tweedy tiki and color work

Posted on January 30, 2008 by mimik

Finished- one tweedy tiki-

and the side-view-

The signature-

Here is one of the distractions that I was thinking about when I wrote the “revving” post. The tug got strong enough that I spent yesterday and part of this morning playing around with dyes. I have a collection of dye packets that I started accumulating in the mid-seventies when I was in college. They are mostly Cushing Acid Dyes. I have a paper with a photo of what the colors are suppose to look like. I also have my preconceived idea of what olive green or burgundy should look like. I have found neither to be even slightly helpful in guessing how a certain dye packet would look on my wool fabric. I decided it was time to test them all out and make my own reference.

This is what I did-

I collected all my white/off-white/cream wool fabric bits and set aside all the smaller pieces- odd shapes and smaller then 12″ x 12″- to use for my dye samples. I also cut up one white sweater with a 40% angora/60% wool content. I put 1/4 teaspoon (or less) of dye powder into a pyrex dish. (I have 2 pyrex dishes and a microwave that I just use for dyeing.) Dissolved the powder.Â Added water, added wet fabric- at least 3 pieces of assorted textures, into the microwave for 10 minutes on high. Then I added a tablespoon of salt, stirred, and added a few more pieces of fabric, smushed into the dye. I let that sit for at least another 20 minutes, rinsed, threw it into the washer and dryer and then made my sample cards. I did 16 tests.

Here is an example card-

Dyeing this way makes it almost certain that the colors will be uneven- fine with me. The first fabric into the dyebath comes out darkest. The later fabrics can be not only lighter, but very different colors… The fabric texture and weave can really affect the look of the color- for instance the angora always looks lighter and hazy because the fluffy rabbit fur doesn’t absorb the dye like the wool.

Now I have these great piles of interesting and some very odd colors. Lucky me!
I was trying to see if I had something that would get me my favorite acid green, so the few bits left in my stash wouldn’t be so precious. I’m not there yet, but I’ve ruled out a lot of things and I have some ideas for additional experiments. I love doing this- it makes me feel like a mad scientist!

and another make-do

Posted on January 10, 2008 by mimik

and another present that got finished-

This make-do is made on an old glass match holder-

The bottom of the container has a rough surface for striking the matches.

I made this for a friend. The match holder had belonged to her mother, but my friend didn’t have any use for it so I told her I’d make it into a pincushion.

I think I’m caught up now on my gifts and can start thinking about Valentines. And getting those tutorials finished that are half written in my drafts.

pin cushions and presents

Posted on January 9, 2008 by mimik

I am so far behind on everything… I’m still trying to catch up on a few gifts I didn’t… quite… get to… ahem.

A make-do pin cushion-

Made on a glass that had a large chip in the lip.

here is a back view-

detail-

and another gift- for our new little neighbor-

I’ll show more of this baby blanket soon.

earrings

Posted on September 7, 2007 by mimik

I was looking for some earrings to wear to the selling event last night. I was thinking- I wish I had something that looked like my artwork. So… tada! I made these with my moo stickers!

they have stickers on both sides.

love this-

I think I’m hooked

Posted on July 25, 2007 by mimik

I found it hard to stop, once I got started. So, I have lots of new fabric to play with (or trade or whatever)!

These are the ones I mailed off to Bitter Betty today for the swap-

1. pears printed on light blue- this is showing half of the fat quarter. It is folded lengthwise.

2. Orange spirals and baby faces- also folded.

3.Green and black, Baby faces, folded fabric-

4. Flower babies printed on light blue-

5. and on off-white with different spacing-

6. Red birds, green leaves, light blue background-

I have the other half of the fat quarter of most of these. I sent the ones that didn’t have the mistakes!

Then there are these-

The bugs faded quite a bit when I washed them, so now they are mine. In general I wasn’t too happy with the ones I printed on the green Kona cotton. The colors must not have absorbed well, because all of them were a bit faded after washing.

I liked this one so much that in the end, I decided to keep it.

even after I’d printed up more in various color and image combinations! I am thinking about cutting up some of these for patches or ribbons.

these too- ribbons or strips-

These are odd sized test pieces and use up the ink/paint pieces. I won’t have any problem finding uses for these non-standard shapes.

and lastly, I needed fabric like this for my applique work-

I am so glad I decided to participate in the swap- just the incentive I needed to get me started. This is a crazy week though. Isn’t it always that way when we get back from vacation? I am having my workshop this coming weekend at my house- that means I have to clean up space to do it in! I’ve got lots of things on my mind and lots of things I haven’t had a chance to blog about yet, so if you are wondering why you haven’t heard from me, that’s why. If I owe you an email, write again. I might have lost it. Now, back to cleaning up!

fabric stamping

Posted on July 24, 2007 by mimik

I’ve been working away on my fabric stamping project. So much to learn!

I showed my carved stamps and first experiments here. Abby lent me a very helpful book. After looking through it, I made some other stamps by gluing string to cardboard in a spiral-

and also rice onto cardboard-

I love these patterns. I was thinking I would use them as background texture, but I really like them the way they are. I can really see using these patterns in my applique work.

BTW- I am not using acrylic paint for the stamping after all. As I have mentioned before, I have a house full of so much art supplies, I should always be able to find what I need. A few years ago, I bought some Createx colors and fabric medium at a yard sale (Thanks Beate!) and that is what I am using. I learned in the book, that you can make a stamp pad using felt. It really works! This is the felt (el cheapo variety) sitting on top of the color. I press the felt into the color using my palette knife, until it is saturated. Then, stamp away.

And here is what I’ve done so far-

bugs-

birds-

ack- a mistake! One of many, actually…

and flower babies-

They are being washed right now. Hopefully they will look the same afterwards.

playing with fabric printing

Posted on July 9, 2007 by mimik

I mentioned at the end of the last post that I was starting to work on my pieces for the printed fabric swap over at Bitter Betty Blogs. I signed up because I have been wanting to try it forever and this is the push I need.

I decided to go with stamping as opposed to silk screen or something. I wanted to try it with the least possible capital outlay and the fewest new skills to learn. I was already feeling totally over my head and have had a very hard time finding any information. The first confusion was over the Speedball Speedy-Cut block- pink or white? What is the difference? The people in my local art store couldn’t enlighten me. Later I found this on Alma Stoller site, so now I know. I ended up buying the white because it cost less and I had no idea what else to base the choice on! Carving was easy and fun! I was having so much fun with the carving part, I was very reluctant to transition to the next step…

printing. I REALLY didn’t want to go out and buy printing inks- I know, I’m cheap. But I have so many types of color mediums already- I just couldn’t imagine bringing something new into the house. I was thinking about oil paints, oil bars, acrylic paints, to start the list. I found this article and it helped me settle on acrylic paints. This is another page of useful links and information. I wanted something that would be washable and have a good feel, not stiff- I want to be able to actually use this fabric!

The first step was to try out my stamps on paper. I used inexpensive craft type acrylic paint- the kind that comes in the little bottles. I sponged the paint onto my stamps using pieces of make-up sponges- those things are a great art tool! Here’s what I got-

The brown stamp on white was my first attempt on fabric.

Based on the various bits of information I could find, this is what I have figured out so far.

-Acrylic paints work very well, but don’t try using a brayer or a brush of any kind- I couldn’t manage anything that wasn’t very streaky. Daubing the paint onto the stamp works very well- I used the make-up sponges and also some wads of felt.

-adding drying retardant was helpful both in slowing the drying and also making the paint a bit gummier.

-one article suggested dampening the fabric first. I had no better results when I tried that. Actually I had some color bleeding so I’d say forget that idea.

-after I finished printing/stamping, I let the fabric dry for a bit (1/2 hour?). Then I ironed the fabric on both sides with steam on a cotton setting. I have no idea if this was necessary. I then threw them all into the washer at a regular warm wash. I noticed no change in the color at all, after the wash. Yeah!

Here are my test pieces after washing-

detail-

Now I have to think about doing my bigger pieces- yikes! This is actually a lot harder then I ever thought. I am nervous about the 1/2 yard pieces with no major screw-ups. Also, choosing the colors turns out to be a lot harder then I thought it would be. I will be coming out of this project with a new respect for fabric designers!

little project

Posted on April 14, 2007 by mimik

another little thing I was working on this week-

Here’s the problem. I am going to participate in an open studio event in Boston with a group of other Etsy sellers- details on that in a week or so, but in case you want know, it is May 4. I needed to figure out some kind of give-away to add to a promo pack… stuff from all of the exhibitors. Some of the others in the group were already doing this and had buttons made up. Hmm. I knew I didn’t want to spend much money, I wanted a clear image of my work and I didn’t want it to involve a lot of labor. Here is what I came up with-

ta da! Refrigerator magnets!

They are made from photos of Mosaics on Flickr. First, I made up a variety of mosaics. I picked out photos that worked well in the square format and in a 2″ x 2″ photo. I made the mosaics 2 photos by 3 photos since that translates perfectly to a 4 x 6 photo. The most important thing is to upload your images in the large size- spoken from experience. My first batch of photos was too grainy to use. I printed out my info- name and etsy site address– nothing fancy. Then it was just putting them together onto the self adhesive magnetic sheet. The paper doll project brought this stuff into my life and I’m loving it! This project involved no special tools- the photos were printed at Target, I got the magnetic sheets at AC Moore, you can cut the magnetic sheeting with regular scissors, I printed out my info on regular paper with my very low end printer. Yes- meets all criteria!

busy week

Posted on April 14, 2007 by mimik

First of all- Thank you, thank you for all the positive response to mr. naked robot! I’ve been glowing!

It was one of those weeks where a lot was going on that kept me away from the sewing machine. I have a friend that works at Harvard in the African Studies Department. They were having a special event this week which included a workshop lead by Oyenike Okundaye, on Nigerian fabric dyeing. It was fun to get out of the house and get a glimpse into several worlds I’m not part of- African textile arts, Harvard and their academic arts, and people in general who end up at a workshop like this, mostly somehow connected with Harvard, which I am not.

The first night we did what I think of as tie-dyeing. She showed us a variety of traditional ways to fold the fabric before tieing (actually we were using rubber bands). These are the ones I did-

and this is what the floor looked like by mid-evening-

We also did some work with wax and dye and also a technique that involved stitching and pulling to gather the fabric. What I did the second evening-

I think I’ll be able to use some of what I was playing with when I dye my wool fabrics… which I do every once in a while. Lots of fun!

Also- I think I worked out the twisting leg problem that was bugging me on the naked robot guy- I did some ripping stitches out, adjusting and resewing- better now- phew!

doll club and expedition

Posted on April 6, 2007 by mimik

Doll club was yesterday and we tried needle felting. I’ve never done it except to try putting hair on a doll- not for me. But this was fun! We made bunnies-