Sunday, August 24, 2008

Weekend mojo

I thought I was going to spend this weekend editing a proposal. Neh. That didn't work out. So now it looks as if I'll be spending my Labor Day/birthday weekend editing. *sigh* Oh, well, la-la. I'm disappointed that I could have spent this weekend in Eureka Springs at a writing workshop with Scarlett. That would have so rocked.

But since I was home with nothing urgent on the agenda except a haircut (Thanks, Joy!), I got a boatload of catching up done. Some of it had to do with the paperwork side of my art sideline - not interesting to anyone but me. But I also got more than 50 cards finished and packaged and ready to go to the stores. I got the latest series of collages finished, fitted with hardware, and labeled for delivery. I got a little surprise for Erin - which has been languishing for, like, two weeks - finished and ready to ship. I wrote three days' worth of posts for CraftGossip and caught up the e-mail that goes with that gig. I got the backgrounds for Polly's collages planned and cut out. And I got a good start on the embroidery, too. Not a bad weekend's work. And I did it all with just two minor injuries (a record for me): a cut on my palm where my skin got in the way of the scissors tips, and a minor stab injury from a screwdriver in my thigh.

I'm still not sure how I'm going to finish the backgrounds. I tested my new needlepunch tools on a scrap, thinking that might be a nice touch. But the fabric is too loose-woven to hold the thread loops securely. (Maybe home-dec-weight fabric would work?) So I'm sticking to embroidery, beading, and quilting. Here's my progress so far:


Polly looked at the fabrics on line one night while we were talking on the phone, and she burst out a few words of excitement about the one on the far right - the one with the red roses. Since I have seven fabrics and nine boxes to fill, I decided to use her favorite on three of them. That is, one background in each of the three rows of collages will use this fabric. I'm thinking I'll use a little different treatment on each one, though. We'll see.

Back to my hoop and needle...

5 comments:

Janna said...

To solve your problem with the loosely woven fabric, could you iron on some interfacing to the backside, and then it would hold the loops securely? I have done that before to make fabric stiffer, and then cut out little holes between the floral design of a fabric before. I used the piece with the cut outs as the back of a dress. It was quite sturdy.

I love the colors and patterns in your fabrics!

idyll hands said...

What what what? What do you have for me? I'm dying to find out!

:)

Denise Felton said...

Brilliant, Janna! I'll try that!

And Erin...you'll see. :)

Anonymous said...

I can't believe you shanked yourself! ~jw

Unknown said...

Ooooooh, I love that fabric! How lovely!!