Art Quiltie - make it a great day!

I created this quiltie for a swap on one of my groups for July!!  I am happy to have the chance to make a few more of these!!
I started with an experiment in free motion stitching that I made up a while back. I took small pieces of fabric and used small pieces of fusible webbing to tack them in place on my substrate fabric. I just kept laying on pieces overlapping until all the surface was covered.  I started free motion sewing and I found that the tension was off so the fabric wrinkled up a lot. I had set it aside as an unfortunate experiment and when I found it the other day it looked better than I remembered. So I decided to trim it up (4" x 4") and use it as the front of my little quiltie.  A while back I had my sister print off some sayings for me onto printable fusible fabric because it requires an inkjet printer which I no longer have.  I chose this little saying from the sheet and cut a strip of green fabric which coordinated with my front.  I trimmed out the saying, fused it to the strip and then stitched all the way around. Next, I stitched the strip to my front.  I went looking into my fabric embellishments and found this flower and leaf combo that worked well with it.  I stitched them into place with embroidery floss in the right colour and then added sequins and a seed bead to the middle of the flower.  To add a bit more texture I decided to embroider some flowers on the green strip as well.  I used seven french knots to create the flowers and added green leaves using several chain stitches.  I was happy with that!!  I used several scraps to create a little quilt for the back and stitched it to a layer of thick flannel using one line of stitching that spirialed from the outside edge to the inside.  I backed the two pieces and stitched all the way around the edge and then did blanket stitch all the way around with brown embroidery floss!!  Pretty happy with my little creation!!  Half way through my border stitching I remembered that I had wanted to try couching yarn into the edge when I did blanket stitch the next time.  Needless to say that will have to wait until next time!!!

Therese

Art Quiltie with stamped fabric

On my Fabric Postcard group we are having an art quiltie swap.  There was one in June and I missed it!!!!!  Fortunately, I am blessed to have a member of the group that volunteered to swap one for one with me so I made her this cute little quiltie!!
I started with a square of stamped fabric which I received in a swap a while back.  I love the quote so I cut the fabric piece down to 4" x 4" for the front of my quiltie.  I found and installed my free motion foot for my sewing machine.  It was not working properly so I found a YOUTube video that gave me a visual of the process and a few hints on how to best proceed with free motion stitiching.  Once reinstalled and the adjustments made it was working much better.  I layered my square over a piece of batting and started stitching.  You can see from the photo that my free motion skills are only in the beginner stages but I did manage to go around the petals on the flowers that were stamped on the fabric.  I will keep practicing!!

Next I stitched my backing fabric (4"x 4") to a scrap piece of fabric and used the same technique to embellish the swirls on it.  Next, I found some coordinating pink embroidery floss and added double sequins (iridescent white and fuchsia) to the center of the flowers and secured them in place using a ivory seed bead.  I added three more stitched flowers in the same floss and added fuchsia sequins and ivory beads to their centers. as well.  Then, I laid my front on my back and trimmed them to the same size and added a few more loops of free motion stitching to secure these two piece together.  With that much complete, I changed my foot back to the one for regular stitching and zigzagged all the way around very close to the edge to create a nice neat edge.

I have been playing with the idea of making fabric tape using fusible webbing for a while.   So, today, I decided to play and made some fabric tape to bind the edges of my quiltie.
I positioned a strip of fusible webbing (sold to fix a hem without sewing) on the edge of a coordinating solid, enclosed it in resist paper and ironed it.  The fusible webbing very nicely adhered to the edge of the fabric.  I trimmed away the piece with fusible webbing on it and I had created a length of fabric tape!  I cut a four inch length and positioned it neatly on one side of my quiltie with half the tape on the quiltie and the other half hanging off.

I place resist paper over and above and ironed it in place.  It fused very nicely to the front portion of my quiltie. Next, I turned the quiltie over and ironed the remainder to the back which very neatly bound that side of the quiltie. I cut another 4" strip and positioned it on the opposite side and repeated the steps to bind that edge.
To finish it off, I cut another two strips but made sure they were long enough to cover the strips I had already put in place, trimmed the corners into a point so that the corners would look mitered and adhered them in the same fashion as I had done the other two sides.

You can see how the binding looked in position before I ironed down the final edge to the back of my quiltie.  It worked very well and created some very nice corners on my little quiltie.   I decided to add a row of straight stitching very close to the inside edge and the outside edge of my binding to help secure it and to give the binding some texture and definition!! I am very happy with how well this technique worked and will certainly be using it again when I am making quilties!!
So my quiltie is ready to go and will be off to my partner this week!!

Therese

Exchange cards that reused supplies!!

I like to reuse items when I am creating so saved these images from a pocket calendar I used several years ago.  I loved these funky collaged images when I first bought the calendar and decided to use some of them to create cards for my monthly card exchange. I trimmed the images and layered them onto coordinating card stock.  I trimmed two pieces of different coloured cardstock to just less than a quarter sheet, embossed them and stapled on strips of decorative mesh on the left hand side trimming the mesh to the edges of the cardstock.  I glued these layers to my card fronts and added my focal elements using 3D foam tape.  I really like how they turned out!!
The decorative mesh is something I made a while back.  I used scraps of fiberglass window screening, applied embossing ink, covered them in gold embossing powder and then heated them with the heat gun.  They take the heat well and the embossing powder adheres to the mesh very nicely.  Another item that I reused on these cards!!

Therese

Watercoloured cards using ADORN IT images

My sister gave me several images from an ADORN IT scrapbooking page a while back.  These are just perfect for cardmaking!!  I trimmed the edge to be even with the border and watercoloured the image.  I used my stamping jig to stamp a birthday greeting after it was dry.  I layered it with yellow cardstock to coordinate with the bee.  I found this serendipity background which coordinated nicely so I trimmed it down to size and stitched it to a green card front.  I added the focal element with 3D foam tape and my card was done!!
If you have never tried doing a serendipity collage click on the link and go find out how easy it is to use scraps of paper to create something that you can use in your art!  It is a fun reuse for paper scraps!!

Therese

Quick and easy cards from kits!!

A friend wants to buy a few cards and I needed to get a few more made to add to the options she could choose from so I put together these two from kits from my last class.  The first card has a purple card base, a decorative check paper layered with some strips of magenta cardstock, a length of white gros grain ribbon folded with flagged ends overlaid with a scallop punchie and a birdie greeting which was watercoloured!!  The greeting is a layered - a laser printed greeting over a label punchie with a little coordinating rhinestone which I adhered with 3D foam tape.
The other is a label die cut from an embossed paper quilted background to which I added a length of ribbon onto which I had tied a short length in a different coordinating colour.  Like the look of that!! I adhered the ends to the back using double sided tape and glued this whole element to a distressed purple card front.  I layered the laser printed greeting onto a coordinating rectangle of cardstock and added it to the card front using 3D foam tape.
Quick and easy cards!! Worth making a few extra when you get started making cards and having them ready for "the last minute"!!

Therese

Some large birthday cards!

 I made a few large cards for my sister with the supplies she left here last year!!  I was headed to her house today and wanted to get a few made before I left last night.
I did manage to get four made but one of the photos was really blurry so is unusable!
These are 5.5" x 8.5" cards.
For the one on the left I started with an image off of the cover of the pad of paper which featured some cute birds and flower.  There was printing on the corner so I created a layered greeting to fit in the space (Decorative Label punchie (SU) in red, Circle punchie with a "bird " greeting from Birds Cards, a little circle punchie all held together with a black brad).  I layered the trimmed image onto brown cards stock and added it to a white card front to which I had adhered a distressed piece of green cardstock.  It was white core cardstock so I distressed it by sanding it a bit.  I also punched the one edge with a scallop border punch (SU).  It still needed a bit of something so I added two little red branch die cuts and that was better!!
The card on the right started with a brown card front to which I added a strip of birdhouse paper which I layered onto green before gluing it to the card.  The focal image is another one cut from the cover of  pack of paper and features some cute little birdhouses.  I wrapped a laser printed transparency greeting to the image and secured both ends to the back with double sided tape.  Next, I layered the image onto red and border punched the left hand side  with a scallop punch. I pierced all the scallops with a push pin before adhering the whole element to my card front over the decorative strip using 3D foam tape.  It needed a bit of something so I added faux stitching to three circle to make them look like buttons and adhered them below the image.  That was better!
My third card features a large butterfly image (CLKER) which I painted with shimmery water colours!!  Love the shimmer! I layered two green triangles behind the top right and lower left corners.  I created the background by cutting the peacock feather paper in two and adding a strip of orange.  I then trimmed the piece to fit o my white card.  I punched a hole in the decorative paper and layered a greeting behind it.  It was looking a bit forlorn so I punched a scrap and framed it and that was much better.  The flagged end overlaps the image and really helps to unify the elements.
The last one was a Christmas one with cute little houses as well.  So a few more cards for her stash!!

Therese