High-Tech Adventures

I've surprised myself today by learning how to download photos from my camera to Microsoft SkyDrive -- and thence to my memory stick or...I hope...onto this blog.

I've been working hard on the "roses" piece, to whit:

I'm now ready to re-consider the "grid" portion.  I wasn't sure that there was enough balance using only thread to stitch onto the surface, so this morning I tried a different tack: creating a thread grid sample with water-soluble fabric:

Grid stitched on Fabri-Solvy (R) - before dissolving

 Looked good...but then I cut away the excess fabric (yes, all the insides of those squares), dissolved the rest and pinned it over the background. 

Nope.  Even though this is just a sample (not secured) I can tell it's not what I want.  It's too wobbly, too 'all over', too imprecise, compared to the black applique squares I've sampled -- as in this photo, taken before I finished applying all the roses.

Next step: re-audition fabric squares.

Back to work -- but before I go, I'm linking this with Nina-Marie's Off the Wall Friday.  :-)  My next check-in will be Monday (God willing); have a great weekend! 

*Whoo-hoo!  Not only was I able to share this with you, but I was able to re-size the file so it wouldn't be too large to upload/download/share in an e-mail/store efficiently on my memory stick! 

Quietly Busy

I am posting less often these days...in part because I am working and sampling and in part because I'd rather be out-of-doors, and the Outdoor Studio is not conducive to computer work.

However, there have been photos...and knitting, too!

I finished the hoodie for my husband's cousin's first grandchild, a boy -- a couple of weeks old now, Baby C:

I've almost finished Niven, a capelet, from the Berroco book of Nora Gaughan patterns, #13 -- knit in Lustra.  Once it's finished I'll post a photo -- I promise!  This one is in a discontinued colour (a hot pink) and will be a store sample at The Crafty Lady -- my first store sample!

It's a pretty little thing and once I have it back from the store, I think I'll enjoy it 'round my shoulders of a cool evening.

On the quilting front, I continue to sample techniques.

The current project?  A 10" x 10" that must be mounted on stretched canvas for a silent auction donation to the Lacombe Arts Foundation -- due at the end of August.  The tree theme continues, and this week I have been playing with acrylic felt, the embellisher machine, and the heat gun.

I've been trying to recreate the fungus on the mountain ash (aka Rowan) in my back yard:

I thought acrylic felt might work...embellished with yarn and then burned away with the heat gun.  I tried a couple of colourways in my samples:

Yarn felted to acrylic felt, burned away

Here it is from the 'back' side, which I liked better...

And here it is in a different colourway:

But it didn't matter...In the end, I knew I needed something 'lacy' but with a softer hand, less 'plastic'.  I can use these samples, cut into pieces, for another project.

I turned to water-soluble fabric, and a combination of hand and machine stitching, and have begun my next sample:

I free-motion machined a pattern drawn from samples of the fungus, outlined and enlarged, and have now begun to embroider over the machine stitching using DMC floss, 2 strands, in different greens.  Beads will be added to achieve a 'dewy' effect...and then the water-soluble fabric will be dissolved to leave (it's hoped!) a lacy, beaded fabric that can be overlaid on the background -- a nubby olive green silk.

Stay tuned...

This will be linked to The Needle and Thread Network's WIP Wedneday.  I'm off to the shop tomorrow...
Ta-ta for now!