The 2017 Newport News Fall Festival of Folk Life

I absolutely love this festival!  I grew up in Newport News so coming back to do the festival just warms my heart.  I have been on the juried side in the past, and my mom has been on the marketplace side BUT since they are moving to Wisconsin I decided that I wanted to be in my mom's place this year.  My mom has taught adult art classes through the NN Parks and Rec for 40+ years so she has a huge following in Newport News.  Since she is moving I wanted to do this for all of her students who want to keep up with her and my dad and their new adventures closer to my brother and his family.

Because I was on the marketplace side this year I was able to combine my sewing and painting talents under one tent.  Had I been on the juried side I would have to pick one category.  I realized a long time ago that my brain doesn't work like that, I am definitely all over the place when it comes to my artistic endeavors.  Here are a few photos of my tent at the Fall Festival:

 

 

Thanks for stopping by!

Small craft bazaar

Photos from the Winter Bazaar I was in last weekend:

I prefer making snowmen over santas

Debut of some of my altered paintbrushes

I love painting these doll chairs

My very whimsical one-of-a-kind painted doll chair

I'm now branching out and painting on other found objects as well

Another one of my painted chairs

More fabric baskets

A few Christmas coiled fabric baskets

One of my tables

Another table and I still couldn't get all of my stuff displayed

There wasn't a lot of room in the gymnasium at the school

Merry Christmas!

I much prefer to create Halloween stuff but I have been working on these two Christmas wall hangings for some time now and I have finally finished them!  

I designed and embroidered this nutcracker adding beads and sequins.  The face and hands are hand painted with acrylics.  I then free-motion quilted the entire wall hanging.  It has a rod pocket on the back for easy hanging.

My "cutesy" snowman was created with the coiled fabric bowl method.  The red and white background is actually an upholstery remnant.  The snow is three-dimensional (gel medium) and I hand painted all of the buttons

The back is pretty fun too!!

The start of my Nutcracker Art Quilt

I love art quilts.  I love making them and I love looking at them.  Sometimes an art quilt contains embellishments such as beads, ribbons, found objects and things from nature.  A few months ago I started hand sewing beads onto one of my art quilts and I LOVE how it is turning out.  Granted it is taking a while but it is totally worth it!  

After deciding to embroider the centers of my Block of the Month blocks (see last post) I have really embraced this type of needlework.   I love it because to me everything about embroidery is creative, I can draw my own pattern and I can use any colors I want.  If you can't draw, or need ideas, all you have to do is search "coloring pages+mermaids" or whatever you little heart desires.

About a year ago I found this Christmas fabric on sale.  I traditionally like red and green but this one really grabbed my eye.

I had not known what I was going to do with this fabric until a few days ago.  Along with peacocks, mermaids and Halloween I also like nutcrackers (like mother like daughter!)  I found a line drawing of a nutcracker online and have decided to embroider him in blues and greens.  He will then be the center of one of my art quilts with this fabric being one of the borders and maybe the backing.

I love adding sequins and beads to make it really "sparkle":

I purposely did not sketch in the eyes because I was going to use black beads and I didn't want the pencil marks to show but last night I had an idea, I may paint the eyes so I can get the tiny details.

This may be for sale at the Newport News Fall Festival next year or it may not depending on how much I fall in love with it.

Sew Sweet Simplicity BOM (#1)

I'm taking a break from making fabric bowls to refocus on quilting.  I found this wonderful lady by the name of Jacquelynne Steves on Facebook who just started a 6 month BOM quilt along.  I am so excited because I've always wanted to do a Block of the Month quilt but I didn't want to commit to 12 months.  Well Jacquelynne has created a 6 block quilt.  It has a large center piece that you can create your own pieced or appliqued design or you can use the design that comes with the pattern.  This is perfect for someone like me who likes to create her own look.

Jacquelynne Steves website is called Jacquelynne Steves: The Art of Home . You can either visit her homepage with a link to the block of the month: Sew Sweet Simplicity or click here .
This is what the original quilt blocks look like but we can choose our own fabrics and color combinations:

I have never been one to follow a pattern and that's why I fell in love with this quilt!  The possibilities are endless as far as fabric combinations and also the fact that you can put anything you want in the center.  

This quilt along started right before Halloween, one of my favorite holidays, so I was going to do a Tim Burton Nightmare Before Christmas themed quilt but changed my mind at the last minute and decided to go with a peacock theme instead.  

Here are my fabric combinations:

And before I even started cutting the pieces I got started on embroidering my peacock for the center.  I used beads and sequins as well as metallic embroidery floss:

Then I started cutting the rest of the fabric:

And here is my finished first block:

I've done half square triangles before but I've never done the flying geese pattern so this was a lot of fun.  I've already started embroidering my second peacock for the center and can't wait to get the second month's pattern so I can put that one together too!

Fabric bowls gone wild!

I have taken my fabric bowls to a whole new level, embellishments!!

The first bowl was a Halloween bowl with hand sewn beads and that crazy eyelash yarn (I finally found a use for it!)

The second bowl isn't finished yet but it's a pumpkin bowl with a lid.  I created the stem out of creative paper clay but haven't painted it yet.  The white piece of paper is the template for the leaves that I drew.  It will be cut out of olive green velvet and this weekend I hope to embroider the veins of the leaf and add sead beads.

My "wedding basket".  Again not quite finished because I think it needs more pearls and sequins but I'm thinking about customizing these for brides.  If your colors are teal or burgundy I could incorporate those colors into the basket as well.  It would sit on the table with the gifts to hold wedding cards.

Then I decided that it would be fun to sew beads between the fabric rings.  My inspiration was these wooden painted beads I got in Cozumel, Mexico on my honeymoon.  I then looked through my stash and found this butterfly fabric, perfect!  Again not quite finished because I'm going to continue upwards and do a few more rings.

Not a new endeavor but putting creative thoughts together

My cousin Susan has always been intrigued by the thought process of my ideas, which I've never paid attention to, but am now more keenly aware of.  So just for Susan I'm going to write down the steps that lead me to today's blog post.

1.  Quilt convention in February ---> bought wool felt pattern packet to make a candle mat

2.  Wool Felt ---> Craft Felt ---> searched for an old project I had started months ago

3.  Small project became large project with beads and sequins and embroidery
     (See previous post called Gypsy Love)

4.  What else could I do with felt? ---> Searched for more felt project books online

5. Found my next endeavor, making little people!

This may be my cheapest project yet! 
All I need are pipe cleaners (now called chenille stems) from my kids craft box. 
Little felt pieces -  .30 cents a sheet 
Embroidery floss - have tons of from my cross stitch days
Markers for the face - who doesn't have a marker laying around!
Wooden balls for the head - 3.00 for a huge bag
And the last thing I need is time - PRICELESS!

First you have to measure and bend the pipe cleaners according to what size doll you want.  Her patterns range from a 1 1/2" doll to 4".  I'm going to start with the 4" size because I plan to do a lot of decorating on their jackets and skirts.  A good hands-on activity to do at night while watching tv is wrapping the pipe cleaners.  These are my first five that I will be "dressing" in the next few days:

The only thing I don't like about the little figures in the book are the way the faces are drawn so mine will be be getting a face lift plus more sequins and no acorn hats.

Here are some pictures from the book:

I purposely cut off the head in this picture so you could see the detail of the clothes:

I'm not sure I'll make any fairies but with some pink tulle I may design a ballerina

My husband and boys are out of town today so I may actually find some time to sit down and dress my little people.  But we have a huge art festival coming into town tomorrow (right near my art gallery) so I'm trying to finish up six of my fabric bowls for my studio too.  Oh the life of an artist... I LOVE IT!