Happy Red Balloon Purse

A few years ago I impulsively bought a red felt bag with circles of color on one side, made in Nepal. $40. I never used it... guess I'm conservative at heart when it comes to purses. Yet still, it always makes me happy to look at and touch it.

The original purse just had the "spots" of color. I embroidered the "strings" to make them look like balloons.

While moving, it surfaced. Wow, I thought, bet it would be fun to bead this bag! Maybe a more flamboyant person than I will buy it at the Artist Studio Tour (next weekend). So, for the last two days, my worktable heaped with stuff, I turned the circles of colors into balloons.

I started with the strings, embroidered with 6 strands of floss (detail picture above). Then I began adding beads, buttons and ribbons... Whoooohooo! Balloons!

Here are a couple of them.

I finished the bag at midnight last night. Most fun things were stitching into felt and adding the ribbons at the end. Most difficult thing was getting inside the purse to knot off the threads. Happy colors, happy red, happy Robin! How do YOU like it?

August BJP Finished!

I started this one in July, before Aug. 1st when I would list my six words for the month. I needed a stitching project for a sew-day with friends, so why not begin a little early? Recently I got a new prescription for my glasses and they gave me the old lenses. I thought it might be fun to use one of them in the piece!

So first I picked one of the resist-dyed felts I made in Chad Alice Hagen's class that had a circle on it where I might be able to put the lens.


Then I started stitching on the felt. This particular piece was quite thin, less than half the thickness of commercial felt. I needed some stiffener to keep my stitches from puckering. I suppose I could have used acid-free, interleaving paper (as I usually do), but this time decided to try a light-weight, non-woven interfacing fabric (which worked quite satisfactorily). Although I didn't finish that day, I worked on some of the stitching shown below.


The stitches are done with cotton buttonhole twist. I used mostly back stitch (above), but around the circle I used chain stitch and then filled in the centers of the chain with size 15 beads (below). The rock is a chip of slate from some steps we had made on the trail to the studio.


After choosing my words on August 1st...

release
listen
talk
shift
risk
commit

I thought long and hard about how to add them to my piece. I wanted them to be under the lens, suggesting the need to really see the words, or even to magnify the importance of them in my current life... words to live by. I considered writing them on paper and then mounting the lens over the paper. That idea didn't seem quite right for the piece, as I wanted to preserve the mottled look of the felt in the circle area.

Finally I got the idea of writing the words on a somewhat transparent fabric, organza, then basting the fabric over the circle and embroidering the words with backstitch (through both the organza and felt). It worked pretty well! After finishing the words, I made a beaded bezel to hold the lens over the words, as per the instructions in my book, Heart to Hands Bead Embroidery. The last step was to cut the outside edges of the organza about a quarter of an inch away from the beaded bezel. I used my finger to scruffle and fray the edges of the organza. Here's how it looks...


I used colonial knots (similar to French knots) to mount the felt onto my painted paper and added a twisted embroidery floss border (as on all of my BJP pieces for this year). The finished size is 7 x 7 inches. Here's how it looks...

After finishing it, I got out all eight BJP pieces for the year, placed them in order on the table and took a good look at them. Conclusion? It pays great dividends to stick with a challenging technique or artistic concept! Step by step, piece by piece, improvement is seen.

This is the year I took on words... and collage too. I've been fascinated by other BJP members over the three years who so successfully use words in their work and who use paper collage techniques as inspiration for multi-media collage with fibers and beads. I was afraid my need for technical perfection and structure in my art would be a road block, which it was and to some extent still is. But definite improvement is there to be seen, each piece a small victory over the one before it. Yay!

Stay tuned, I'm finally back on the beadlust/BJP track again! My next post, in a couple of days, will feature a tutorial on finishing and after that a post showing my July BJP!

Change - May BJP - Finished!

Major changes (which came into full swing during May) are happening in my life. All six of my words for the month are relevant. They are: change, remember, forgive, seek, open and thank. Can you find them in the finished piece below? (You may need to click to enlarge.)


I named the piece Change because that's the most important word of the six. Although I've decided not to delve into the personal changes I'm making in this post, it's not really a secret. If you're interested to read about it, you can check out my journal-blog, Words Paint, which I write under the pseudonym of Peacefulbird.

Obviously, the butterflies are symbolic elements of change and metamorphosis. A once-closed envelope (me) is now open with butterflies flying free. Feathers are another symbol of freedom, flight and good perspective... My husband found these two in our yard. My best guess is that a Northern Flicker gifted some tail feathers to us. The turtles are all about getting there, no matter how long it takes.

I started with the second, luscious, butter-soft, piece of resist-dyed felt made and given to me by Sweetpea. Without thought, I immediately folded and pinned it into an envelope shape. What could go in it? Oh, maybe those flicker feathers I've been saving! Oh, OK, now what paper will I use for the background?

Auditioning papers: This one seems to dark, don't you think?


This one seems too busy.


This one is really too busy; it competes with the pattern on the felt.


This one was my second choice. I like it a lot, but it seems a tad too pale or washed-out looking with the felt.


Here's the one I chose. Doesn't look like much in this picture, but the color has lots of life without being overpowering.


Once that was decided, I started playing around with various beads and elements I might use. I had 4 plastic butterfly-shaped buttons in my stash which looked really nice coming out of the felt envelope and had appropriate relevance to change.

How could I apply my words to these buttons and where could I find two more? Hmmm... gave up on that one and decided to make my own butterflies by sawing them out of copper sheet and metal-stamping the words. Tried that. Too big, and way too visually heavy for the delicacy of a butterfly. OK, well, maybe I could make butterflies out of heavy, water-color paper, write the words on the wings and paint them. Here are the three ideas. You can see why I rejected the copper...


So then I played around with drawing butterflies free-hand. Ummm, I'm not so good at that. However I had a sheet of butterfly stickers that gave me an idea. I peeled off the background part of the sheet and placed it lightly on the water-color paper. Then I used a #2 Micron pen to draw around the inside (where the sticker was), which gave me some nice shapes.


I wrote the words vertically along the edges of the left-hand wings, extending some of the letters to look like the veins. For the right-hand wings, I wrote the words backwards. Ruined a few, but finally got six usable butterflies. Next I painted them with watered-down, transparent acrylic paints.


After painting, they looked like this.


Before cutting out the butterflies, I used an embossing stylus to score along the body on each side so that I could easily fold the wings into flying position.

Next, I had to figure out how to attach them to my piece. Everybody knows how much I don't like glue. So, I needed a way to sew them on the paper and felt. I also needed antennae. A double-layer body might do the trick...

I cut out six little, body shapes from heavy, black paper and made antennae from bent pieces of 28 gauge brass wire. Using PVA (acid-free, bookbinder's glue) and a toothpick applicator, I put a little glue on the back side of the butterfly bodies and along the duplicate body shapes. Then I placed two pre-cut lengths of Nymo thread in the glue, perpendicular to each body and laid the antennae in the glue at the head. When the glue was slightly set, I joined the duplicate body layer to the back of each butterfly. My plan, if the glued layers worked, was to use the four Nymo threads to sew each of the butterflies to my piece. It did work! I hope the picture helps to make sense out of what I just wrote.


I also used 28 gauge brass wire to wrap beads around the feather quills. In a similar manner to the butterflies, I laid two pre-cut Nymo threads along each quill before wrapping, which would allow me to sew the feathers to the paper.

Here's what the back of my piece looks like. You can see where I tied the Nymo threads to secure feathers and butterflies. I used Tyvek (from a mailing envelope) as a backing to prevent the thread from cutting the paper. You can also see where I sewed the felt envelope to the paper using Nymo thread.


Well, there you have it, probably more how-to than anybody needs or wants... but I can't help myself sometimes...

I love this piece and what it represents in my life! Hope you like it too.

April Bead Journal Project ~ Finished!

Well finally!!! At last the words, felt, painted paper and beads all flowed together easily (and fairly quickly)... Here is Forgive, my BJP piece for April!


It must be due to the fabulous hand-dyed felt that Sweetpea gifted to me. She made it in a workshop taught by Chad Alice Hagen. When she showed me the precious bundle of resist-dyed felt she had made in the workshop, I about went nuts... drooling, petting it, rubbing it on my face (sooooo soft!), tracing the patterns with my fingers, admiring the saturated colors... What could she do? Of course, she gave me not one, but TWO, of the pieces!!!!

Until this month, I've used store-bought, wool felt and covered it with beads so that you couldn't see it. I was bored with it... bored with plain, solid color... and frustrated by the way the beads would sink down into the felt. I kept wondering WHY on earth I had decided to use felt this year.

Well now I know! Working of this piece of butter-soft felt with its uneven, felted edges (must be a proper term for this type of edge) was such a tactile pleasure!!! I did not use paper or any other stabilizer under the felt, which made it pleasing to touch on both sides of my piece!!!


The other thing that made this piece come forth so beautifully was the lime-green felt. I was visiting my family in Minnesota and beading with Julie (my brother's wife) and we got to wondering if it would work to rubber stamp on felt. It does! She had a scrap of lime green felt from which she had punched out a Christmas tree (see the shape on the bottom?) So we stamped it with a bird stamp. I liked it and asked if I could have it. (Who me a shameless beggar? You bet!)

The scrap looked a little different when she gave it to me. For this piece, I cut it in half (the lime green beads flow between the two parts), frayed out the edges using a needle and embroidered the birds and branch using single strands of standard embroidery floss (mostly back stitch).


I painted the tags in the same colors as the background paper and wrote the words on them with a #3 micron pen.

The words are special to me for the month of April and so is the piece because of some personal changes I began making then. To forgive myself and others is an important part of this change... I see the words flow and forgive working together in this piece to guide me in the process. The other words are part of it too, especially to rest and to finish what I've begun.

One other reason this piece went together so easily is that I worked improvisationally, without a plan. On last month's piece, I worked more representationally (the mesa or butte), which is always more difficult because I'm trying to make it recognizable.

Unexpected things happen when I work improvisationally. In this case, after completing the piece, I noticed the over-all shape of the felt reminded me of a house... a bird house? a house for a Robin? This metaphor applies to the changes I am making, yet I didn't plan it at all! Improv just works for me and I'm always more satisfied with the end results.

I hope you like it too.

Felting, Dyeing, Beading, Stitching ~ Exciting Workshop in June!!!

June 17, 18 and 19, yours truly will be on lovely Lopez Island to learn all about making and embellishing hand-bound blank books with resist-dyed, felt covers. Oh be still my heart!!!


This intensive workshop, taught by nationally-recognized felt artist, Chad Alice Hagen, is brought to 12 lucky students through the efforts of Jan Scilipoti, a felt and quilting artist who lives on Lopez Island (one of the San Juan Islands in NW Washington state). Thank you Jan!


Just in case you're starting to get that itchy feeling (the way I did when I first heard about this event from Sweetpea, who also will be attending), yes, there are still a few openings!!! Contact Jan to get all the information (she'll email you a pdf flyer), ask questions and register. But don't wait too long...


The first day will be all about resist dyeing on needle-punched prefelts... Imagine, 15 dyebaths and oodles of ideas for creating uniquely patterned felt!!!


The next two days are all about creating at least two books each, using our dyed felt for the covers. I've made and Coptic-bound a few books and done a bit of beading (LOL) in the past, but never with felt. I'm looking forward to the feel of the felt in my hands as I work the embellishments and binding! We should have lots of delightful hours surrounded by color, texture, and the companionship of like-minded, wool-dye-bead-book-crazy gals. (OK, men too, if any dare to join us!)

If you'd like to join us, for sure, Lopez Island, mid-June is the place to be! You can see more pictures on Chad's Flickr photostream. And here is Chad's blog, which is waaaay fun!