Day and Night

I've got a great thing going - in my studio, in the garden, pool late afternoon and/or gallivanting and/or visiting the family during the day; doing prep work for some easy felting or stitching while watching tv with my husband in the evening (when we are not out and about).  I hope to have a whole bouquet of flowers by the first weekend of October; I've made four so far and already given one away as a thank you to the person who organizes our Habersham knitting (social) group.  Didn't get a picture of the pink one but I'm sure there will be many more.  These are lariat necklaces which are perfect for the Southern woman - a blossom arranged around her delicate neck while she sips her sweet tea (wine!) under the palmettos and crescent moon - hahahaha! I've been reading too many Southern novels so fun!

Anyway, still stuck on Joomchi (layers of delicious mulberry paper rolled together with nothing but water and then manipulated with your hands)  which is one of the other things I do in the evening as I have to be busy doing something with my hands to be happy.  I visited the Savannah Dick Blick store (what a treasure trove of everything an artists loves!) and spent some time with the resident artist brainstorming about the best way to display my Joomchi for the FAB (Fiber Arts Beaufort) and now I cant wait to see how my ideas will transfer into reality- stay tuned for more!

Green FanciFull Vest

Here is another FanciFull vest - so fun to make one or two pieces of felt, cut it/them up and stitch creativly back together - there is so much leeway; you can choose to seam a lot or a little depending on what you want to do; you can make it long or short, add a collar or not, use silk to bind the edges if the organic look isn't really for you.  It is fun and creative just to go along with the flow adding pieces here and there.

This one, however, has absolutely taken me forever to finish because I began it right after I finished six weeks of physical therapy because I very stupidly did something that caused me to fall flat on my back and then just when I was better, somehow I injured something in my ankle and it was so hard to stand for any length of time to layout the design - it wasn't really enjoyable and very frustrating because once I get started, there is nothing I love more than to let the design process take over but I just couldn't think straight . . . then there was travel and I brought my darling mom home here to SC for a week's vacation and she just left last Tuesday.  It is hard to be creative on demand so I just got back into feltmaking late last week and now I'm raring to go with a zillions ideas.  My fiber group is going to have a show/sale in early October, so my goal is to create something towards it each day and to try some new things.  

Samples

My Dad taught me never to use the word "hate"  - but I am allowed to STRONGLY DISLIKE and very frustrated with my new computer and Windows 8 - I've been using computers and photo software for a very long time but trying to work with this operating system is awful and eats up my time!!!  

Enough of that, for those of you who are interested, the workshop at Sara Felts in Vancouver had to be postponed - Vinitha put so much effort into making it work, but arranging for the machines was getting way too complicated so we decided that it was best to put it off for the time being; it WILL work out again but the next time will be much more simple and I'm ready!

I'm still working on achieving a good routine for work here in our new home - I admit that there are lots of distractions and travel; the time goes so much faster when you are having fun :-) and a lot of the fun we have been having is spending time with our adorable grandsons who are just 30 minutes down the road and we know that road well :-)

I've met some lovely creative souls and have joined a fiber group, FAB (Fiber Arts Beaufort).  We are having a show and sale in early October so besides workshop samples, I've been making lists (growing daily) of ideas for items to show and sell.  I thought after I retired that I'd have tons of time, well I do have more free time but I have sooo many creative ideas and not enough time for them all so I have to schedule and focus on each or I'll get nothing done - in the mix there is felting (of course), hand stitching, joomchi, dyeing, collecting leaves/flowers for eco printing/dyeing and gardening (add to that jewelry experiments).

I'm also teaching in Portland, Oregon, in mid-August, for a guild that meets in Charleston in September, and for the Baltimore Weavers Guild in November, so I've been working on another vest sample to ensure my pattern will work for students.   If you are a feltmaker and enjoy creative sewing, you have no idea of how much fun it can be to make felt fabric, decide how to best utilize the most interesting focal points in putting together a piece of wearable while learning techniques that can be utilized in other projects; you can truly get lost in your imagination, texture and color.  I find the process extremely liberating and relaxing working on a piece of wearable art that tells it's own story of what colors and textures you most enjoy.  Anyway, these pictures are of a new work in progress in the green/blue range.

Working with Mulberry Paper - Joomchi Beginnings

I've found another obsession - just can't get enough of Joomchi!  I'm completely enthralled by the way that working with simple mulberry paper and water can produce such lacy results and I have BIG plans to work with these pieces further.  I took a workshop a few years ago and the process really intrigued me.  If you want to know more, I love the book Joomchi and Beyond.  Basically, the process entails layering mulberry paper/water and lots of squeezing and the process reminds me very much of felting.  I'm still very much in the experimental stage and the ideas for enhancements and display are dancing around in my head!

Workshop at Sara Felts This June

Please - come join me at Sara Felts this June to enjoy playing with an Embellisher (provided) and creating your own one-of-a-kind gorgeous vest; the techniques you learn can be used again and again!

FanciFULL Mosaic Felt Vest

After delays due to a fall on my back (carelessness on my behalf because I still think I'm a spring chicken!) - thank goodness nothing was broken but I've had six weeks of physical therapy and on top of that a sinus issue that left me with no creative energy, I'm finally feeling GREAT and ready to roll :-) 

I have been working on vest samples for upcoming workshops; I found that I love nothing more than to create felt fabric - sometimes with the Embellisher and sometimes not - before cutting it all up and piecing together to take advantage of the texture.    It is easy to get lost in the design and it really is quite a creative and enjoyable process; using one simple pattern, you can make it as long or as short as you would like to showcase the felt.

This pink felt felt fabric was made right before I hurt my back - the inspiration was a gorgeous but quite wild swirls; a silk scarf from TJ Maxx in reds, fuschia and touches of plum - something I would never wear but just perfect to use in felting since the wool tones it down a bit.

The pictures aren't the best but it is too cloudy today to take better pictures outside, but you get the idea.  I will be doing this workshop for Opulent Fibers in Portland, Oregon, in August and for the Baltimore Weavers Guild in November.  I'm designing something similar but using more of the Embellisher for a workshop at Sara Felts in Vancouver this June.  I'm so excited to meet new people and to see what my students come up with - felters are such creative souls and this technique provides just another outlet for them to showcase their creativity.

Here is a another that I posted to Facebook a while back in a soft peach showcasing lots of silk and some velvet.  

If your group is interested in a workshop - it can be arranged!  just contact me either on here, email hermajestymargo@aol.com or message me on FB!

2014 SO FAR . . . .

This past year, I have come so far but still have so far to go; the more I learn, the more I find that I'd need another lifetime to accomplish it all.  The main focus besides getting our cottage and garden in order is still felting, of course, but I am still enamored with eco dyeing and eco printing. 
I have gotten some really brilliant information and tried some of it today - and I'm so excited with the results and this is just the beginning! pictures will follow soon as it is too dark outside now for me to use my new little photography studio set up in one of our screened in porches.  I do love printing with leaves but I also love natural dyeing - I've stocked up on a big variety of natural substances from Maiwa but there is so much to learn about which mordants to use. The outcome depends on what mordant was used and if it was added afterward or soaked ahead of time.  I do believe that I will be forced to keep notes - I'm not into taking time to write things down when I'm engrossed, just love going along with the flow but I can see it will be necessary especially if I am happy with the results.

I am only now getting my creative house in order - I've been making samples for upcoming workshops and waiting to hear about some other opportunities that are in the pipe line.  In the meantime, I've made two pieces of felt fabrics to cut up for another vest and created a sample book of silk paper for a workshop in Portland, Oregon, later this year. 

Here are the pictures of the felt that I am now going to cut up and stitch back together to create a vest - so fun to play with felt this way as you can play around with your design elements as you go along - nothing is set in stone; I'll be teaching this workshop for the Baltimore Weavers Guild this coming November.

For this project I used a red/violet silk burnout wrap that I found at TJ Maxx a while back andn used it as the inspiration piece and used a variety of techniques to create texture although I have learned through experience to leave a few places rather plain for design purposes - very, very fun when it all starts to come together!  I have some ladies from Tennessee who are coming to visit me to learn how - I met one of them, Helen, who is a dear sweet soul when I taught a while ago in Richmond and she brought her good friend Sue to take the Blossom Wrap class at the Maryland Sheep and Wool - these ladies are adorable and so eager to learn everything they can about felting - I can't resist because I have had those same feelings.  I just can't believe that they travel that far to learn from me :-)

Here is the silk paper, embroidered by hand and then enclosed in a book to keep all the samples together; I'll be teaching several workshops at Opulent Fibers this coming August and I'm so excited to see Kristi's setup especially those cool felting tables - I've been following her since we met at the MFS in 2012; have quite a bit of her wool and other fibers in my stash and it is luscious - love working with it!