Snow in March

It never fails.

I am always out of sync with the seasons. And it seems I can never finish a monthly project in the month I'm supposed to finish it.

The dream I had of finishing my January Crazy Quilt Journal Project by the end of February is dashed. And now I'm two months behind. *sigh*

Nothing to do, but to buck up and finish this piece and so...

I'm making snow on the first of March.

I finished the tree the way I wanted to and I really wanted to have the effect of snow nestled into the hollow of the tree and resting on the branches.

In the top right corner of my block, there's a piece of glitter dotted fabric that looks like snow...

I wanted to carry that snow down into the rest of the block as well.

Enter wool nibs.

I found a little bag of wool nibs at last year's Sheep and Wool festival so I bought them thinking they might come in handy for something.

And today they got their day in the sun...uhh...I mean, snow.

I took a little empty spritz bottle and filled it full of textile medium and spritzed it all over those wool nibs...then sprinkled all the nibs with glitter.

Now I'm waiting for my experiment to dry to see if it's going to work...

I've got my fingers crossed. This might be the only snow we see this year.

Maybe if it works, I should let Jack have a snow day. Wouldn't he love that.

A snow day in March...

Pink Petite Poinsettias

I just can't help myself! Meet Madge...


Madge was delighted when I asked her to model my petite poinsettia bouquet for today's photo shoot.

Remember the other day when I mentioned that those pink, glittery poinsettias were inspiring me? Well, they might not be very life-like but they just shout JOY to me.

Well, I really wanted to figure out how to make them for my Christmas in July in December bead journal piece.

And look! Woohoo! I'm all a-light with the joy of them!


In fact, they turned out so cute that I want to make a million and sew them onto everything! Whoa, girl, settle down...

Does that ever happen to you? You hyperventilate when you get overexcited?

OK. I'm breathing regularly now.

First, I took the my 25 cent glitter model from Michaels, traced the shapes and then reduced them on my copier to create a template.


Then I used a similar technique as I did for the Alstroemeria...I got out my china doll shade of Hanah silk ribbon (love this ribbon!) and backed it with light interfacing...


I then went to my stash of Artglitter (love this stuff too!) and chose colors that I thought might work for my piece. I actually thought I would prefer the pink glitter on the left...but after looking at the glitters against the blue background -- I settled on the glitter that has a bit of an orange tint to it to the far right...it looks more gold in the pics...glitter is hard to photograph...


Once I picked my glitter, I applied Jo Sonja's textile medium to the ribbon, poured glitter over the wet glue and left it overnight to dry...


This morning I cut out my petals and then used the Clover mini iron to give each petal some shaping.


I used a green silk 4mm ribbon and made a big knot which became the center of each poinsettia...and then stitched gold beads for stamen.


And the end result is a handful of happiness for my good friend Madge here...


I think she's going to be sad when I tell her that the flowers are going to live on my bead journal project instead of in her lovely hands...

But she'll be alright...she has too happy a disposition to stay mad at me for long...


And Judy S., I think you and Madge would get along famously...she's a singer too just like you!

Glitter, Glue and the Flu

This week, H1N1 Flu came home with Jack and landed on me by the end of this week. Evidently 20% of Jack's 8th grade class was out sick this past week, which tends to lend some credence to all the flu-mania in the news...

I'm happy to report that we're on the mend so I thought I'd post a quick update. Not too much progress on my bead journal piece but I did decide to add a little more dimension below the tulle that I placed over my musical, painted fabric I made the other day.


First, I used the very fine ArtGlitters from Barbara Trombley as well as JoSonja's textile medium. I painted the glue very lightly -- taking most of the medium off of the brush by brushing it on a paper towel before applying it to the fabric. It doesn't take much at all to make the glitter stick.


I then sprinkled the glitter over the fabric much in the same way that you dust sprinkles over sugar cookies -- trying not to glump the sugar in any one spot.

I loved how the glitter shone through on this rainy, gray Fall day.


And I loved how it gave just a little more dimension to my overall background.


Now, I guess I better get beading. I really don't have any idea how I am going to do that...but I know I'm looking forward to figuring it out...

Thank you all for your ideas for painting charms. Now I just have to find those blasted charms...they are around here somewhere.

And if you'd like to see another example where I used glitter, you can check out my experiment here and it's result here.

Playing with Glitter...

I've been wanting to play with my Art Institute glitter and my Jo Sonja's textile medium for a while. Needing to add some glitz to my tea party girls, I thought I would run a test experiment to see how applying glitter to fabric would work.


The textile medium has a milky consistency and I wondered whether it would leave a "glue" trail on my fabric in addition to the glitter.


I tried painting the glue on the fabric first and then "sprinkling" the glitter over top. Next, I tried mixing the glitter into the medium. I was surprised at how much glitter I needed to add to a small amount of medium in order to get decent coverage. A little bit of medium goes a long way so work in small amounts.


I used fabric brushes and found the glitter/medium clumped on my brush requiring that I wash the brush out frequently. The mixture washed away easily with soap and water.


The results are above. The third blue stripe is where I dumped the glitter over the glue strip which is the method shown on the Art Glitter Institute web site. This was too messy and not going to work for my girls who are already stitched in their finery inside the garden. I think mixing the glitter with the medium is best for me.

Notice I played with a piece of silk organza scrap and painted that with the glitter medium as well. I thought that the glue would gum up the holes in the organza but I was pleasantly surprised with the result.


I followed the instructions on the bottle and let my sample dry for 24 hours overnight. I then heat set the glitter for two minutes before washing and drying it. Again, I was surprised when very little of the glitter washed off in my sample. I washed it with a load of towels on medium temperature with regular laundry detergent and dried it on high. I think the use of glitter would really work well on my jean skirt project...


I used my left over glitter glue to paint a whole piece of organza. Because the glitter glue sealed the organza fibers, I could cut my glitter organza into strips without having to worry that the edges would fray. I wrapped them around a few pencils and let them dry for 24 hours.


Now I have my own glittered organza ribbon to use in my piece as well! I was really delighted with this finding so stay tuned for what happens next at the Tea Party. The girls are still getting "dressed"...