Blossom Girl...again....and other lovely 'B' things...

I spent a little time today working on Blossom Girl some more...

She finally has a little better context! I got some of the shading done on the ring she's sitting in.

Now is a good time to make decisions about binding, etc., so I've been auditioning bolts. Right now it's between the purple (which matches so much better in real life) and the Navy blue - my current favorite. I think I'll do a wide (1" finished) binding as I did on the Cherub quilt. It makes such a nice frame for the final piece.

I think I'm ready to quilt her. Just a couple more customer quilts, and she'll go on.


Something I've been meaning to post since I got back from New Hampshire...

While I was gone a lovely box that I ordered from Bitter Betty Industries arrived...isn't this the most beautiful packaging, ever?

Inside was my new Tokyo Star Twinkle necklace! I've been in love with Bethany's work for quite some time, and found her great blog through her Etsy shop.

I'd originally hoped that it would be here in time to wear to the banquet in NH, but will wear it for my next big day - tomorrow!

Tomorrow I get to go to Nelson and sign the final property transfer for our new property. We'll soon be acreage owners (only 2 1/2, I know, but c'mon, we've been living in town for the past 15 years)! After that I get to go to Castlegar for my school orientation day. My courses start in the fall in earnest. I'm looking forward to meeting my new instructors - somehow the whole thing feels a bit like a job interview. At least I know my accessories will knock 'em dead, even if my own performance is not quite as good as I'd like...

:)

Lisa

The return of Blossom Girl

I've had a rather interesting weekend this weekend....some of which I'll share with you down the road (but not yet).


One of the lovely things that this weekend has afforded me is the chance to continue painting Blossom Girl. I get to spend a couple of hours today putting the shadows into the roses, making the dark purple much more - defined. The photo above is a progress photo (bad angle), and the second photo is with all of the dark purple completed.

There are still areas that I'd like to make a little darker, either with thread or with more ink. It helps to look at the photos on this scale, as I can see things in the image that I'm missing when I look at her regularly.


I'm excited about finishing her soon, and am looking so forward to finding out what she'll look like all stitched up.

Hope you're having a good weekend,

Lisa

A week in review...

Believe it or not, I've been writing blog posts all week - in my mind. At one point I came quite close to posting a photo of my studio in all it's quilty mayhem - I finished several quilts this week and there was a point at which I had 3 finished quilts waiting to be boxed and mailed, one finished quilt hanging to be photographed, and two out in different areas in the room with thread proposals on them waiting to be photographed and emailed to the quilt's owners. Somehow I opted to just keep working instead.

Today I've got my machine part way through my 'large maintenance routine', waiting for the WD40 to drip out of the bobbin area. Every month or so I take a day to check the timing on the machine (99% of the time it is fine), clean out the excess oil from inside the machine head, clean all the wheels and rails thoroughly ( I use q-tips with rubbing alcohol on them on the wheels) and clean out the bobbin race really thoroughly with WD40. It's amazing how much gunk gets in there, even though I wipe out that area frequently with my stiff brush and oil often. Once the WD40 has dried completely, I'll re-oil the bobbin race, let it run for a while, then stitch out some test bits to make sure there is no yucky stuff in the oil, no residue left in the race, and then I'll be ready to go again.

This week I did a bit of playing with my new-to-me knitting machine, and have consequently ordered some parts for it (!).

I did finish a hand knitting project I've been working on for over a month, a fan-and-feather stitch shawl in a lovely, soft merino wool I bought on Etsy. I'd give you a link to the specific store, but it seems to have temporarily evaporated! The photos, sadly, do not do this hand-dyed yarn justice. It's far more plummy/purply/raspberry/rhubarb than the photos here would suggest.

I also crocheted a couple of child-sized hats for a charity my Mom works at...and I realize now with our long weekend they'll not get to her until Wednesday (sorry, Mom. The holiday/post conflict completely slipped my mind).

I got a little bit more work done here and there on Blossom Lady, mostly just filling in the background with a nice dark indigo blue (their name for it is 'Midnight'), and deepening some of the shadows in her garment.

Now that there is some real contrast going on the areas that I was already working on seem quite washed out...time to go put some BOLD contrast in this baby. Unfortunately I spilled one of my ink pots on my work space and now have to wait until it is THOROUGHLY washed and dried before I dare to put the piece back on it. Of course I spilled the darkest colour. Of course I lost more than half the little dye pot to my clumsiness. Blargh.

Well, off to check on my machine and put it back together. It always runs so much happier after this little wee pick-me-up.

Happy stitching,

Lisa

PS - I was floored by an unexpected and generous hearted gift this week. Thanks so much, Tracy. You really touched my heart. Thank you.

:)
L

Blossom Lady gets a new dress

Again, not the greatest angle, but things are starting to really take shape now. I stood on a chair to take this picture, so the angle is slightly 'up' the figure, further accentuating the bottom part of the piece.

The dye I used for the dress and hairband is 'Sky Blue' - a lot like a nice cerulean blue. Having some of the sepia ('Autumn Leaf' - much like a burnt sienna) lightly pushed into the shadows was really helpful when it came time to do the blue for the dress. I've never worked a single colour over such a large area before and there were many challenges to be met in getting the colour even in the large, open, lightest areas. I tried several techniques and finally settled on working with a really dry paintstick in large motions in the 'grain' of the fabric's wrinkles.

I didn't want this to get too dark yet because I'll eventually fill the inside area of the ring with some very dark colours, and I want to be sure to have enough contrast to let the figure remain in the foreground. It's hard to let it go, but there are many hours of painting left and only so many for sleep before the new day comes. I love how the few 'tightened up' roses have so much dimension. It bodes well for the rest of the piece, I think.

I should probably go and try to sleep now.

All the best,

Lisa

Blossom girl sepia wash...

Pardon the oddball angle, but with this on the table it's hard to get a good shot of her. I've been doing the sepia toned wash today, and you can see that I'm setting up some shadow areas in the drapery of her dress. Just a sense of where the shadows will fall, nothing too definitive just yet.

I love this stage (do I say that at every stage?) as the image really does grow and change from minute to minute.

I'm looking forward to working on it more after supper. The sepia is not done yet.

Don'tcha just love how the contrast just brings the image into 3 dimensions? I think I'll cutaway trapunto or false trapunto the figure and maybe the roses, too. We'll see.

Happy Monday,

Lisa

*edited to add - the funny line shadows that are in the left of the photo are actually shadowing coming through the muslin from the big ironing pad that I have underneath the piece (It's a big machine quilting practice sandwich. Multiuse). On the right, the big shadow is the iron. I tend to work really hot and dry (fabric, that is) for the detail stuff, and a little more loosely in the larger areas. If you've ever used these inks you know that they want to BLEED. Any time there is a hard line I've really heated things up so that the ink is drying almost as it's applied.*

Blossom girl continues...

No, really, I do other things than going through old knitting magazines...
Thanks for the comments, though. Gosh, they're fun. Don't encourage me too much, ladies, 'cause I've also got some Beehive pattern books from the '30's and '40's that are ripe for lampooning!

Yesterday afternoon and last night I got back to working on the Blossom Girl. Once I traced her on to the fabric (Roc-Lon bleached muslin with mechanical pencil) I untaped everything from the wall upstairs and moved it down into my studio. I'm pretty lucky with the size of my space - there was room enough for both drawings to be pinned to my design wall, then to work at the sewing table (a twin to our dining table...DH made them both for me).

When working with Tsukineko inks I find it's best to work up in layers of colour, much like watercolour (all those who followed me through this process in Jan/Feb for the Cherub Quilt might not find this part all that interesting).

The first wash was done in Banana Creme (their colour name). It was applied to the parts of the painting that are going to have skin tones, or as under painting for areas like leaves and the circle that she's sitting in.

The next wash was done in Apricot - again focusing on the areas the will be warmest in colour.

This time, just so that I could keep an eye on how the whole piece is developing, I started in with the Orchid colour, then the Celadon. Normally I'd work the warm tones all the way up through their next two (at least) washes, but because the piece is so big, it was better to work over larger areas.

If you enlarge the photo at left you'll see some of the roses to the far left have already had some dark purple (purple mist? I'll have to look up that name) shadows pushed into them.

I know things look a little amorphous at this point, but stick with me...it'll all come together. And if it doesn't? I've got another piece of muslin waiting in the wings.

Happy Monday,

Lisa

(P.S. I'm totally jealous of all you Houston travellers out there....have fun, have fun, have FUN)
:)
L

More Blossom Lady

Well. This is the second go-around for this post. It seems that blogger or my computer lost that last one. I've been having some computer problems lately, so maybe the fault is mine. If you never hear from me again, it's because my computer(s) crashed.

Anyhoo, I got the blossom lady traced. The first photo here on the left is to give an idea of the scale of the drawing.

After dinner I taped another layer of vellum over the drawing and traced it with Sharpie - note! I can use a Sharpie without it bleeding through thanks to the quality of the vellum I'm using. If you are following along, doing a project of your own at home, be sure to test your paper before using a Sharpie on it!

I love this stage. The whole thing starts taking shape at this point a bit more. Now I can get a bit better idea of the colour balance and composition of the piece. Often at this stage I'll spend some time working with a few black and white copies (MUCH smaller) and a stack of pencil crayons until I get a colour scheme that feels right.

Is she Demeter? She just might be.

Happy Thursday.

L

Making lemonade

I had a bit of a rough morning. Yes, it even happens to quilters!

After wandering around my space for the morning unable to concentrate on anything for others, I figured I better just take a day and do something for myself...so I got going on a design for a quilt, one that I've had pressing at the forefront of my mind for several months now.

I'm hoping to do it in a similar technique to the cherub quilt (Bacchanalia), but wanted to do it bigger. After lunch I closed the door on my studio downstairs, cleaned off the dining table upstairs, spread out my vellum and got to work.

The piece I'm working on is based on a little (1 1/2" X 2") drawing on page 97 of a book called 2,600 Typographic Ornaments and Designs published by Dover, edited by Maggie Kate. Most of the designs fall into the broad category of the Art Nouveau movement - a movement that's rather close to my heart. Both DH and I are big fans of the kind of work that emerged during William Morris' Arts and Crafts movement in the 1870's, and hold many of the principles embodied there dear.

The piece got big, fast. The vellum I'm working on measures 36" wide by 47" long. Originally I worked on the table, but soon found that I'm just not long enough to work on the top of the drawing with it down... so I took the cherub quilt off the wall and taped up my vellum! MUCH easier.
The photo at left was taken standing on the table. My Oldest was home today with a stuffy head, and he had set up his drawing space at the other end of the table. Gotta love the reaction of a 10 year old when his mother STANDS on the TABLE to take a photo...you think I'd ever let him stand on the table? I'm such a hypocrite.
:)

The photo at right is taken for comparison sake, so that one can see the actual size of the original drawing with my sketch. Of course the translation from something so small to something so large means many, many differences in the final work...I changed many elements quite substantially.

In the small picture it looks as though she has cherry or plum blossoms behind her (impossible to tell for sure, the flowers just loose, cloudy shapes), and the flowers she is unleashing, sprinkling from the cornucopia are roses. I've opted to make them ALL roses, for continuity's sake. I'm sure there will be botanical-minded viewers that will find the rose on the tree-like branches to be anachronistic, but so be it.

Sadly, as she is done only in pencil at this stage, she is hard to photograph. I've sized the photos so that you can click on them for a large version, if you like, and hopefully that will give you a better idea of what it looks like. Or not.

I'm not sure what to call her yet, but I'm sure that will emerge as the piece progresses. So far, she's just 'the blossom lady' and she feels like a tribute to spring, to renewal and regrowth.


Here's to a day making lemonade out of lemons.

All the best,
Lisa