Sun #6

Remember me? I'm the one who used to blog at least once a week. Being out of the house and my studio for a week and then getting into gardening mode, I just haven't had anything to show. But I did finish this sun block where I had to "put objects in a grid".

I had fun with this one, even though I did a lot of ripping out and doing over. I used a fabric marker by Crayola on the upper left yellow sun and the two on the far right. They were the easiest to do.


For the other suns I used Pearl Ex Pigment Powers. I had purchased these several years ago and then never really know how to use them. For the center sun with the spiral I mixed the gold powder with yellow paint. I didn't think the metallic showed up very well, I mixed the other powers with textile medium and I was very pleased with those results.

This was Super Copper and it looks very metallic, especially against the dark blue.

This powder was Pink Gold. I also use Sparkling Gold for the sun at the bottom of the block.

And here they are all together. The next card that I drew was Positive/Negative. I hope to work on that this week. 

I'm linking up with Off the Wall Friday.

Pink Snow

We have a lot of flowering trees in my development and every year I am thrilled with these crabapples. As beautiful as they are in bloom on the trees, I love the way the fallen petals on the ground resemble pink snow.

I have started taking my phone with me on my morning walks, good for counting my steps and also for capturing any plant beauty that I see.

Finally....Sun # 5

Yep, I finally finished my hand embroidered sun a few days ago. I would have been done sooner, but I wasn't satisfied with the face. As my sister pointed out, she looked sad and I agreed, so I laboriously picked out all the stitching, using the tips of my very sharp Gingher embroidery scissors and a tweezer. I made a new face separately and buttonhole stitched around the edges. Again, as my sister said, this new one looks quite pleased with herself.

I only used a few stitches: running stitch variations, chain stitch, French knots, outline stitch, and button hole.

The little tendrils around the edges were an afterthought. I thought that it looked a little static with just the sharp points. Of course, that added to the time. I'm glad it's finished and I will definitely send this one into CBS.

The next card that I drew was "Put objects in a grid pattern" and I think I know exactly what I'm going to do. I will be out of my studio and my house for a few days. I am having all the floors on the first floor done over. I am taking out the hated tile in my kitchen and replacing it with hardwood and having all the rest of the hardwood floors refinished to match in a nice mellow color, a bit darker than what I have now. Fortunately my sister lives two doors down from me so I will move in with her and will be close enough to check in on the progress. Tomorrow the movers are coming to move all the furniture into the garage for the duration. It's been a LOT of work because I had to empty china closet, book cases, etc, etc, take down pictures, put away all accessories but I think I'm going to love it when it's done.

Sun #4

The last card that I drew for the External Forces project was stitching, hand or machine. I decided to do hand embroidery and I'm still not finished. It is taking me forever as I stitch an hour or two almost every evening in front of the TV. So I decided to also make a machine stitched sun, which only took a few hours.

Everything was done by machine. The rays are free motion quilted just using a straight stitch back and forth with two different variegated threads.

I used Dupioni silk for the face and a free motion narrow satin stitch for the features.

I'm almost done with the hand stitched one and I'll show you that when it's done.

I'm linking up with Off the Wall Friday.

Wordless Wednesday