Craft Discoveries

On a happy note, it's Index Card A Day challenge time again!

I've lost track of how many years I've done ICAD, somewhere around 9 years. It's 61 days of doing something with simple index cards, June 1st to July 31st.

I'm not doing the prompts, I'm going with my own book theme with simple watercoloring with images relating to reading. It may change so I can keep the creative options open. Whatever I do, I'm taking this as a great opportunity to use a bunch of my stickers that have lingered for far too long in my stash.

The class was to get us checked out for safety/etc, and then we had to get a quilt top ready and sign up for our first session. When i got to schedule mine, I was being lazy, I had fabric but hadn't started cutting and sewing yet. And my options were either for a session in a week, or a session in a week, or a session in... five weeks. Anyways, I made this in about three days of dead sprint, and I'm so pleased with myself and I love it SO much.

And the longarm is such a thrill. I have so much room for improvement, but even my most amateur results make me SO happy!!! And there's so much to learn and experiment with. I love this so, so much, and I bought the materials for my next quilt before I left the door. I'm not moving quite as fast in getting ready for the next one, I have to pivot to getting ready for my brother's wedding, but I had the time of my life, I was practically vibrating with excitement as i finished this thing, and I'm obsessed with it

More abstract art, big and small canvases and some ink flowers.

This is what remains of the watercolors I used throughout the month of February. I learned from the online Watercolor for Relaxation course with Willa Wonders that rinsing in-between each piece just wastes paint and to continue using it until it becomes obvious it's time to start anew. It's interesting to see how colors change with just the tiniest bit of another color or by adding more water to the brush.

I made this for my grand niece who loves pink, heavy metal music, and works in real estate. She wanted a fun journal for ephemera and to use up some of her stickers. If you know anyone who's crafty, you know we tend to amass quite a collection of both.

The cover is an off brand similar to Kraft-Tex. I lined it with fabric and edged it with black trim with silver metal eyelets. I sewed along the edges, not only because I like the look, but also to make sure the iron-on HeatN Bond stays put. The edges are purposely frayed, and as she uses it, it should start fraying more along the bottom edge as well for a nice grungy touch. I used a wrapped long stitch to bind it.

I made this bag for my apparel technology class final. I call it the Lantern Bag. The final version took about 40 hours, but counting R&D it was probably more like 100. The outer fabric is 8 oz 100% cotton twill with computerize machine embroidery along the slashes, and the inner fabric is a horrible poly satin. The structural interlining is a spun poly about 1 cm thick which I think turned out much better than the buckram I was planning on using. The lighting component is 2 meters of EL wire in the area behind the satin, powered by a battery pack inside the bag. I wish I had chosen yellow instead of white, because the white looks very blue. It is inspired, of course, by the classic Chinese lantern and European slashing and puffing. Here’s a picture of the interior:

I'm not sure if I'll be sharing my February Flowers every day or not, but here's day two, COLLAGE.

Snapshots from the sewing room this month! Working on something overly detailed and time-consuming that I will probably faill to finish on time, as per usual 😭