joy, and I spent last Friday going all over the East Valley. Stopped at Hobby Lobby, Michael's and Goodwill.

The background piece I found at Merchant Square just this week. Look how it fringes! Love that. And the pattern is tiny roses that are burgundy and pink. And it is soft! I think it has already been washed. The piece of black fabric is velvet that has a pattern on it. There is a name for that, but I can't think of it now (embossed velvet??). That is all I have of this velvet. Drat! It really is a pretty piece. Discovered that and the ticking in my stash. The ticking is a very small piece, too! Another drat because I love the color. And coffee stained it will be great!

Kim, Kim, Kim!!!! Thanks ever so much for this grand fan!! I absolutely love it! I hope that this weekend I will be able to scour Mesa to see if I can come across more of this good stuff! You have much better luck than I do!

The fan rests against the wire dress form on a cedar chest that my dad made when he was in high school. The dress form has a vintage lace collar, a vintage corsage (pink rose, of course!), pearls and a light pink ribbon tied in a bow. I love this! Thanks, Kim!!!

Sneak peek!

Here are some pics from a project that I have been working on through my cold-ridden, fogged-up mind. Yesterday, with a clearer head, I did more work on this altered book project and am getting closer to having it finished. I am going to offer it as a class, but first it has to be finished.

This is an altered house book. The idea for it came from the most recent issue of Cloth, Paper, Scissors. I decided to do a wintertime book. As I progressed through getting the pages done, it suddenly became a "flip book" yesterday. Trying to figure out how to view the entire book and not see some of it upside down, I knew it had to flip. As in once you look at it from one side, you can flip it over and look through it again and get a totally different book.This is one of the finished pages in the altered book. I know it looks washed out, but the flash did that. If I don't use the flash, the colors wash out. Hmm! Time to get out the owners manual for the camera and do some research.

Lots of techniques used in this altered house book. Collage, fabric, plenty of gesso, plenty of sparkly things, plenty of recycled vintage things, Pearl Ex (not shown), hearts, angels. The flip side will feature more Christmas items to become a Christmas book.

Of course, I am not leaving those awful red rings on this book. It needs slightly larger, regular binder rings on it. I hope to get to Staples today to remedy this.

La Mode Illustree slide mailer collage

I picked up this small slide mailer at Mystic Paper earlier this week. Decided to do a quick project with it this morning. I made this little book. Below is a peek inside the slide mailer book.
I used old images from my scrap box, pink paint, papers, fabric (the book spine cover), trim, a stamp, and Stickles. Quick to do and fun!!

Productive weekend

I have been working all this holiday weekend on what I call a "Fashion Folio." One definition of a folio is "a case or folder for loose papers." My folio is actually an altered book that won't be bound together, but tied with a pretty ribbon to keep its contents together when it is finished.The kitchen island is where I have been most of Friday and all day on Sunday.
Plus I have been at my sewing machine and sorting through my boxes of fabrics and trims.
This little doll I had made several months ago, but she has found a place in this folio.
Here you can see I have also been collaging papers and pictures to the pages of this book. Spent most of Friday hunting up paper, wall paper, and fabrics to include in the book. I have sewn or glued them to torn pieces of manila cardstock.

These pieces here were actually taken from an old altered book I made (didn't feel bad about tearing it up!) and a transfer made in a class taken a long time ago. Just using some recycled items makes this folio more interesting. The covers are from an old Reader's Digest. More on those later!

This is a "work in progress." If you look closely you can see that most of the images are held in place with a paper clip. I am still adding things, moving things from page to page, redoing, and reworking. Got lots more to add: sequins, beads, jewelry bits, more Stickles, more coloring. Hmm! Perhaps this is a submission piece in the making??!!