Learning Saori Weaving...

I have not abandoned my painting, journaling, etc, but learning to weave is taking most of my attention lately. In researching on the web I came across Saori weaving,  http://gingerbreadsnowflakes.com/node/352 , which is a kind of freeform weaving using scraps of yarns and fibers to make different projects.

 

This is the beginning on an oval shape that I configured out of my Martha Stewart Knit/Weaving loom kit, which hubby got me for Christmas. I used some fun yarn from an old stash of yarns, plus some new yarn yarn that I picked up at Wal-Mart to practice with.

 



This is the finished piece as a wall hanging. It is approximately 24 inches long, including the top and bottom fringe. I am thinking that I may add some beads to the bottom fringe. My mama just loves the colors in the piece. I don't know how well they show up in the photo, but there are several different textures of yarn included.

 

This is actually the first one I tried, and it is on a handmade cardboard loom. I tried different textures and stutches on it. The yarns wrap all the way around the loom, then are cut and tied off to make the fringe. Here it is still on the loom. 

 

 

This one is about 10" x 12", including the fringe. I'm not liking the fringe much and am thinking I might trim it off some. These can be used for coasters (smaller weavings), mats, journal covers, embellishments on tote bags, etc. Whatever I want!

 

Both pieces hanging against a large mixed media WIP painting that I have redone so many times it's not even funny. She is about to wind up in pieces for art journaling, I think. Anyway, Saori weaving is a lot of fun, and I think I prefer the handmade cardboard looms over the MS looms. They are easier to handle while weaving, at least they are to me. :)

What I'm Working On Part One

Hi All!

Praying for all of you in the path of Hurricane Sandy. May you all stay safe.

 I also want to apologize for having to put the word verification back on my comments. I hate it too, but spammers have to ruin it for everybody it seems. I guess they have nothing better to do. I took it off, but had to put it back, because I was bombarded with spam every day it was off. :/ Your comments really mean a lot to me and I appreciate every one. Sorry it has to be so much trouble to leave one. :(

Anyway, I thought I'd share some of what I'm working on this week with ya! OK? :)

This is a page where I used up leftover paint. I see a cowboy boot in there! I like it! :)

She has the beginnings of a nose!

These two pictures should be reversed, but the bottom one is a 36" bed doll that I have sewn and stuffed. Her arms and legs have not been sewn on yet. The top picture is the beginning of her paper clay face, using techniques I learned in a cloth and clay workshop with Jane Desrosier. I made a much smaller doll in the workshop and it turned out pretty good, so I'm trying it on a large one now. Fingers crossed that it works! For now I'm calling her Dollie Doll.

I've had this 5x7" gallery canvas painting started for a while. I worked on it some the other day, but it's still very much a work in progress. This was an image that emerged out of paint, and she forgot her neck, I think. Hope I can fix that! :o

One of my favorites! Three old friends!

 

It had been a while since I did any doodle sketches, so I've been doing one a day in my 18x24" sketchbook for a few days. These are a few of them.

 



 

This a doodle sketch in its beginning stage. I close my eyes, make several marks and swirls on the page, then let an image immerge. Nothing has stepped out in this one yet...but it will. Sometimes the images are a bit shy and it takes a while for them to show themselves. :)

I can use these images as a base for drawings, paintings, journal pages, tear them up for collage, or just enjoy them for what they are. They help keep my drawing/painting looser, plus it's good brain exercise and fun.

I was going to show you some more wips, but I had trouble uploading the rest of the pics, so there will be a part 2 to the blog. I'm kind of like a butterfly flitting from project to project. :)

The next part will include some prints from playtime with my new Gelli Arts Gel Printing Plate. I've been wanting one for a long time, and thought they were too expensive, but I finally broke down and ordered one. Love it!

I've worked some on all these projects, plus I put ANOTHER layer of paint on Contrary Angel's wings (Remember her? the very large canvas/mixed media painting I started months ago), wrote a poem draft, and brought down a Granny Square crocheted afghan that I started years ago to finish. The poem will be on my other blog when it's finished.

Hope you've enjoyed seeing what I'm doing. I'm sure having fun creating and learning stuff! :D

Mixed-Media, Play Things, & Snow

Remember these?

This one was a rough draft drawn with a brush on a 20 x 24" canvas for a "Get It Out, Get It Down" workshop by Connie Hozvicka in the 21 Secrets Playground.

This one is how it wound up after multiple layers of writing, stamping, texturing, and pasting papers.

It was too busy to suit me, so I covered it in a thin layer of white gesso, then added more layers of papers, paints, etc. I lost track of how many layers. It now has a bit too much blue and pink to suit me, but I'm stopping while I'm ahead. Below is what it looks like now. I like it better than the other version...at least for now.

The words have a lot of meaning for me, because of the message the preacher gave at my aunt's funeral. His words really spoke to me and have stayed with me. I also wrote messages on papers, tore up, and pasted them under the layers of paint and textures. It's been very cathartic for me. I got a lot of stuff out and down on this canvas among the layers.

This is some of the art stuff I got for Christmas this year.  My niece got me a lighted paper cutter, my nephew and his wife gave me paints, canvas boards, aqua pencils, snow texture, and matte spray, and hubby gave me markers and hi-liter pens. I love it! I later took money that I got for Christmas and ordered some fluid acrylics, acrylic inks, unruyu paper, pens, markers, sketchbooks, 2 new cds, and some needle felting stuff to go with them.

I also got a lot of freebie art materials in the form of bubble wrap, tissue paper, shoe sole stamps, boxes, ribbon, papers, etc. I'm set for a lot of fun. Watch out! :)

We have 4+ inches of snow in downtown Rabbit Hop. This a picture of my grandpa's old shoe shop school bus. It was his last shoe shop, and is now parked next to my dad's work shop. The bicycle is an old one that Daddy bought at a sale before he passed away. He had plans to combine it with an old push lawn mower and make it into a novelty riding mower. He made one, but he was planning to make a better one. He had a lot of fun out of the first one. Great memories of both of them.

It's been a good year so far. Hoping it stays that way. :)

AEDM Weeks 3 & 4 and 21 Secrets-A Hodge Podge of Creativity

I didn't have as much time the last two weeks to create as I did the first two of AEDM and today is the last day, so this post counts as one of my creative things for today. I only created for a few minutes each day, so all of what I'm sharing are works in progress, except maybe the first one. There is also a daily list of creativity about half way down if you're interested.

When I worked, I worked on the same painting, adding layers every day and using the leftover paint on the journal pages in my Doodlicious Day Book, created in the 21 Secrets workshops (registration closes tomorrow, Dec 1). I've had fun arting every day, whether I have a finished piece to show you or not. Here's what I played with...

These two pages were made for the 21 Secrets workshop, Doors and Windows to Your Soul with Paula Phillips. The left page of a two page spread, using leftover paints, stamps and ink, and zebra duct tape (LOVE the zebra tape!). The big letters are sponge stamp alphabet letters randomly stamped around the page. The star shape is a cookie cutter. The cat is stamped on a piece of card stock, held down with zebra tape and a red sticker.

The words stamped down the right side also trail up the left side, across the top, and onto the door on the second page, and they say, "You Never Know Where A Puddy Cat Might Be Hiding."

The right side page of the spread (left page above) with the door closed. I made photos of the whole spread together, but they didn't turn out well at all, and the scanner won't scan both pages together. Anyway, the closed door is cut out of painted cardstock and is held on with a zebra duct tape hinge, inside and out. The G and stars trail down the door and end with an X under the copper wire door handle.

There he is! The right page again, door opened. There will be writing on the lined paper on the back of the door as soon as I figure out what I want to say. The other piece is some writing that I tore up and collaged on with pinkish/greenish cellophane on top. The cat is stamped on top of the cellophane...hiding. :) I may or may not add some more to these pages. I really kind of like them the way they are...

A random page from my Doodlicious Day Book, with the doodling still visible on the white background. I had some black paint left over, and I had been using the sponge stamp alphabet on a large painting, so I used up the paint with random letters on the page. There will be other elements added eventually.

You may remember the marbled book page from another post where I was learning the shaving cream/marbling technique. The journal page that it is on is actually pink marbled card stock, and they look much better together in reality than they do on here. The page is from the book "The Dancer" by Oriah Mountain Dreamer (I think that's her name). I was going to cut it off even with the journal page, but I kind of like it hanging over the top and bottom. I will put my own thoughts down on the left side.

Just a piece of cream colored card stock that I took a cookie cutter and used up some left over burnt umber paint on. This could be used as a journal background, or I could cut out the stars and paste them down on another project. Incidentally, I do have othe cookie cutters, but I like the star, and it's usually laying handy. Acrylic paint dries fast, you know. :)

These are my daily lists up til today, and I see that I scanned them out of order. Oh, well! I AM perfectly imperfect!

OK, This is the first draft of the 20x24" stretched canvas I've been working on for two weeks. It was another project for the Get It Out Get It Down workshop with Connie Hozvicka in 21 Secrets. I really like the idea and the design, painted better of course. I can't get it to post right side up, so you will have to tilt your head to the right. Sorry! Anyway, the base design and colors...see next photo:



Sorry, you'll have to tilt right again! This is the same painting after several days and multiple layers of writing, glazing, stamping, squiggling, and the light glaring on the top, since I couldn't scan it. Love the message. It's what the preacher preached at my aunt's funeral, and it has stuck with me. But the painting is too much like party confetti or something to me. Incidentally, the two doves are also done with a cookie cutter, a thinner one than the stars. Didn't like it at all, so...see next photo

 

Same painting yesterday after I added a burnt umber glaze then a burnt sienna glaze over that to tone it down. Hated that, so I then added a layer of gesso mixed with gel medium and smooshed it around with a sponge in a very thin layer. Over that I added a layer of red oil pastel and rubbed it on with a rag, which is what you see here. BUT I hated that too, so I took a bit of turpentine on a rag and took the oil pastel off, washed it off with water to get the oil residue off, and it now has another thin layer of gesso swirled around on it. So, basically, I'm now back to the beginning, only I already have a background of elements showing through the gesso. Where it goes from here, I don't know yet, but I'll show you when I quit on it. :)

This little fellow I just decided to throw into the mix. He's on the bottom corner of my apron. When I was learning the shaving cream/marbling technique I had a lump of shaving cream/paint left on my plate and without thinking I wiped it on my apron, which is why I don't wear good clothes when I paint. After it dried it kept reminding me of a bird. Of course, I was looking at it upside down. Anyway, the other day I had some black paint on a brush, so I painted him a head while I had the apron on. I like him! :)

A page that I've just started. It's on yellow cardstock. The acrylic paint is swiped on with an old credit card. The other day I was gluing this page to the back of another page, and I noticed these star shaped cut outs, cut out of textured scrapbook paper laying on the table, so I just stuck them on the page and outlined them with a black marker. There will be more elements and writing added as they come to me. :)

The left side of a double page spread. Below is the right side. OK, I worked all morning one morning picking up papers and cut out shapes off my table and gluing them to these pages with gel medium. Both pages are pretty much covered, giving it a lot of texture. A few days later I had quite a bit of paint left over in different colors and these pages were laying open just begging for some color, so color they got. Fluid acrylics were smooshed around with a brush. I layed a paper towel on top and pressed and pulled it up to leave the little dotted texture (love dots!). Then I took a brush and slung yellow paint on them. What fun! You can see a little bit of the underlying cutouts if you look closely. I love it! :)

Right page of spread. I don't know what possessed me to put that bright green star in the corner, except that I had green paint left over and the cookie cutter was handy. LOL That may not stay, and, of course there will be writing on it when the words come to me.

Left side of a two page spread. You can see some of my original Doodlicious doodling under the layer of paint, left over, of course. See, I told you I had other cookie cutters besides the star! I love this fish one almost as much as the star. I wonder what my nieces would say if they knew I was using the cookie cutters they give me for Christmas to journal with instead of to bake with. Tee Hee!

Right Page of spread. I kind of like these pages as they are, plain and simple. Right now I'm thinking some writing will be all I'll add, but that could change...

Are you worn out yet? :) Almost done! This page is textured scrapbook paper with a pocket of red and gold metallic smooth scrapbook paper glued to it with a note sticking out the top. Lots of space to the left for me to chatter on, and of course there'll be a secret on the pocket note. ;) 

The right side of a two page spread, and it's a manilla envelope, which is smooth and yellow looking with left over paints smeared and drizzled over it. I free hand cut the angel from a paper towel, seperated it into two one-ply angels and used gel medium to glue them down. The flying hearts are the cutouts from the center of her dress skirt. They tried to disappear on me when the gel medium was absorbed into them. The envelope can hold extra papers, cutouts, secrets...

Left page of the spread. It's on a textured piece of scrapbook paper that had alphabet letters in shades of gray, which accounts for the difference in texture and color. I like the ghostly appearance of the paper towel angels. There will be more added to these pages as I go along.

Last picture is of yours truly in heaven. Mp3 player plugged into my ears, styrofoam plate/palette in one hand and a paint brush in the other! Happy times! :)

Everybody asks, so, no, I didn't paint the little girl in the picture. Wish I had, but it's a Renoir print. The eyes on top of my head belong to my little dog angel, Kibbles, in an oil painting, which I almost have finished.

Ok, I'm tired and I know you are, so I'm off now to check my email and see how else I can torture that painting that I shared above. I may not get it finished today, but that's my creative project planned for this the last day of AEDM.

It's been a lot of fun for me, and even though I've shared a lot of works in progress with you, I hope at least one thing made you smile. :)

PS-Apologys for the form of this post. My laptop is trying to quit on me and I think Blogger was too. :/

Week 2 AEDM and 21 Secrets-Another Mixed Bag of Creative Attempts!

This is week two of art every day month and I am still participating in the 21 Secrets playground and again I've saved the week into one post, so there is a mixture of projects and another list of what I did creatively this past week.

I scanned the list pages in backwards, so you have to read the right side then the left side to read them in order. Sorry! I am perfectly imperfect! :)

 More experiemnting with shaving cream and fluid acrylics on card stock. Love the top one! From the workshop Everything But the Kitchen Sink with Heidi Dilley.

 Another shaving cream/acrylic print on green card stock this time (top). The bottom is an experiment on off white card stock using blue and yellow linoleum block printing ink brushed on, then I took a Q-tip dipped in clorox and drew the face. Not too good a drawing, but I like the effect. The clorox/ink technique is also from the Everything But the Kitchen Sink workshop with Heidi Dilley.

 More experiments with clorox and ink-with the wrong kind of ink apparently. Stamps dipped in clorox didn't work and neither did a Q-tip on the bottom one. It did a little on the top one if you look closely. I still have some pretty journal page backgrounds.

 OK, this is more like how the clorox/ink technique works. The right ink makes all the difference! This is in my Moleskine journal. I still haven't gotten my rubber stamps to work on any of them, but Q-tips dipped in clorox worked well. I like it, but I'm thinking I need to visit Heidi's workshop video again.

Another clorox/ink page. I love this one on salmon colored cardstock using a pear shaped sponge and Q-tips dipped in clorox. I don't know if I'll be able to do anything to this as a journal page or not. We'll see...

Trying To Live Life in Color--This is a double page spread in my 11x14" Canson sketchbook/journal. It's a project for Connie Hozvicka's workshop, Get it Out, Get it Down! We were to paint standing up and being fearless in applying paint, textures, etc. We were also to write a letter about something that was bothering us, tear it up and layer it among the paint layers. That way we get it out of our system, but nobody else can read it.  I didn't have anything in particular bothering me at the time, so I just wrote stream of conscious stuff on magenta unruyu rice paper, tore it up, glued it down, and covered it up. This is very freeing, and I love how it turned out. Sure it's not perfect, but I loved doing it, and besides that, Perfect is Boring!

Faith--Another 21 Secrets project--This one is on a 9x12" canvas (the next one will be unstretched and larger) and is from the workshop Running Loose on Canvas with Samantha Kira Harding. We learned to do all sorts of things to the canvas and this is something that I also love and will be doing more of. There are multiple layers of fluid acrylic glazing, drawing, writings in gold and black, glued papers, etc. The angel is one of my paper cut outs, as are the flower and two hearts. The little bunny square over her wing is one of my original inchies. I used the top of a cookie cutter to make the stars. The buttons are sewn on by hand with copper metallic embroidery thread, and so is the fabric with my Granny S's drawn work in it. It's from a pillow case that I wore out and saved her work from. When the side with Faith on it is lifted up there is a gold metallic piece of a paper doilie over a burgundy ribbon from a flower arrangement from my dad's funeral. I'm happy with how this turned out too and look forward to doing one on flat canvas where I can use the sewing machine and some hand embroidery.

Just fooling around with paper cutting on the cover of a booklet from The Renaissance Center. I layed it on the greenish background for scanning purposes, but I like it. :)

Just some idea doodling that I did in my Moleskine last night while watching TV. I visited someone's blog who did mandalas in a different way (I'm sorry I don't remember whose it was) and doodled an idea. I also jotted down a list and some notes. Couldn't find a black pen, so I just went with a red sharpie. I did mean to put a watercolor wash over them before I scanned them, but forgot. Oh, well...

Please lay head to right shoulder to see correctly--It's turned right on my pictures, but I tried three different times and it wouldn't upload right on here. Don't know what the problem is, but it should be standing on end. :/

Anyway, this is a 20x24" canvas that I started yesterday, so it is a work in progress and this is just the beginning stage, but I thought I would share it as something I worked on this week. I used Connie Hozvicka's Fearless technique by painting standing up and just putting paint to canvas. Of course, it will look nothing like this when I'm finished. I'm already thinking of incorporating ideas from the Running Loose on Canvas class into it. I'm loving the idea and the colors and layout so far, but I'm just getting started so we'll see how it goes along and I'll show you when it's done. :)

I guess that's it for this week. I'm hoping to do some art stuff today (Sunday), but also expecting company, so whatever I do today I'll share next time. Hope something on here made you smile!