Spring Handbag collection!

The sewing continues....my little fashionista self loves handbags so guess what I've been working on....handbags!

My wonderful husband saw the writing on the wall with this whole sewing thing and bought me a Pfaff Ambition 1.5 machine, 196 stitches, computerized, automatic tie-off, and so much more, I am totally in love with it. My faithful Kenmore with its 9 stitches will now be the official mixed media sewer for paper, painted canvas and other stuff I really don't want to sew with my new baby.

Signed up for the STITCHED workshops, several awesome online workshops all together on one site. First one I did was the Fylerion Bag with Sara Lawson, I found this awesome plaid Ultrasuede at Joann's that was perfect for this project.

The decoration for the flap was a pin I also found at Joann's, it completed the whole Scottish vibe.

Next up was a bag of my own design with a mixture of home decor fabric and red brocade, the flap is another Ultrasuede.

Latest project is a clutch inspired by a tutorial on the THREADS magazine site. My stash includes a lot of yarn/fiber so that along with a couching foot for my machine and some fabric applique produces this fun little number.

Here is the back showing more couching and applique....

That concludes the craft portion of this blog, now on to the (much anticipated) Crazy Cat Lady portion.

Apollo is the Studio Cat, Dana could care less, that 10 feet from the house to the studio is just a tad bit too far from the cat food and her cushy binkie.

WHAT APOLLO DOES WHILE I AM SEWING

WHAT APOLLO DOES WHILE I AM WORKING WITH PAPER

WHAT APOLLO DOES WHILE I AM RETURNING EMAIL...PAYING BILLS...AND TRYING TO LOAD MUSIC INTO iTUNES

Needless to say my studio comes equipped with a lint roller to get the hair off the fabric, paper, bills and CD's.

Moving onto the GARDEN portion....

Kind of a crappy spring so far here in Bellingham, lots of rain, SNOW (boo...hiss), more rain and wind. However things are coming up, the snowdrops are always the first.

Rhubarb is making a good showing.....foreshadowing of pies and crisps.

Angelina Fiber Play

Played for a few hours yesterday with Angelina fibers, polyester fibers that can heat bond to themselves producing a sheet of polyester film, also called fantasy film by some. After perusing the ye olde Internet for a while I had come across a product called BoNash bonding power (aka 007), basically fusing medium in a powder form. The nifty thing is you can sprinkle your Angelina pieces with it and then bond them to fabric, netting etc. Here are the basic ingredients of yesterdays work....

Angelina fibers in assorted colors, some are not heat fusible and therefore must be sandwiched between the heat fusible variety, iron, Teflon sheet, and the 007 and a variety of sequins, decorative fibers and fabric. You can embed flat things in the Angelina, hence the sequins and decorative fibers.

Sheets with inclusions and bonded to fabric or netting....

Sheets not bonded to fabric....

Bonded to some black spider web netting, with sequin inclusions.....

You can stamp the fibers by placing the loose strands on a inked rubber stamp, Teflon sheet over that and then iron.

These samples will be cut into decorative shapes, edging and embellishments for other projects. 

Messed around in the garden this morning, finally got the beans planted and erected the netting over the bed to keep the birds from plucking them from the ground as soon as they come up. The rhubarb is a happy camper right now, probably all of the rain....

And of course Dana wants everyone to know that It's Good To Be A Spoiled Princess.

Altered Stiletto & Mouse Adventure

New altered Stiletto for the ArtFest gallery, the theme is birds so lots of bright feathers. This shoe was made in memory of my sweet friend Sherri, many of the materials for this shoe were ones that were also used during the last retreat she hosted at her Sparrow's Nest Studio. Body of shoe was covered in altered paper towels and sprinkling of glitter. Heel was painted and then a random application of some Jones Tones foil.

In another shoe related story The Vermin (aka the Cats) have outdone themselves again in the mouse department.

We were sitting watching TV on Sunday and I had not seen the cats in the living room for a bit which usually means they are up to something so I went to find them. They were in the bedroom staring very intently into my closet at my shoes. The back door had been open and they had that "we have something cornered" look in their eyes. After shooing them out of the bedroom against bitter protest and shutting the door I looked around in the closet really good and could not see anything..... and then noticed that one of my brand new 3 inch heels had suddenly grown a long skinny tail. There was a BIG fat mouse tucked into the shoe, the shoe is a peep toe so his little face was peaking out the toe and his tail was hanging over the heel. I picked up the shoe VERY carefully because I did not want him to bolt and then be wandering the house for eternity.  Managed to get mouse, shoe and myself out to the back yard and let him go. I am sure he was pretty traumatized, what with being trapped in that leather prison with two cats breathing down his neck. We think Apollo caught him, and so I guess we have to stop calling Apollo "The Big Marshmallow" and start calling him the "Mighty Hunter".




FX pictures

Have not posted in a while, there are some projects that are being worked on but not quite done yet. In the meantime I am having a complete love affair with my new Droid smartphone, I found the FX Camera App on the Droid Market and downloaded it. Very cool, here are some pictures taken just a minute ago.

This is my Hosta that is coming up in the shade garden, picture taken with the Toy Camera mode. Gives it a retro kind of look.

Here is Apollo sitting in the flower bed, in the SymmetricCam mode. He looks quite entranced with himself.

Last but not least here is my Cinderella Party Shoe as Andy Warhol would see it.

The possibilities are endless with this app, I am sure there will be more to come.

Artist Trading Cards

I am lucky enough to be part of a group of artists called the Sister's in Art Society (SAS), this month we had our annual Valentine's party and exchanged ATC's and other wonderful handmade items. Here are some samples of my cards, the backgrounds were made using Distress Inks that had been watered down. The blank cards were pressed into one wash, dried with an iron and then pressed into another wash. I added specialty paper, the stamped face, rhinestone embellishment and fibers to finish it off.

Close ups....

I love these Distress Ink's by from Ranger. They were developed by Tim Holtz, he has some great demo's on his website here.

I am still grinding my way through my website design class, there are episodes  of extreme panic followed by "whew, maybe I'm not a dumb as I thought" moments. I foresee extended periods of hair pulling and wine drinking when I actually do sit down and attempt it on my own. Til the next time I leave you with this slightly out of focus studio cat picture, enforcing the motto that one's feet (paws) can never be too clean. Apollo has a slightly obssessive compulsive thing about keeping his toes clean. He likes to sit on my lap while we watch TV and it's a little distracting when you are trying to watch Lost and he is gnawing away at his toe jam.

Cupcakes

Just a quick post to share the fabulous cupcakes one of my good friends brought me for my birthday last week. They were almost too pretty to eat but in the end that did not stop me.

And of couse what are designer cupcakes without the right wine pairing?

Needless to say, it was a GOOD birthday.

Bad Cats and Funky Letters

Winter has arrived in our little corner of Washington State, the garden has been buttoned up for the winter and all of the neighbor's leaves have come to live in my yard. The southwestly winds always blow all the fall leaves right into our lawn and front flowerbed. I know they are not from the only tree I have in the front yard, they are a totally different shape and size.  Short of conducting a full CSI investigation as to the exact source of the offenders and knocking on the neighbors doors demanding they take them back I am stuck with them and have a hot date next weekend with the rake. The neighbors already think I am a little nuts anyway and I am pretty sure they all call me "That Crazy Cat Lady Down The Street" behind my back. Case in point about 3 weeks ago I thought Apollo (studio cat #2) had made it out of the yard. I could not find him anywhere, searched the yard, studio and house completely, not even the lure of shaking the kittie kibble container got a response.

So now I am in full blown panic, scouring the neighborhood in the pitch black, shining my flashlight into everybody's yard, garage and porch within a 3 block radius, yelling the requisite "Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty". Nobody came out to see what the hell I was doing, probably because they were saying to themselves and their guests "Just ignore her, Crazy Cat Lady, she loses that damn animal all the time". After an hour the husband yelled at me across the street, "He's in the house!". Apparently he had been in there the whole time, sleeping off his latest cat nip hit somewhere,  and could not be bothered to wake up and assuage my heart palpitations. I staggered into the house relieved, but filthy from getting down on my hands and knees to peer under vehicles, into crawl spaces through assorted shrubbery.  All I got from him was a sleepy "Dude...whassup?" look, similar to this one....

 If you don't talk to you're cats about catnip, who will?

The studio had been completely gone through, a futon that was taking up was too much space removed to the attic in the garage. I have gone though every single art supply I own, things are looking far more organized. But of course that only lasts for about 5 minutes once I start working on a project...sigh! I was able to spend most of the day in it though, working on some fancy letter techniques I picked up at Letter's of Joy last may. Spoiler alert to members of RainWriters who may be reading this, one of these may be my Christmas Party exchange gift.

Picture is a little blurry, I will need to get a small tripod to make these shots of smaller pieces.

Happy Thanskgiving to all.

My (art) bags are packed and I'm ready to go!

I leave for ArtFest first thing in the morning and have managed to successfully cram all my supplies into two medium sized bags, whew! I am still packing all of the rest of the stuff I need and doing all those things that must be done when you leave your husband alone for a few days. Had to make a unexpected trip to the vet, studio cat #1, Dana, needed her "treatment", in other words she needed her glands expressed, yuck! It it a routine thing with her, I find that if I sugar coat it by telling her she is going for the "treatment" instead of what it really is she doesn't get the crazy eyes and hide in some dark depth of the house when I come to scoop her up and put her in the kitty carrier. Hopefully there are no more unplanned events today. We catch the ferry tomorrow and will spend the morning in Port Townsend visiting all our favorite shops before heading up to Fort Worden (yes...where they filmed Officer and a Gentleman). I am lucky enough to be sharing one of the officer's houses with the most amazing group of women, it has been a year since most of us have seen each other so we can't wait for our reunion. I think one of my favorite parts of ArtFest is sitting around the big dining room table in our house, drinking wine, sharing our art and laughing so hard we almost wet our pants. The classes I am taking are awesome, "Wax the Casbah" with Judy Wise, "Junk Mail Artist Book" with Carla Sonheim and "Wood Collage Vignettes" with Karen Michel, they are all wonderful artists. I did manage to finish a piece for the gallery, and in only two days! The truncated time frame was actually good for me as it did not allow time to over think the project and micro-manage every step, which I have a HUGE problem with. Sometimes its better to just start throwing things together without getting to far inside my head. It may not be my most sophisticated work but I am pleased with the outcome and think it is kind of fun. The theme this year was sea creatures, this piece is very 3-D, it reminded me of those old plays where they had a ocean scene and would have the wave props stacked one behind the other and shift them back and forth to look like the waves were moving.

I will post when I return from ArtFest with all my fantastic projects and rejuvenated from being with my Art Posse.