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Fun in the Sun Under the Big Top

Saturday, September 1st, 2012

I finally had 3 nice days in a row that were nearly perfect for painting and sunprinting fabric.  This is the first year in a long time that I have put up my 10ft x 20ft tent outside the front door for painting fabric.

Paint Tent aka the "Big Top" Outdoor Studio Space

In order to do the sunprints I love so much, I need to work in the shade and have easy access to a sunny area for drying fabric.  In my early years of puddling with paint on fabric, I used my Easy-Up canopy to give me the shade. I would have to set the thing up in the morning and take it back down when I was done since those are not reliable in gusty, stormy, rainy weather.  My “Big Top” is made to be left up all summer for use as a carport or whatever and is shown ready for a painting session above. Securely staked into the ground and attached to the wall of our mobile home, it behaves pretty well. I am able to keep  my supplies outside ready to use with very little time or effort.The plastic drawer units and a couple plastic tubs hold most of my supplies.

I have been finding myself playing with much brighter and clearer colors than I used to work with.  This has been a wonderful change from the last big painting sessions a few years ago when it seemed all I ended up painting were muddy, mucky, mossy colors. I called it my “mud and rocks period”…  I would try to start a painting session with “pretty” colors, but seemed to end up with the browns, and mucky greens.

Day's Work 7-25-12

The photo above shows one group of fabrics painted back in July. I have been using my Dye-Na-Flow fabric paints which allow me to get deep, bright colors without adding the plastic feel of some other paints.  The Strawberry red, hot pink color is a new one for me to use… The light pink piece with the flowers was the first sunprint of the season, done with Phlox florets scattered over the painted fabric.  The green and yellowish piece was made for the Arts in the Cards “Cucumber” challenge… I printed it using titanium white and a zucchini cut to resemble a cucumber.

Ferns and Phlox Flowers Sunprint in Orange and Pink

I’m not exactly sure why I started playing with the hot pink and orange together, but I have done a number  of sunprinted panels with this color combination, am I am finding I like it.

Orange Lizards, Ferns and Frogs

This piece was one of the fun ones I did using foamie lizard and frog shapes along with Ferns for the sunprints on bright tangerine shades. I did end up playing with other bright colors as you can see from the next photo.

Aug 25 2012 Painted Fabrics Hanging on Tent

This photo shows the finished fabrics done on August 25th which gave the “Big Top” a tropical feel.  I started out playing with the Orange and Pink, then only Pink, then moved to shades of blue. I even did a couple landcape-ish pieces that are on the far right to use as backgrounds for some botanical applique art quilts.

It has felt so great to actually be playing with “pretty” colors again!  I like the bright tropical shades much better than the “mud and rocks” of the past!

 

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New Photos from the Gardens

Tuesday, July 10th, 2012

July has cooled a bit from highs in the 90′s, but there has been very little rain. Even with the lack of rain, things are still blooming in the gardens.

The Garlic that has grown wild in the new Bird Sanctuary Garden is beginning to bloom…

Garlic Bundle

The flower heads not only have flowers, but baby Garlic bulbs… The papery cover the flowers and bulbs are bursting out of reminds me of fabric baby slings… Makes the baby bulbs and blooms look as if they are being cradled.

The Annabelle Hydrangea has been blooming with it’s big billowy flowers.

View With Hydrangeas

This photo was taken from behind the Hydrangea, catching the view of the mountains in the distance.

Pink Lily with Annabelle

Above, is a photo of one of the pink Asiatic Lily blooms with the Annabelle flowers as a backdrop.

Daisies

In the Rock Garden I found this clump of wild Daisies that I allowed to stay and am glad I kept them around. There were so many flowers… this photo gives the illusion that the flowers go on and on…  Back in the Maple Tree Garden, the Floral Carpet Pink Rose has been blooming on and on.

Single Open Pink Rose

The photo above highlights one of those  flowers that was fully open.

White Echinacea with More

The Front Door Garden is full of blooms again… Here is an open white Echinacea with lavender ones and other flowers in the background.  The Phlox are beginning to bloom, too…

Dewy White Phlox

This is a macro shot of some dewy florets from the Flame White Phlox. I love the tinges of pink in that are not usually seen when looking from farther away… The dewdrops look like tiny little sparkling jewels.

All of these photos in this post will be available for purchase in my Art Quilt shop on ArtFire, but right now, you can get one of them for FREE!  See the post about the sale on my ArtFire blog to find more information about the coupon sale I am running in that shop and my Andrus Gardens gift items shops through July 15.

Very briefly, take 25% off any purchase from either of those two shops when you use Coupon Code “25OFF”,  AND if you purchase $15 or more at the sale prices will qualify you for a FREE PHOTO!  You can choose from any photos you see here in this post or in the ArtFire post. The photos are 5″x7″ or 6″ square depending on the photo. They are printed on quality Strathmore Radiant Gloss paper with archival inks for very long lasting prints that have a beautiful pearly gloss finish that adds to the beauty of the photos.

If  you would be interested in purchasing one of the photos, just let me know which one you like best and I will get it uploaded to the site or just send a Paypal invoice. Right now, the photos are $10 each through July 15th when the price will go up to $15 each.

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Flowers Into Photos, For Now….

Thursday, July 5th, 2012

I have been trying to get things caught up in the gardens during the past few weeks.  I love my gardens and flowers, but this year has had it’s challenges….

Daffodil Opening in Snow Glories

After a warmer than usual winter, many flowers began to bloom earlier than usual. We had a very warm spell in March followed by very hard freezes…. not a good combination.

Wisteria Buds

The Wisteria was covered in fat, beautiful flower buds…. until the hard freeze… every bud froze… Amazingly nearly 4 months later, there are new flower buds forming just in time for the onslaught of Japanese beetles… Yikes!

Pulmonaria Mrs. Moon

Pulmonaria Mrs Moon bloomed beautifully, along with most of the usual early Spring flowers…

 

Double Trillium Pair

The Trilliums bloomed nicely, especially the double ones… They have not multiplied yet, but keep blooming each year.

 

Dewy White Daffodil

Many dewy, damp mornings made for great photos of dewdrops on the flowers such as this Ice Follies Daffodil…

 

Pink Luau Day One

Amazingly, I was able to have gobs of Peony flowers even after the plants started growing too early and we had the super hard freeze. My mulching things with hay for the freeze did keep the Peony flowers.

 

First Iris Flower of 2012

It looked as if the Iris would not have flowers, but even though the buds looked papery and dry, the flowers still bloomed nicely :)

 

Tradescantia Macro

Some photos I took were nice surprises, like this macro shot of a Tradescantia flower showing the fluffy detail of the flower’s center.

 

Raindrops on Alyssum

More rainy, wet mornings gave more interesting photos like this one of tiny Alyssum flowers dripping with water reflecting the house windows.

 

Wild Daisy Clump

Even the wild Daisies put up some full clumps of flowers… This photo was taken of one large clump of flowers and gives the impression of flowers going on for a long way.

 

Pink Lily Detail

I even found some of the Lilies that were lost last year, coming up to bloom this year. This is a macro shot of one of the bright pink ones.

 

Portulaca with Dew

I have not been feeling too creative in the studio with my quilting, so I have begun to play with some of the flower photos like this portulaca flower above.

In the middle of the strange garden season, I ended up falling and hurting my back in a new place…. I really didn’t need that!  I fell hard while trying to hurry to get some garden work done before a rain storm that was forecast.  In addition to landing me in the ER to be sure I hadn’t broken anything, I lost over 2 weeks of garden work… So much for getting ahead of things this year….  In addition to helping me to lose the garden work time, I ended up racking up some nasty medical bills…. With no insurance, CT scans, ER visit, and extra rheumatologist appointments, have made a mess of the finances.  The additional bad spot in my back has not helped with the creative funk, either… working in my studio, stitching on the machine, and other things have ended up increasing pain which was already giving me grief enough with the fibromyalgia and arthritis…  At least I have the flowers blooming in the gardens to take photos of, and I have been slowly getting things weeded and mulched little my little.

If there is enough interest in my flower photos, I am considering adding them to one of my shops… Maybe if I can’t create much in the studio, I will able to be more creative with my photos.

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Two More Little Quilts….

Monday, September 13th, 2010

I finally finished another Fast Friday Fabric Challenge! This time I ended up with two pieces instead of one…. even if it was by mistake :)

Black and Gold Blooms

This  is the quilt I meant to make… “Black and Gold Blooms” is 8.5″ wide by 12.5″ high, and is available for purchase in my Art Quilt Studio on Artfire, (just click  on the name of the piece to go directly to the listing). I wanted to use one of the sunprints I did during my latest sunprinting sessions. (This post shows some of the fabrics I printed, and this post shows more of the process of creating the sunprints.)

This month’s Challenge was to incorporate metal into our quilt in some way. I have had a roll of the gold metallic ribbon for quite a while, and decided to use it for a bow “holding” the bouquet of flowers in the sunprint. I had also collected a set of metal letter charms that I thought would work nicely, too. I used a sheer fabric in gold with metallic accents for the section beside the sunprint.

Black and Gold Blooms Detail 1

Here is a detail shot showing the butterfly made from Angelina fibers with details stitched with gold metallic and black threads. The centers of the Nicotiana flowers are parts of snap jewelry clasps that I had collected at some point in the past.

Black and Gold Blooms Detail 2

This detail shows the bow made from the metallic ribbon, and hand stitched into place.  The hearts and vine design was free motion quilted into the lower black panel, and the veins of the leaves and flower details are also stitched with the same gold metallic thread. The letters BLOOM are hand stitched onto the gold side section.

As I mentioned, I made two pieces instead of just one…. The mistake I made….. I grabbed the wrong sunprint to use. I had two prints cut to nearly the same size, and had the one I wanted to use pinned on my design wall with the other pieces ready to use. For some reason, I grabbed the other piece I had cut that was just lying on the ironing board.

Black and Gold Dream

This is the piece that got made by “mistake”….“Black and Gold Dream” is 7.25″wide by 12″ high, and is also available for purchase in my Studio on Artfire.

I really wanted to use the heavier ribbon with the less delicate sunprint. For some reason, I didn’t realize I had the wrong one in the piece until I was quilting with the gold thread and something didn’t feel right…. I happened to look at the design wall, and there was the sunprint with the Nicotiana flowers that I wanted to use…. I almost just finished this piece and let things be, but the other sunprint was telling me it wanted to be used, so I did them both. The sunprint in this piece is of lacy Queen Ann’s Lace foliage and Pansy flowers. I found a thinner, more delicate gold ribbon to use for the bow on this, and used the word DREAM along the side.

Black and Gold Dream Detail

This detail photo shows a couple of the flowers and the gold butterfly beads flitting above the flowers. I used small confetti butterflies in the sunprint, and thought the two teeny-tiny, and one small butterfly beads fit well.

Both pieces are similar, with the same fabrics used for the side and lower panels, but they each have their own personalities.  Sometimes “mistakes” end up turning out pretty well!

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Back to Sunprinting and New Book Covers!

Sunday, September 12th, 2010

As I sit here on a dreary, cool day I am finally writing about and getting photos posted here of the first major batch of sunprinting I have done in a loonnnggg time during a hot, dry week the end of August. In this post I am going to hit a few highlights, and in a post on my Classroom Blog, I will have a more detailed post of the process.

Sunprints 8-31-10

Above is a photo of a pile of fabric from my second day of printing. In the past, I had done my sunprinting with mostly lighter colors. This time around, I wanted to give black and deep colors a try and got some great results! I did a couple of sunprints with black paint back in 2008 on just about the last day I could print that year. I used some of those prints in a black and white challenge quilt.

Forest Ferns, black & white Art Quilt by Sue Andrus

Forest Ferns

Here is the quilt I made then…. it had been traveling for a while and returned home earlier this year. Since doing this piece, I kept thinking that I wanted to play with more black paint, as the sunprints really seem to stand out much more on the black than they do with many colors vying for attention, too.

Ginkgos on Fabric finished

Here is one of the first pieces I did this session. I finally found where I had stored the Ginkgo leaves I collected last summer, and wanted to play with them. This piece has prints of Ginkgo, Maple, Nishiki Willow, Green Dragon (Arasaema) and Corydalis foliage with some Phlox florets. I love the effect of sea salt on the paint, so used that on most of my pieces, too.

Black with Feathers

This piece is the first I have done since 2006 using feathers. I just randomly layed them on the surface for an allover print. The more downy feathers make very different prints from the heavier ones. These feathers are from a package purchased at a craft store. I also “had” to add salt, too.

Black and Blue Sunprint 1

I used my Dye-Na-Flo paints fro Jacquard for this batch of prints. This paint is very thin, with high pigment load for deep colors and no plastic feel of the regular textile paints. For this one, I added some of the azure blue with the black. this piece had more Ginkgos with ferns, Little Leaf Linden (chewed by beetles), and a Green Dragon with Phlox florets. I had some trouble with my leaves curling while the paint dried, and found a way to prevent that which I explain in the leaf preserving classroom post.

Black and Red

Here is another piece with red added with the black… It gave a nice black cherry color.

Black and Green Sunprint

Here is one in green…. I played with some foamie cutouts of lizards and frogs along with the leaves and flowers.

Set of Black Book Covers

Here is what I used some of the black sunprints for. These are the first of the newest group of notebook and journal covers I have finished. I did up most of them with black & white or gray, but added some color with dyed fabric for a couple for something different. The Composition Books are available here in my Andrus Gardens Studio on Artfire.  The Mini Composition books and Memo Books are available here on Artfire.

Posted in Book Covers, Book Covers, Dyed or Painted Fabric, New Projects | 1 Comment »

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