Deck the Halls

In a recent episode on Design Matters TV, Linda Kemshall demonstrated how to make some beautiful little Christmas ornaments, and I was so intrigued that I had to make one myself.

The shape of the ornament wasn't unfamiliar to me. In fact, Ive seen something similar by Clover called a 'Clam Shell Accessories Case'. You can buy the pieces that make up the walls of the case, and cover them with the fabric of your choice. In DMTV Linda demonstrated that it is very easy to make these pieces yourself from card or sturdy watercolour paper. Or why not stencil plastic to make them even sturdier? For a Christmas ornament, however, card is probably enough, as most of the time it will just be hanging in your home looking pretty. I say most of the time, because you can also use them for hiding little objects or sweets, if you leave an opening, so they'll have to be able to withstand a bit of handling. If you don't have access to DMTV, Clover has also published an instructional video that will show you another method for making these little cases.

So, with a bit of patience, three little leaf-shaped fabric-covered pieces of card

could turn into something like this:

And if you want to hide something inside it, you just press it open like this:

Pretty neat, right?

And while I'm on the subject, here's another Christmas ornament that Linda and Laura Kemshall have inspired me to make. A few years ago I learned from them how to make triangular hanging bags (here's one that I've made), and that inspired me to make a tiny version that you could hang on your Christmas tree. There's room for a sweet in this one too!

It is so enjoyable to make precious little ornaments like these that I'm thinking perhaps I should start a tradition and make a new one very year.

Thanks for visiting!

Winter Blooming

Since I've been absent from this blog so much this past autumn and winter, I have a lot of catching up to do. Here's another project that I haven't shared with you yet. I learned this technique from Linda Kemshall. She calls the technique 'hydrangea blooming' in an episode of Design Matters TV. I just had to try it. There are four layers of cotton in this hanging bag; three of which I've cut open on the grain, to produce maximum fraying. I like the way the frayed threads form stamens in the middle of the blooms.

Speaking of blooms, here's an image of an amaryllis I was given by some of my students at the end of term in early December. It bloomed just before Christmas, again after New Year, and now it has produced a third stem, which is very short, but with full-sized flowers. Amazing!

Here's a view of my neighbourhood this time of year. We had gorgeous winter weather at the start of the week, and I treated myself to some free light therapy. The snow catching the sunlight and frost on the tree branches was a sight for light-starved eyes.

 Have a great week, and remember to drop by again soon! - Annika

Custom-Made Dream Journal

Ooh, time flies. Where does it go, I wonder? It seems I have so much to do at the moment, and by evening I've only done a fraction of it. I've had a very long vacation this summer, and I feel it's about time I got back to work. It's only a few weeks now until the first two classes I'm going to teach will start (the children's classes). Well, tomorrow's Monday again. The best day to start a new life, and to pick up old routines. I do need to get back to my routines. No more staying up all night and sleeping away half of the morning. Discipline!

Right now I'm participating in another one of Melanie Testa's online workshops at the Clever Guild: Dream journal (you can still sign up!). You can find some images of what I've done so far (not much, as usual) in my Flickr photostream. This workshop explores different techniques that you can use in your sketchbook or visual journal. And since I can't find the kind of sketchbook I want in the shop, I have custom-made my own sketchbook. A page in this book is only 15 x 15 cm (6 x 6 inches), which is a nice little format to work with if you're like me and easily get performation anxiety or fear of the Huge White Page. I can choose to work on a small single page, or on the 30 cm spread. I used smooth hot press watercolour paper (300 gsm/140 lb) for the pages, and cardboard for the covers. I covered the cardboard with my own breakdown printed fabric. Fun!

The signatures are sewn together, and the covers are also sewn onto the signatures. I used a technique I haven't tried before and which I learned from Laura Kemshall in an episode of DMTV. Before this book I've tried Japanese stab-binding, small pamphlets and the thirty minute multiple-pamphlet journal taught by Gwen Diehn in her book The Decorated Journal (follow the links for a look at the books/pamphlets in question). This binding method was both fun and easy, and here's the result;

I was a bit hesitant whether this kind of structure would work for a watercolour sketchbook, but figured that I'd just try it out to see what would happen. As you can see below, there is a gap between the signatures that can be problematic with watery paint.

However, I've decided that I'm not going to be bothered about it. If I want to lay a wash over a spread with a gap, I can always tape the gap or glue a piece of paper over it. Things are only a problem if you make them a problem.

Isn't this a beautiful binding method? I love the loops that form over the spine and the exposed signatures.

Now that I have the book, it's time to start filling it. This week's assignment for Melanie's workshop is to make 10 starts, that is to do something - anything - to 10 pages somewhere - anywhere - in the journal. Sounds like fun!

Thanks for reading, and see you again soon! - Annika

Untried Thing No 3: Fabric Medium + Watersoluble Media

Here's my third and final Untried Thing for this time: combining watersoluble media with fabric medium on fabric. Again, my inspiration is Design Matters TV (DMTV), and I learned this technique from Linda Kemshall.

Combining fabric medium and watersoluble media such as e.g. watersoluble crayons and Inktense pencils can be done in different ways. In my library I also have a couple of videos where Kerr Grabowski demonstrates how to use on fabric what she calls 'fugitive media', i.e. media that wouldn't stay on fabric unless you combine them with some sort of binder. The difference between Linda's and Kerr's methods (at least in the videos I have access to) is that Kerr uses a silk screen to trap the pigments under a layer of medium, whereas Linda uses a brush. I want to try both methods, but I decided to start with Linda's. As I see it, if you draw on fabric and want to make sure that your marks stay exactly where you put them, you should use the silk screen method. However, if you want to blend colours on the fabric, you want to use the brush method. Also, with the brush method it is easy to limit the area that will be stiffened with medium to where the actual image is. With a screen the medium will also cover the areas around the image.

The technique is very straightforward. You draw an image on fabric, which has been stabilised with freezer paper, using some kind of watersoluble medium (pencils, crayons). When you're happy with the image, you apply fabric medium over it with a brush, covering the whole image and blending the colours. The medium will stiffen the fabric about as much as an ordinary fabric paint would. Here are my samples:

Inktense pencils

Neocolor II watersoluble crayons

Graphitint pencils

I haven't tried washing any of my saples yet, but I'll get to that too eventually. In Linda's tutorial she used Inktense pencils with good results.

I'm very excited about this technique as there is so much potential in it. Be still, my heart!

Thanks for visiting: I hope you too will be inspired to try this! - Annika

Untried Thing No 2: Drawn Monoprints

I've wanted to try drawn monoprinting ever since I learned the technique from Laura Kemshall on Design Matters TV (DMTV) quite a while ago. I went out and got the necessary acrylic retarder but, as so often is the case, I didn't have time to try it immediately and forgot about it. When I went through my stash a few weeks ago I found two (!) different brands of acrylic retarder. Apparently I'd forgotten about the first one when I went out and got the second one. Not to worry, now I have two different brands to compare. I tried them both for my drawn monoprints.

You may be wondering what a drawn monoprint is. Well, it's a cross between a drawing and a monoprint. A monoprint is a print which you basically just pull once. Sometimes you can also get a second print, which is referred to as a ghost print. In short, to do drawn monoprints, you simply ink up a printing plate (a transparency or a sheet of Perspex/Plexiglass) with the help of a brayer or paint roller. You then float a sheet of paper or a piece of fabric on top and make marks with e.g. a skewer or pencil. The marks will transfer to the paper or fabric, along with the 'background noise' that is characteristic of this technique. The acrylic retarder is important if you want to use acrylic paint, as the paint otherwise dries too quickly for this technique. Fabric paint can be used as it is.

On paper I used Winsor & Newton acrylic retarder and Liquitex Slow-Dri blending medium with black acrylic paint and both worked well. The first brand, which was a lot thicker than the other one, gave a little drier print, whereas the Liquitex medium, which was more liquidy, gave a wetter and darker print, which seemed to work better for ghost prints. On fabric I used black fabric paint. The ghost prints I tried were more successful on paper than on fabric.

Drawn monoprint with acrylic paint and W & N acrylic retarder

Ghost print of the above print

Drawn monoprint with acrylic paint and Liquitex Slow-Dri blending medium

Drawn monoprint with fabric paint

Drawn monoprint with fabric paint

I love this technique. It's easy, perfectly addictive and gives great results. Try it!

Thanks for stopping by, and stay tuned for more Untried Things!

Spread the Word

Today I want to tell you about a Clever Tool. Last autumn I came across some pretty funny-looking brushes that stopped me in my tracks. They weren’t really brushes, because instead of bristles they had a shaped tip made from silicone, and they were called clay or paint shapers. Now, I didn’t have a clue about how I would use them, but they looked like Something That Might Come In Handy For Something. They were pretty cheap too, so I bought them – and forgot about them.

Silicone clay or paint shapers

Much later I was watching an episode of Linda and Laura Kemshall’s Design Matters TV (the episode Watercolour Tricks), and there Linda offered this excellent tip: you can use rubber shaping tools for applying masking fluid. That was very interesting news to me. About the same time that I bought my shaping tools, I had also had a go at masking fluid. The question of how to apply the fluid was still open though. I had ruined two brushes, and I didn’t like wooden sticks. So this tip sounded promising. But I didn’t try it at once – and forgot about it.

When this month’s theme for the Sketchbook Challenge (Can’t Resist) was announced, I knew right away that the time was ripe to put Linda’s tip to the test. And I’m more than pleased with the result. The different tips on the tools make it easy to create a variety of marks with the masking fluid, and it was really easy to remove the masking fluid from the tip: wet or dry, it just peeled away with a light wipe. So if you haven’t tried this already, I recommend that you do. It certainly has made the use of masking fluid less problematic for me.

Here’s an example of some of the shapes that I quickly masked out with the help of my shaping tools. You can see the whole page on Flickr.