Thinking about TREES

It is not so much for its beauty that a forest makes a claim on men's hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air, that emanation from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit. Robert Louis Stevenson.

When I read this quote by Stevenson, I am reminded of the feeling of reverent awe I have when I walk through the California Redwoods. The hush and majesty of these old trees always calms my heart. Somehow, I intend to use this photo as a starting point for Ruth's page. I'm starting to gather fabric and threads, but I'm glad I have over a month to pull it all together.

Castles

I have almost finalised my design for Carmens page with 'Castles 'as the theme, now I have to make a decision on what techniques I will use , that will be the hard part I think.

New Badge for Everyone's Blogs

Liz W. has made this wonderful badge to go on every one's blog. I've sent you all an e-mail with the file containing the badge. Let me know if you haven't received it yet. Just follow the instructions in the e-mail and you can put the badge on your own blog and then others who are reading your blog, can click on the badge and they will be "magically transferred" here. So spread the word and add the badge to your blog! Thanks Liz for all your hard work on this project.

Made it.

I think I made it and have signed up on this blog. Hoping by the time this starts Life will slow down just a bit. I am looking forward to working on pages.
My name is Carmen, I under estimate the time it will take me to do things. Bear with me this may be my New Years Resolution. Trying not to take on more than I can realistically do. I have a Husband who is very busy getting our crop acres in. Two grown boys who sometimes need their parents. They each have the most beautiful girlfriends that I already love dearly. I have started on Christmas presents.
My Theme was Castles. Anything associated will be fine. I just picked it out of the air. Relax and have fun creating. Dreaming Quilts : ) Carmen

Request from Elizabeth

I had a request from Elizabeth to put the schedule and information about the swap on the blog. The way I've done this is to put the list of all the participants and their themes at the very bottom of the blog page. I didn't think it was good idea to list every one's addresses etc. because of security reasons. You can figure out the schedule by looking at the person below you on the list, that is the person for whom you are making a page for the first month. The next person down is the following month etc. Once you've reached the bottom of the list, you go back to the top of the list to complete all the rest of the participant's pages. So you can use the list at the bottom to figure out your schedule if for some reason you don't have your written copy right at hand. I hope that makes sense and if you have any questions, let me know.

Getting started

Hey, I'm so impressed with all the prep work everyone's doing! I've just cut out my templates as the material I want to use had been folded and so needs flattening out. As I did it I thought to also cut out a 'negative' of the shape so that if I colour/dye/patch/whatever some backing fabric for a page I could use that as a frame to choose the right part of the 'pattern' to use. I've found that really helpful before. Also I cut the template out in the shiny paper packaging that printer paper comes in so I can iron this onto fabrics and cut round and re-use. I think there's some proper stuff available but we don't have here.
While I was sitting thinking about the pages, I decided to try to use as many different techniques etc. as poss. I did a foundation C&G course in the UK before I retired out here and learned so much that I don't use so I got my books out and ended up with this list:-
Hand & Machine embroidery, Patchwork, trad and crazy, Scrunched brown/tissue paper, Silk paper, Wet and Needle felt, Silver foil,plastic packaging etc, Metal, Resists of wax,PVA,gutta, Applique and reverse, Stamping, Crayoning to colour, Transfer crayons and of course dying of all kinds.
What can you add to this?
Also when you're doing my pages I'd love for you to try some unusual techniques or materials as well - jsut looking at some of the mixed media work on different artists' websites etc. makes my mouth water and my brain hurt sometimes!! So creative!

The tree of life

What do you think of this Cobi?, i love the shapes and the mixture of shapes he has used.

Looking at Klimt

Gosh those designs are looking good Trillion, I have been doing some thinking about my first page i have to make and i have had some inspiration from Klimt, I am hoping Cobi you like Klimt, maybe you could let me know if you don't before i go too far with this. I love the shapes and colours he uses

A Request

I think that it might be a good idea to have a place on the blog to have a master list of the rotation schedule and the themes and addresses for each participant. Inevitably questions will arise and it would be very handy to have it on file and accessable thru the blog so we can all get to it!!
Just a thought!
I hope that everyone is having a good Monday!
Best Regards!!!
Elizabeth

Brainstorming

My first theme is "The Sea". How to start? To get my ideas sorted I draw some quick ATCs:
You can look at the sea from different points:
1. you can look at the whole. That means
- the sky above the water with sea birds,
- the surface of the water with ships, boats, lighthouses, swimmer,
- the animals under water like fishes and jellyfishes,
- the live on the bottom of the sea with mussels, snails, crabs.
2. you can look only at the surface. That means at the structure of the waves or the colors of the water.
3. you can concentrate on the fishes.
4. you can only look at the bottom of the sea.

I am not yet sure which possibility I will choose.

Goddess Research

I've made a notebook to keep everything together and I've started on my research for my first theme for Johoanna which is "The Goddess Within". I always like to look up the symbolism and some good quotes as well. Here's a quote from Shakespeare, "Go to your bosom; knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know."


I also found this very cool photo online of a "tree goddess". And another quote about reaching within ourselves by Edward Hopper, "Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist and this inner life will result in his personal vision of the world."

I have some ideas that might work for my page but I don't want to give too many hints as it is early going yet. I have a tendency to think of several ideas and then finally go with one. This part is so much fun though, coming up with a variety of ideas and then letting everything rest in my brain for a while and then out pops the final plan.

Getting Organized?

Hi, all.  It was so exciting to get the guidelines and the lists for this swap.  Once I saw the list of themes I couldn't just do nothing!  So I started thinking about how I could keep a handle on all these ideas, addresses, deadlines, etc.  Yipes!

Answer?  Index cards!  I made a 4x6 card for each month and wrote the recipients name, theme, and particular likes or dislikes.  I also wrote the country they live in so the overseas pages can be mailed a little early (maybe?).

As I go through magazines, blogs, and generally around town, I will grab photos and/or thoughts relating to the themes and stick them on - or with - the index card.  You can see that I have a few already. 

I'm thinking this is pretty brilliant for someone who is as scattered and dis-organized as I am.  LOL!  Time will tell if it actually works, however!

What are the rest of you doing to prepare?

Swap Information E-mailed Today

Hi everyone! I e-mailed out the swap information today. If you didn't receive it, please let me know. If anyone hasn't introduced themselves here or shown photos of their work, we'd love to hear from you. I'm excited to get started and I might not get any pages going before the holidays but my little brain is swirling with ideas!

We Have A Winner

Everyone has voted for the page shape we will use . . . and this is how the results look.  A template will be distributed with the swap guidelines before long.  We can start creating soon!

P.S.  There are 13 votes because I planned to vote only to break a tie.  But I like this choice!  LOL!

Some of Elizabeth's work!

I have already introduced myself in a previous post but at that time I did not have a chance to share some of my owrk. The tree's above and the floowing group of pictures are projects that I ahve been working on to deliver to a local gallery , here in Virginia, for Chirstmas sales. Except for the green batik tree at the front, all of the fabreics atht I am using on my trees is of my own design. I print my fabrics using acrylic paints and each one is a unique monoprint.

I made these trees using a very tattered Swedish Linen dish towel from my grandmother's home. We never had paper towels nor a dishwasher, so these towels played a very important role in my grandmother's wonderful kitchen. I will be making more of these as gifts for family members. These trees are for my personal Christmas collection.

I made these heart ornaments using scrappy fabric that I made with fusible web and free motion embroidery. Then I added some quick hand embroidery and beads and sequins and backed them with a wonderful red vintage silk fabric.

Here is one of my Fabric/Paper bird ornaments. I fuse all sorts of vintae text and tissue papers to fabric and then cut and stitch ornaments form the collaged piece. I wired on a real twig and added some leaf beads and berries.

This small collage falls somewhere between an ornament and a very mini art Quilt.
The back ground is a baby wipe that was used to clean hands during a fabric painting workshop. I have a hard time throwing serrendipitous art backgrounds like this , away!!! I added a stamping with one of my hand carved stamps, a quote and then embellished with some monoprinted fabric scraps that had accumulated around my sewing machine. I finished it off with a few beads ( MUST have beads somewhere!!) and a hanging string. I backed this piece with more of my monoprinted fabric!


The following group of pictures are examples of some of the fabric book pages that I ahve amde in the past for various swaps. The criteria for many of these was that they be 6x6 squares, with various themes. Blogger has insited on posting some of these pictures on end so I do appologize for that!!

The theme for this piece was Nature and one of the color choices was green. I used some fo my sunprinted fabric and hand dyed trims for this piece.

This piece was for a gal who requested that we work all in white. I used various vintage white pieces and included a quote from an old dictionary that I stitched behind tulle and trapped some pearls and white beads in the pocket.

I finished the back with white damask linen and added a tag with some beads and mop buttons. This is how I generally finish my page backs.

This page was for an Ocean themed book. ( Sorry that it is on it's side) you can click on the pictures to enlarge to see details, if you want to.) I used some bleach stamping on batik , added some vintage lace for sea foam and used sand paper for the sandy waters edge. I also stiched on some sea shells from my collection and added more sparkly beads for water droplets!

The following two pieces are pages for a different swap. They include both fabric and paper and stampings with my hand carved stamps and OF COURSE, MORE MOP BUTTONS AND BEADS!!

By now I think that you can tell that I love buttons and beads!!!!

Another Introduction

My name is Johoanna and I live in Orange, NSW, Australia. I'm 37 years old and totally addicted to craft. I've been making and creating since I was small. I grew up in a family where my mother crocheted and sewed, my aunt painted, and my granny knitted.

I love using thrift shop finds in my artwork. I'm forever looking for that something special to add to any current and future pieces.

The pictures to the right are examples of some of my skills. I spin, knit, crochet, embroider, and sew. I also loved working with mixed media.

My theme for this swap is "The Goddess Within". I believe that each woman is more talented and more special than we are led to believe from others. For too long we have accepted the place we have been given in society, but it is time to rise up and acknowledge our beauty, and our value.

I am looking forward to working with all the ladies on the swap.

Hi,

my name is Trillian. In real live I have an other name but in bloggerland/blogosphere I like to be Trillian. Called after the lady in the Hitchhiker written by Douglas Adams.

I like hand crafting as long as I can think.

Knitting and sewing I learned at school. In the past I liked to knit more than to sew. At the moment I prefer sewing.

In February this year I started to make fabric postcards and to swap them. Therefore I started my blog.

I haven't made fabric book pages before. So it is very exciting for me to start this project.
My theme is Fairy Tales. I have chosen this theme because I was in a fabric postcard swap with the same theme and began to read fairy tales. They are so interesting. And I like the interpretations of the stories.

Hope the next year will be full of positive surprises.
Looking forward swapping with you.

Hello

My name is Mandy, an ex-teacher (Primary School) in my mid fifties. I am very lucky to live in the heart of the old county of Cheshire in the UK.

A self-taught textile enthusiast, I love to play with threads, fabrics and wool. I make felt (the wet, messy way), quilt, knit and enjoy free machine embroidery.

(This piece is called "Tree" - free-machine embroidery over scraps of fabric on a home-made felt base.)

Never having made a fabric book, I am very excited about working with this interesting group of people. I know I shall learn a lot in their company.

My topic for this project is "The Sea". Living a distance from the sea, I really love to go and watch the waves whenever I get the chance. I love water, its sounds and movement.

Samples of my work

This is a book I made at college for an exam, it is based on a place called Spurn Point which land that juts out into the North Sea. It forms a complete circle and each page has a different technique on it.

A stocking made with crazy patchwork and SRE, I love this work.

A small envelope bag using Scumbling