Archive for the ‘Studio Stuff’ Category

Back in the Studio Again!

Saturday, September 29th, 2012

Thanks to a web hosting move, the first version of this post was lost… A backup wasn’t done between my posting and the move, so here goes again. …   The last post from about 3 weeks ago showed the studio upheaval from the main electrical panel having to be replaced that left my fabric, machine, and so much  more scattered here and there, making even small ATC projects a challenge.

Thankfully, the studio is back in order again!  The new electric breaker box is in, the shelves back in place and everything that used to live in the space is back home.

Empty Studio Shelves Back In

The studio looked a lot different with all those empty shelves. I did lose one shelf since the new breaker box is taller than the old one, but no other modifications were needed and the panel doors are easily accessible for resetting blown breakers or shutting off circuits for other repairs. In the past I had a plywood design wall mounted to the back wall shelf unit with hinges. That made things really hard to get to the electrical boxes, and since I had been using a 4×8′ piece of 2″ thick foam as my main design wall, the plywood one is not returning…

Shelves Almost Full Again

Getting all the fabrics and what-not back into the studio took much longer than hauling it out.  The shelves on the back wall don’t look too tidy in the photo above, but the foam design wall will hide what is there while still allowing me to quickly and easily move it out of the way to access the breaker boxes and the crawl space under the main part of the trailer home we live in. Since I have sold off most of my commercial fabrics, the bulk of what is on the shelves now is my collection of fabrics I have painted or dyed. They make for a pretty wall!

Design Wall Back in Place

Since I spent much of my time after getting the shelves filled again working outdoors painting and sunprinting fabrics, I didn’t get the design wall back in for quite a while. I cut the foam shorter to just under 7ft high to make it easier to move out of the way since the ceiling slopes down from the back wall. I really have no idea how I originally got the 8′high piece in there in the first place… I needed to cut it to get it out!  The foam also has a new cover of a double layer of poly batting that I pinned on more neatly than the first time it was in here.  Another thing I did was to cut little slits into the foam on the bottom to fit into small flower pots that make little “legs” that will keep the foam off the floor in case of new water leaks if we have heavy rains or snow melts.

The first piece to grace the new wall is one I did for a challenge put out by Karen Musgrave that I called “Funky Flowers”. I have had the top waiting for quilting for quite some time now…  The photo above shows it after quilting was done, and the one below shows it with yarns pinned around it trialing it’s binding.

Design Wall 9-18-12

Since I tend to be a major procrastinator, I needed to quickly finish up 3 more pieces that I had entered into my local guild’s quilt show that was last weekend. Two are shown in the photo above, below “Funky Flowers”   The Wisteria piece was done all but the flowers and leaves, but the stone wall piece above was started less than a week before it was due to be delivered for the show.  I seem to need deadlines to get the creativity flowing, but I really wish I could create more without the rush to meet those deadlines.

Group of 3 quilts

Group of 3 Quilts

The photo above shows the wall with the 3 pieces in addition to “Funky Flowers that I finished last minute for the show.  The biggest problem with finishing quilts so close to a deadline is that when they get “done” I always seem to find something that isn’t working or needs some more to make them better.  The top piece, “A Walk in the Woods” ended up really close to what I had envisioned when I started it over 2 years ago, but once I got it on the wall at the end, you can see a dark rock that really stands out too much…. It went into the show that way, but I need to tone it down with paint or something…  The “Stone Wall” piece lower right still bothers me too, with very little value change on the right side with the chair. I am thinking that lightening the chair a bit will help. Amazingly, this piece was the one that I heard about the most during the show while I was manning  my booth I had set up there.  I guess even with it’s artistic problems, it still grabbed eyes…

This post is also being linked to Nina Marie’s blog for “Off the Wall Fridays”

Quilt Show Booth

The last photo for this post is of my booth at the show where  I was selling my patterns, fabrics and some finished gift items.  The photo was taken near the end of the show when things were calm. The day before, every flat surface was covered with various fabrics and sunprints being looked through by many customers.  I sold many of my newest brights and some older, softer colored pieces. It was such fun! The first show I have done in a Lonnnnggg time, but it let me know that it will be a while before I get brave enough to do another.  Ken was great helping me with setup and take-down lugging, but a week later my body is still complaining… I miss the interaction with the customers so much, but spending much of a week in bed afterward is no fun….

My next project is using the little group of fabrics, painted coffee filter and papers that were hanging on the design wall in the second wall photo for this month’s “Arts in the Cards” theme of “Pear as a Color”. the rusty colors remind me of the wild winter pears that grow on our property.  I’ll probably show them in my next post along with my “Cool Cucumbers” from August.

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Jonquil Sunshine… Learning Lots

Sunday, September 9th, 2012

Back to blogging about Art again!  I haven’t written a post here about my Arts in the Cards ATC exchanges for a while, so here goes with the latest lesson in patience and learning…. This post was started a while back and I am finally finishing it and saving it from being stuck in “drafts”  forever….

Orange Jonquil Fabric Beginning

The theme for July was Jonquil… Our themes this year are colors, and the color prompts are open to interpretation which had made them very interesting and lots of fun.  I began by painting fabrics in colors found in the beautiful Spring flowers. The first piece was done with oranges and yellows. The photo above shows the first streaks of colors added to the wet fabric on my paint table outdoors. The colors were layered on while keeping things wet until all the paint was applied, and I kept spritzing the fabric with water during the drying to allow the colors to run and blend into each other.  In addition to the yellows and oranges, I also added some metallic gold for some shimmer.

Jonquil Fabrics Group

The photo above shows the deep orange finished fabric in the center, along with two others. I used the same paint colors for the two coordinating fabrics, just with more water for lighter shades. The lightest one was a fat quarter used to clean the paint out of the brushes… just enough left in them to give it a light wash of color. The medium  colored piece began as a white print with circles on white fabric that added more interest to the piece. The photo also shows the backs as well as the fronts of the fabrics. Both sides are interesting to use!

Since the medium colored fabric had circles on it, I decided to stamp circles on some of the dark fabric using various plastic bottle caps as stamps with white paint.

Stamping Circles

I have acquired a glass topped outdoor table to use under the “Big Top” (my tent set up by the front door) where I can play with paint on fabric in the shade and have easy access to my paint table that is nearby in the sun for drying fabrics. The glass is a great surface to spread paint on to dip the caps or whatever items I use as stamps. The above photo shows the orange fabric stamped with the white circles in various sizes. The pieces of Zucchini sitting on the table are waiting to be used on the green fabric on the table next to the orange for the next challenge with “Cucumber” as the prompt.

Jonquil Construction 1

My original idea for these cards was to use the three fabrics together with the addition of stitching.  The idea had to change almost immediately, due to a burned out main electric breaker… The breaker box lives Behind the set of shelves that lives Behind the TWO design walls in my studio… While trying to find a new main breaker, it was found the brand of box we had was a fire hazard… Not a good thing, so a brand new box was in  order….  That left me moving everything that was on 2 entire floor to ceiling walls of shelves (where most of my fabric lived), as well as everything from my new ironing board shelves, everything from on and around the cutting table. What follow are a couple studio photos…

Behind Design Walls

The photo above shows the wall after my foam design wall was removed and the plywood one was opened to reveal the offending box and wall that needed to be accessed…  Note, the shelves are literally wall to wall and the back set is blocked by the South wall set… everything had to go…. UGGG!!

Studio Shelves Moved

After a day of moving, this was what the view was just inside the studio door… The shelves were moved out of the way as much as possible.  My sewing machine, iron, and lots more were also moved out as well as the thread that was still on the racks in the above photo to keep them safe from drywall dust and such…   So much for stitching anything….

After hoping things would be back to “normal”  in a week, I didn’t get much accomplished on the art cards. Then I decided I HAD to do them somehow, so the ironing board was set up in the kitchen for fusing and card construction began. (I also hoped that blocking half of the kitchen with the ironing board would hurry the process of getting my studio put back together along… it didn’t help much.)

Jonquil Construction 2

The pieces of fabric cut and fused looked pretty blahhh, especially since there could be no stitching involved, so I decided that I would add the yellow “suns”.  I still didn’t like the look of them… still blahhh… not much to look at… so some supply digging was in order… Why is it that whenever things are packed up, I decide I just HAVE to use a certain item or 3???  It seemed every time I needed something, a major search ensued… I could not remember what pile or container or whatever I had packed things into…

Jonquil Construction 3

I finally found my Inktense pencils and played with adding some greenery to the cards… I really wanted to stick with mostly circle shapes for these, and maybe NO flowers… I tend to put flowers in or  on everything…. Well… after a bit of scribbling and playing, I ended up with a row of lollipop looking flowers on each card.

Painting Jonquils

A bit more digging for supplies later, I found some pearlescent paint and fine markers to add a bit of interest to the suns with.  They received bright sunrays and a little swish of pearl to give a bit of depth to them. I was liking them a bit more, but they still were calling for More!  Hmmmm….  Maybe some glassy looking clear embossing???   More digging, and I found my bottle of Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel powder and the heat gun…  Now I had not used the UTEE much at all, but knew it was supposed to be able to be used to create thick, glossy puddles if that was wanted… That is what I wanted….  Glassy, shiny suns…. I had read that I would need more than one coat to get the effect I wanted, so I began…. Layer one results in a quite bumpy look. Not knowing the proper way to add layer 2, I added more embossing ink and more powder and aimed the heat gun…  the pink embossing ink didn’t disappear like it did in the first coat… Ikkkk!  More heat added caused bubbling and a bit of smoke… OOPS!…  more ink, more powder, more heat… More bubbles, more pink sealed inside the molten mass and no glassy smooth surface….

First Jonquil with UTEE Melted

Above is the result of the first couple layers of the melted UTEE… I also added it to the lollipop flowers… You can see the pink embossing ink “nicely” encased in the melted enamel… Not the look I was after… The sun was sadly not smooth or shiny…  Time for Youtube… After realizing I was in over my head, I found a few tutorial videos and learned how one was supposed to use this stuff….  So THAT’S how it’s done!  I finally learned what I needed to do… Use the embossing ink for the first layer Only, then add the powder to the still molten goo immediately after heating the first layer, heat CAREFULLY again (avoiding smoke and boiling bubbles) and repeating until I had the look I wanted…  WOW!  That worked!  Now why hadn’t I gone to the tutorials first??  Yea, I’m a stubborn rock-head who tries things on her own first…  NOT always a good thing….

Jonquil Art Cards

FINALLY! I had my cards pretty much done… The photo above shows a group of them after the UTEE was successfully added. (Note: upper middle card was the “guinea pig”, you can see it still has a deformed sun.) I was happy to finally have the thick puddles of gloss I was looking for!  Now this wasn’t the end of the story for these cards… I did finish the edges with a stamp pad, then tried to flatten them out a bit since they buckled a bit with the heating….  OK, I learned another thing…. Pretty, thick glossy puddles of plastic will crack like glass if bent too much…  I really got frustrated, but they were done and cracks and all were sent to their new owners…

Even projects that don’t work out the way you wanted them to can be learning experiences… Now I know how to work with UTEE, AND I know that it is much better to find some tutorials online when learning to use a new supply….  I guess one thing is for sure… I know this will not be the last of my lessons learned by trial and error (and more error)…. I have LOTS to learn :)

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More Storage in the Studio!

Monday, March 12th, 2012

Thanks to seeing various blog posts on the web, showing other quilt artist’s studios, I got a wonderful idea to add more storage to my cramped little studio. Check out the Postmark’d Art blog to see regular studio tours where members show where they do their creating.

Ironing Board Before

I have shown many views of my “cubicle” or studio before, but usually have tried to crop out the view of under the ironing board. Not a pretty site… lots of stuff just stacked there… My paper cutters have been pretty much floating around the place… I use them a lot and it’s too hard to heft them up onto the shelf above the ironing board, so one usually sits on the top in the way… the larger one is shown in this photo above on the Wonder under box on the floor.

Ironing Board Shelves in Kitchen

My first step toward getting the shelf unit I wanted, was to create a drawing with measurements for Ken to use to do the job. He finally got them together, but when I walked into the workshop to look at them, there was a BIG problem…. The shelves were not in the places shown above…. When Ken got to the point of installing the shelves, he didn’t read my numbers right for the first shelf, then things really got strange… he realized things were not right, but by that time he needed to have the tools in a vehicle to drive to GA.  Nick’s house was narrowly and blessedly missed by a tornado a week or so ago. The trees, sheds, fence and pool didn’t fare so well…. lots of clean-up is  needed and Nick and Megan came over from Germany to get things taken care of. My shelves were not tops on the list, so last minute before tools were leaving for two weeks my shelves were done.

I ended up taking the shelves apart and got them put back in the proper places…. they were planned to meet up with the ones on the end wall of the studio so I can still access those shelves.  The  photo above shows the completed and primed shelf unit, ready for the final coat of paint. As you can see, the kitchen became my workshop…. a pretty crowded one, but cramped spaces are not uncommon around here.

The Doorway

Once the shelves were painted, the main challenge was to get them into the studio… this is what it looked like looking from my sewing machine to the door into the office area.  The  shelves are 20″  wide… the space is not that wide as you can see… I have the doorway well blocked with the cutting table and an office table with a plastic drawer unit under it also in the doorway space.

I decided the only way things were going to work would be to get the shelves in on the tops of the tables (after they were cleared).  A rolling chair in my office helped me to get the shelves from the livingroom floor to the table tops. It took a  bit of wrangling, but I got them where they needed to go…. A lot of stuff did have to be moved make room.

New Ironing Board Shelves

And TA-DAAA!! Here are the shelves with their new coat of pale lavender paint left over from the master bath remodel for the finish coat. I did ding the paint in a few spots, but that is fixable…. I don’t know why I never thought of this earlier, but now my paper cutters, Wonder Under box, die cutter and dies, a bunch of fusible backed fabric pieces, and more have homes now… there is even a bit of space still available… The trash can fits perfectly between the shelves and machine cabinet (I did plan for that).  Despite all the trouble to get the thing re-made and wrestled into place, it is wonderful!!! It also gives me a MUCH sturdier ironing surface…. the ironing board was an old one that is sturdier than most new ones, but still pretty wobbly.  I just happened to have been using the purple spray bottle…. It coordinates so nicely with the lavender  of the shelves….  The bits of lime green on the ironing board are for the next batch of art cards in the works.

Now I better get back to finishing up preparation for giving two lectures in the next two days for a guild in State College, PA…. I probably could have waited until I got home to finish up the shelves, but this has been on my mind for a lonnngggg time.  Now If I could magically be able to get down to GA…. Not only are Nick and Megan there, their new little baby boy is there, too…. I soooo want to get my hands on that little guy!  They have been in Germany for over 6 months now, but still own the home in GA.

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