Sunday, July 03, 2011
Stashbusting News and Other News Fit to Print!
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Skyrockets Workshop
Went to a workshop an all day last week, Sally Schneider taught us about making Skyrockets. This was a pretty good workshop, I even managed to get 5 blocks done. I don't have pictures of MY blocks, they are in the car already so I don't forget to take them to the day guild meeting tomorrow.
However, I did take a picture of the wall where everyone was putting their finished blocks. I love it when the students hang their blocks. With all the different fabric choices, the blocks always seem to look good together.
There were batiks, 30's prints, random fabrics and so on. The success of the block is due to paying attention to the placement of the value in the block. Darks, mediums and lights. The Rocket part was supposed to the bold or dark part. Now the picture on the left uses a few different backgrounds to give the light effect in the center.
This is one project that I do plan to finish. Guess I better go add it to my UFO list
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Beyond The Borders - Adventures in Dyeing Coffee Filters
I was especially inspired by the coffee filters that Liz produced and immediatly tried to dye some coffee filters myself! Well, first of all I took the coffee filter out of the coffee pot from this morning, thinking that was a good start. I proceded to dump the grounds out of the filter and rinsed it. Duh, all the dark colors came out. I put the filter in a plastic container, and poured a little bit of the leftover coffee from the pot on the filter. I let that soak over night. Nothing. Same off white color as when I rinsed it.
To make a long story short, after checking the internet, maybe I should be using 'Instant coffee' . The other tip I found was that the dark the roast, the darker the stain. (I'm using HEB San Antonio blend- should that give a red cast?? LOL) .
Today, I went over to Wally world and bought a small jar of instant coffee. Tomorrow, we are going to try the spritzing method. I found this recipe at this Folk Art blog:
mix 5 tablespoons of instant coffee crystals in half a cup of hot water.
Add a few drops of vanilla extract to for a great scent
Using an old sponge, blot the dye on the fabric, adding more until you get the desired look.
She will then put in a 200 degree oven for about 10 minutes to facilitate drying.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
At The Movies! Another UFO Completed!
This is me showing it for Show and Tell at the Greater Houston Quilt Guild meeing in January.
Oh, the gal that was going to buy the whole of pantos backed out. Now I've got to list them again. Bummer....
Tuesday, December 25, 2007
UFO's and Stashbusting
Saturday, September 22, 2007
Phil Beaver Workshop
Picture to the left is Phil in front of some of his pieces. He's telling us that WE are going to be able to make these beautiful sunflowers and poinsettias! Yeah right!
Here we are 'watching paint dry' literally! We laid out the class' painted fabric edge to edge, sprinkled rock salt over them, spritzed them with water again, and now waiting for them to dry. We did all of this BEFORE lunch the first day. These were absolutely gorgeous. As they dried, they got better and better.
This orange one is one that I made so I could do pumpkins! I was able to get two sunflowers cut out and laid out before I had to leave to go to the West Houston guild meeting that night.
Phil is looking at Mary Jo's layout. She did sunflowers and several pumpkins. Can'twait to see how these turn out.
A couple of my friends that WEREN'T in the workshop want to try this, so look for more to come!!