MidSummer Maine, the final day

All of the BIG projects are now behind us and we can start to play. We learned about rubbings, stamps, collage and going back into previous work for added layers.

A collage on the cover of a pamphlet

A page of gelli print above. A small rectangle was cut and lines were added with black pen as well as white dots made with correction fluid.

Watercolors painted over oil pastels. What a beautiful effect.

Flooding the surface with water then adding watercolors. They look like blooms.

Drips of watercolors making a grid

Buttons and someone's personal watercolors below.

Drip grids with some areas colored. 

Collage

Collage

Gelli prints

Marcella, without whom these workshops would not be as professional, smoothly run or fun. Thank you Marcella for all the years you have assisted me!!

Collage luggage tags.

Lunch on the deck!!

One of our favorite things is Saturday night Show and Tell.  Here are Janice and David Jones who are doing work in collaboration. David is an award winning oil painter who has a gallery in Paris and shows there as well. He has painted some works and Janice has used them as an inspiration for Art Quilts.

David working indoors during a rainy spell.

One of our group had to bow out on Sunday so she missed getting her picture taken with the group.
Sorry about that Laura. See you next year!

If you are interested in signing up for next years workshops, contact me using the contact form at the bottom of the page or just leave a comment.

Thanks for reading,

Beth

MidSummer Maine day two

There were several people very excited about making coptic stitched books. Usually this is a very intense one day workshop in itself. We started the first day with the paste paper to cover the bookboard covers and folding the signatures leaving the rest of the process for the next day. The first day we also made accordion folded books and pamphlet stitched books with paste paper covers.

Accordion fold book

Pamphlet book getting a custom first page

We spent a considerable amount of time learning to stitch the spines of our coptic books... 

but look at the results!!

Here is a completed pamphlet (U.R.) with paste paper cover, an accordion book (u.l.) and a coptic book. There are also some fabric beads laying on the book. 

We made fabric beads which are pictures above in the last half hour of day one and left them to dry over night. Second day, we wrapped them in metallic thread with bead embellishments. These are great to add to quilts or book covers. See how cute they turned out!!

Rolling the fabric on knitting needles for the fabric buttons

Another technique we learned was weaving papers

and everyone was interested in learning more about gelli printing.

Wow! What a day!!

Thanks for reading,

Beth

The first MidSummer Maine Workshop

I was struck with this idea during the winter to have a workshop using paper and mark. Why sew something without working it out on paper first. How about a few exercises to rev up that creativity and a hand made book or two to keep those ideas in one place. We had some takers, enough for a full house. The way the room was arranged we each had all the room we needed at a six foot table. We were surrounded with supplies and inspiration. This was day one:

Art Art Greenhouse all lite up awaiting the artists. You can see all the "art faeries" swarming the building (or maybe raindrops on my lens?)

Our alfresco lunch spot on my deck

We are making paste papers to cover our book. We will be using these papers in other ways over the weekend, probably during the year as well as during next years MidSummer Maine II.

Our hard work drying on my fabulous drying rack in the Maine summer sun!!

Covering the bookboard covers with paste paper

Tearing signatures to make our books which had 160 pages each. Each signature was 16 pages.

In the yard making "MARKS" on large sheets of paper. Later we can weave them into a composition.

The long "arms" holding the marking making implements along with using our non-dominant hands gave use wonderful squiggly line and interesting shapes.

Thanks for reading,

Beth

While you are reading this

Today I am just getting all revved up about the MidSummer Maine Workshop starting on the 22nd. I know that was this past Friday but I wanted to have something for this week. So while you are reading this I am downloading and editing all the photos from the event.

To get into the spirit of the workshop, Marcella, my trusty co-teacher, wanted to make some aprons for the participants. I cut a mylar stencil with tiny manicure scissors and made a nice stencil. I tried it out on my favorite "art" shirt. The top you see is clean but further down it is covered in old paint, dye and ink. I LOVE this soft chambray shirt. Now I love it even more.

I think I might have a thermofax screen made.

Thanks for reading,

Beth

Baby quilt wrangling

I thought it would be smart to sandwich up the quilt and add the borders flip and stitch style. I pinned the main body every few inches but there was 2+ inches more border on on side then the other. Time to rip 8 border strips off and regroup.

I Started with the main body, pinned it to death then quilted it. Still one corner went haywire and I had to tear out 9 square inches of heavy quilting. I FINALLY got the top sandwiched into a rectangle with even length sides. THEN I applied the straight of grain borders all around twice. The borders being on the grain were much easier to quilt although not as easy as other fabrics. Darn you Kaffe!! I quilted the borders on three sides waiting for the baby to be born then I could add the name, date, length, and time of birth.

Done except for inscription

Now I am actually going to PLAN the spacing instead of my usual flying-by-the-seat-of-my-pants method.

I measured a strip of paper the size of my opening. Now on to the quilting.

- Thanks for visiting, 

Beth

One month, no posts

So a month has gone by with no posts. I was curious to see if anyone would notice and then I got an email from a former member of the FIRE blog, Judy. who along with my friend Rita and another reader, Carmina from Romania seemed to be the only people who have commented lately. The posts are time intensive with photos and photo editing. I was discouraged.

Judy said she selfishly wished I would keep up the posts so I decided to give it another go. This is for you Judy and any other folks who are reading (are you out there??)

If you have been reading you will remember I found my birth mother's side of the family. One of my great nieces was having a baby and it was a great excuse to make another quilt. I bought this great fabric years ago to make a baby quilt for someone else which never got made.

I showed it to a pregnant friend and she liked it so I am making it for her November baby. Meanwhile my great niece, Shaye, picked out these fabrics for her baby. 

They were baby soft, Kaffe Fassett and the biggest pain in the neck to work with. Of course half square triangles are on the bias and these blocks squirmed and stretched and made me sorry to have chosen them. They were beautiful but frustrating to work with. Looking back I should have starched them within an inch of their life - like cardboard. That might have leveled the playing field.

I managed to get all the rows sewn and stitched into a rectangle.

Next post, the BIGGEST problem.