Saturday, June 02, 2007

Colour me Orange


Colour me Orange
Originally uploaded by curli
It seems "Forever" since I've actually contructed a CQ block.
This is for a very special "ORANGE" person..............
Having at last structured the block...........I've used kimono sliks,silks from cheongsam,brocade,and plain old (Patchwork) cottons,now "it's time" to embellish it and turn it into a...............................(wait and see!)

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Embellisher_Art_Postcards



Yesterday's mail delivered this sparkling beauty from Suzan W of the Embellisher_Art_Postcard group,where we've been having a swap.

For those of my CQing friends,"embellisher" is a term that resulted from savvy marketting by Babylock when they named their needle punching machine an "Embellisher"!

Being the first cab off the rank,so-to-speak,the name stuck,and whether you own a Janome Xpression like me or in the cases of others Viking and I think Husqvarna also have a machine in the market now,generally everyone says "embellisher"

This swap required that we needle felted a background,then went "wild"!
Suz has used gorgeous ribbons,threads,Angelina fibre(I think) and the lace motif.
Not being a skilled photographer I found this sparkling piece difficult to photograph.but trust me,it's a truly gorgeous card!
Thanks Suz!

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Monday, May 28, 2007

PSI


The upper photo shows the partly finished PSI (plus sized inchies)
The lower photo shows them mounted on corrugated card.

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Inchies?? PSI's ??


What is an "Inchie" you ask:
Think of a fabric and fibre Postcard;
an ATC--Artist Trading Card----------and as night follows day,we get the Inchie and the Plus Sized Inchie!

Most people by now know of the Postcard with it's 6by 4 inch format;

The ATC has a 2.5 by 3.5 inch size

and the Inchie, my friend ,is the miniature version of both the postcard and the ATC:
A one inch fabric and fibre art square.

And then Normajean Brevik over at Fiber Art Traders (aka "FAT" to its members)
took pity on those of us with fat fingers and introduced us to PSI..Plus Sized Inchies---
which are 1.5 inch squares.
Trust me,you'd be surprised at how much easier these art sqaures become with that extra half an inch in their dimensions!

The lavender,red,turquoise and purple squares on the left are all one inch squares,and the first I attempted.

The midnight blue and silver ones are 1.5 inch squares or PSI.

The four sets of Inchies were the first I made and were swapped on Carol Taylor's "Textile_ Challenges" group ....and I learned the hard way.!!

I was required to make nine one inch squares for each colour way.
Okay,easy.....a three inch square divided.
My first mistake was fusing the fabric to a stabiliser (in this case,Timtex)
Because I prefer hand work,this made things difficult when I started embellishing;
so I'd advise using a lightweight stabiliser (iron-on Pellon)

You'll also note that apart from most of the Lavender squares,and some of the Turquoise ones I did not "finish" the edges!
(Finished edges were not a requirement,but it does give a better effect)

Before I say anything further,let me tell you where I first heard of the Inchies......and it was Carol who told me:
An Australian woman,Dotee featured One inch fabric collages on her blog"Dotslifeandart"
http://dotslifeandart.blogspot.com/ in mid January this year when she blogged her Fabric Collage Tutorial;

Sara Letchner on http://artsquaresswap.blogspot.com/
also featured them i during May,where you can see how some members used their Inchies to create something else.
Carol on Textile_Challenges ran a Swap, and kindly helped with background information I'd forgotten about (Thanks Carol)
Normajean on FATS went to the slightly larger format.........





So really,how you fabricate your inchie is limited only by your imagination;
Think of them as miniature quilts.......having three layers like most quilts.

But do remember...if you you embellish heavily all over the square it will be difficult to do a machine edge finish after you have added the fabric backing.

My next sets I want to incorporate an eyelet in each one so that they can be more easily used as Charms.

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