Something About Nothing

The Art Nouveau theme was a bit of a challenge for me. I did a lot of research on Pinterest  before deciding on a pattern. I started with a piece of low water immersion dyed fabric. I created my stencils and cut them out with my  Silhouette portrait .   Wow, there's a surprise!  I made a stencil!   I've been doing a lot of stencils with The Printed Fabric Bee. . .  . . . maybe next month I should try something new. . . . . .or maybe not. hahaha I didn't make enough bridges on this stencil and so it was difficult to paint at times because the swirl liked to catch on the brush.  I had to be creative holding down the thin bits, and I got lots of paint on my hands.  But it's not fun unless I get messy! I had a one yard piece to work on so I experimented with various colors. I used Jacquard fabric paint and stenciled in yellow, brown, red and even mixed some yellow and red to get just the right orange. I always struggle with lining patterns

Just coloring. What are you up to?

Woohoo!  One of my doodles was selected for the new edition of Zen Doodle: Oodles of Doodles!   I'm very excited to be selected to have my art appear in this book!  I'll post a photo of the doodle once the book is published.  In the meantime, here are somethings I've been playing with:

I had a wonderful visit with family last week in southern California. Em with a piece of the Berlin Wall at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. I LOVE the graffiti on this piece!  Can't go to Cali without sticking my feet in the sand!  Among our many activities we decided to do an evening of painting. We decided to do four collaborative paintings. We each took a canvas and painted on it for 5 minutes before passing it along to the next artist.  Nothing the last person did was sacred.     We had a great time and learned a lot too!   Next time we do this we will stop after one round of painting. Two rounds on the same canvas was too much.   The paintings were a lot of fun and I hope to have another play date like this with my family here in Utah.  Have you ever made a collaborative painting?

Last week the hard drive on my laptop died. What a sad, sad day that was! No warning, just kaputt! You never realize what you have on a computer until it dies! And this isn't exactly the first time the hard drive has crashed so you would think I would know better and have everything BACKED UP. . .but no I'm just NOT that smart! Yes, really, I like to make the same mistakes over and over! Crazy, huh? But there is good news. . . . . .nothing is lost! They were able to completely recover everything on my hard drive!!! Which is fabulous because I was working on a very important project. Now I just need to LEARN from this mistake and get everything backed up online! Here is a little peek at my very important, secret project: Mister is always helping out in the studio. He is modeling some felt I cut out with my Silhouette Portrait. . . . . .and here is a close up of the fabric I designed for my secret project. I guess I should get back to

Queen Bee, Carol R. Eaton, chose a Woodlands theme for The Printed Fabric Bee March theme.  She wanted the hive to explore the woodlands around us on fabric.  I live in the high desert country of the Rocky Mountains in Utah.  Most of the woodlands around here are made up of what is "lovingly" called scrub oak. It's not as pretty as the big oak trees I remember from back east, as it is more a bush than a tree, and it is not my favorite tree. I decided to search for another tree through my "neighborhood woodland."  We have lots of birch, which are lovely, and there are some gorgeous black walnut trees, and some beautiful  Mountain Ash  but I kept finding myself drawn to the leaves of the maple tree.   I created a stencil with my Silhouette Portrait , and painted it onto the fabric with some color magnet, then did a quick, very diluted dye of chartruese procion dye .    Once this was dried I stenciled on several more layers of leaves. . .  .