Lots of Dyeing and Tyvek Beads

In my last post I mentioned those two big rolls of cotton fabric. Well I washed and measured and ripped and packed ready for the workshop this weekend, then couldn't resist dyeing some up. Below are my two colour way dyes in oranges, greens and purples, well these particular two primaries don't really produce true purples but a lovely array of brick reds, chestnut and wine colours. I used the photo stitch program on the first pic as I have a rotary clothes line.

Here are all those 1/2 meters washed and ironed, I even remembered to dye up numbered sample pieces so I have reference charts for future dyeing. 

I have recently been following a lovely blog Love Stitching Red in St Ives Cornwall, my former home land, Cornwall that is not St Ives, but only up the road from there. Carolyn posted a really good tutorial on making tyvek beads. I have meters of the not so nice tyvek that has small dots all over it and lots of acrylic paints and metallic threads so spent Sunday afternoon playing. Be warned if you haven't tried this before, you wont want to stop once you start!! Here are the beads I have made - so far, I still have lots of painted up tyvek just waiting to be made into these little delights.

This weekend I will be up at Main Creek with a wonderful group of Ladies, dyeing up a storm. I will post some pics next week, fingers crossed for good weather, dyeing is so much more fun when the sun shines.

Shall I - Shan't I

I have just received a delivery of two big rolls of crisp white cotton fabric to get ready for some up coming workshops. It is just screaming out to be dyed LOL. I haven't made a quilt in a long time and have been toying with the idea, so went through some quilt designs I have tucked away. This one I like being bold and quite geometrical. I pulled out my fabrics and put these together as I know I can reproduce these colours successfully, well as close to as is possible with hand dyes. Can't make up my mind, shall I , shan't I - what do you think?

I am frantically washing all this fabric to get the kits ready, but there are big black clouds looming, they did say showers developing, I hope they meant like 3 this afternoon, not 9 this morning :( think I'm going to have a lot of wet fabric hanging around as the rains going to last for days!! My leaky roof will curtail all dyeing activities until the sun decides to shine again. 

Names and Beach Bits

You may, or may not, have noticed that the name of my blog has changed. Recently Paula from The Beauty of Life referred to my blog in a list of blogs she had been visiting recently. All the blogs she listed sounded fascinating, with lovely imaginative names until I came to Tracy's Blog, how uninspiring LOL. I remember back to when I started this blog and it asked what I would call it, nothing came to mind, hadn't really given it any thought, so to fill the space put in Tracy's Blog. I'm not sure Transient Tracy will stay long either, but it's how I'm feeling at the moment, changes are in the wind, for good or bad I don't know, but I feel a change is coming. Also all the pieces I am working on at the moment are very different, I have several on the go and am constantly changing from painting to machining to sculpting. These pieces are gifts for people that read this blog, so I can't show you, or I'll ruin the surprise:)

In my last post I talked about my drying rack that has become a very sophisticated work place, well a name has popped into my head and like one of those bad songs that just won't go away, it's stuck there. I've waited all week hoping it will go, but it wont, so, and I'll hear your groan it's "Able Mable the Painting Table" and yes I talk to it when I pass by.

With Steve getting back into the surf, I have been going with him for some lovely long walks on the beach. This weekend, the surf was pretty big and heavy so we went to a sheltered corner where the surf wasn't too bad. He took off in one direction, board under arm and I strode off in the other, looking for treasure. I was absolutely appalled at the amount of plastic on the beach! There has been big swells and strong onshore winds for a few days, so the expected weed and wood and coconuts were there, but the other rubbish just blew me away. Having been a stranger to the beach for more years than I'd like to remember, it was a real shock to realise the beaches have got in such a state. If I could ignore the rubbish, the walk reminded me of the wild weather and long beaches back in Cornwall, minus the biting cold wind.

We met back at the car, and I was met with the remark "I've never known anyone go down the beach and come back with so much crap!", yes he was referring to my treasures LOL. I'm not really a shell person, but found the piece below which reminds me of a type of fungi. Later that day we went for a second walk on a different beach which had far less plastic but some nice bits of wood. Now I do try and restrict myself to one piece of crap per walk, but seeing as this was the second walk of the day, did bring home two pieces of wood, the second was so small it shouldn't count really :)

Finally, my roof monster has not made another appearance, I get a very sceptical look from Steve whenever I mention it. It's still a mystery as it was definitely too big for possums and there are no drop bears around here as suggested by Paula. I'm rather hoping it does come back so I can see what it is.

Table Mods. Eyes and Things that go Bump in the Night

Back in January I told you about the cloths stand that I had adapted as a work / paint table while I was doing Carol Mcfee and Lynda Monk"s online workshop. The table seems to have a permanent position in the garage and I use it all the time, so today it has had some modifications/improvements in the form of another trusty herb rack, a yogurt pot and an old dolls head, all attached with cable ties. I now have a pot for my brushes etc, a rack for scissors and other bits and pieces that I happen to be using at the time and a pin cushion so I don't keep losing my anchoring pins. It's starting to develop a bit of a personality, I might find myself giving it a name soon, you know how people name their cars, or those shopping trolley's with wheels, I can see myself going down this not so sane path.

Eyes have been on my mind the past few days, for two reasons, one being my own have been scanned and inspected and photographed until I thought I would have permanent dots swimming in front of my eyes, and the other because I have been trying to make some decent, realistic looking eyes for my sculptures seeing as my own don't see as well as they used to and I'm finding it really frustrating trying to paint them on a finished face. I think I have found a technique that will work for me, just got to refine it a bit and try some smaller eyes.

Last night I spent another evening alone, while Steve had to work late yet again, was totally bored, telly usual rubbish, couldn't work on anything as my pupils were still as big as saucers so couldn't focus. I wandered out into the garden on dusk and saw just how huge the random pumpkin plant had got and how wild the lawn had become with all the rain we have been getting. The evenings have still been so mild and the garden was a cacophony of noise, so many different cricket and things all competing with each other. I wish I could have recorded it for those of you that have not heard an Australian garden at dusk

Later that night there was an almighty row of a different kind, the screen door slamming lots of banging and clattering, I thought Steve had come home and I hadn't heard the car, but looking out the window, there was nothing there, another few minutes went by and it sounded like an elephant charging around on my roof, which is tin by the way. It was so loud it bought my neighbour out to investigate, being home alone this was a bit unnerving to say the least and the neighbour and I ended up out in the street inspecting the roof line, looking for some unearthly creature up there. Hopefully Steve will be home tonight, so if it comes back I might be brave enough  to go looking with a torch.

I'm not convinced having a tin roof is a good thing, it's very australian, and with the hail storms we get, very sensible, but oh so noisy. We also have the big old telly aerial still up, from the days when you had to get your signal from way over the hill somewhere. This is a constant source of amusement for the cockies who sit up there and slowly dismantle it, dropping the bits down to bounce on the roof.

Well that's enough rambling for today :)  It's wet and windy and nothing is drying very fast so time on my hands, if you hadn't guessed, better have another coffee.

Journalising / Diaries

I had to do it at Uni and we make the students at school do it, so why did I stop?

I'm talking about keeping a record of the things that emerge from my work room. Time might be an excuse, but it is so frustrating to go back to a piece and wonder "how did I do that". so I am going to try and start keeping a visual/process diary of some sort again. Inspired by Ro Bruhn's wonderful journal pages, I dug out an old lino cut I made years ago of blackberries, very convenient as my latest piece was inspired by this delicious berry, then stamped and water colour washed some pages.

Now these are no comparison to the beautiful and colourful pages created by Ro, but they gave me a base on which to record my materials and some of the new techniques I tried, Oh I wish I had lovely handwriting! but at least I have something I can look back on when the grey matter refuses to remember.

Today is wet and windy, autumn has finally arrived so I am spending the afternoon making Cornish pasties, and my favourite and nearly healthy carrot and date cake.

12 Month Project Finally Finished

Remember way back when, I told you about a Wendy Froud inspired doll I was making as a group challenge, ........no.......... well here's a reminder

Well she is finally finished. Steve had to work all weekend so I had two whole uninterrupted days to work on her. She will be dancing when I get her stand made, the one she is on is only temporary and doesn't support her too well, hopefully it won't take me another 12 months to get it done. It is so good to be able to finally spend some time back out in my work room, the weather has been glorious so everything dried nice and quick so I could get her finished ........ ummmmmmm what to make next :)

MIA

I have just realised it has been nearly a month since my last post. There is a very good reason for this, the inability  to sit down. An old back injury has been giving me a very hard time and I have spent the past few weeks  much like this.

I have watched far more daytime telly than can be good for anyone, all sorts of old dvd's and done a lot of ceiling staring.

The two things I could really have done with, my itouch  and microwave were both being replaced or repaired, well the microwave, which I needed to heat my wheat bag, was repaired, worked three times then broke again. It was brand new used about a dozen times then sat in a dusty workshop for two weeks waiting to be fixed. When it was finally ready, Steve picked it up on his way home to find it covered in dust, glue and scratches. When he mentioned this to the lady, she gave him one of those stainless cleaning cloths!!.  The glue obviously didn't work,  so it's got to go back again. I wonder what state it will come back in this time.

My itouch would have saved my sanity a little, at least I could have written the odd e mail, checked my favorite blogs and generally kept in touch with what is going on, but, alas, that too decided to pack it in. There was no trouble having it replaced, but they didn't have any in stock so have had to wait three weeks for one to come in. As is always the way, there is a replacement waiting for me, well Steve, to pick up, now I am able to sit at the computer again, all be it for short periods of time.

Talking of sitting at the computer, this has been blamed for my bad back, which I try to deny adamantly, but lost the argument, so the computer chair has been banned and I now sit on a very large red ball. I don't care how good it is supposed to be for my back, it is impossible to sit still on, the urge to roll about is just too much :) and very uncomfortable after a short time, which I think is the whole idea to dissuade me from spending so much time here.

So nothing creative has happened, hopefully very soon I will be able to get back to some sort of normality, but I have a feeling I am going to be doing a lot more moving around and back strengthening for some time to come yet

Valentines Give Away Winner

 

I hope you are all having a wonderful Valentines Day. Well the time has come to announce my winner. The choosing of the winner was a technical process,  putting names in a glass and as I was home alone apart from Mango the bird, who was very unhelpful,  I shut my eyes tight and pulled out...................................................

Paula Hewitt - The Beauty of life

Congratulations Paula :) With the weather the way it is I'll be sure to put these in a waterproof bag!!

Japanese Treasures

A dear friend of mine, Ruth offered to take me along when she went to visit one of her favourite places "Edo Arts".

This place is an Aladdin's cave of anything Japanese, including a vast array of kimono's, textiles, papers, books and old photographs. 

There are beautiful wooden chests and cabinets whose draws are filled with exotic textiles. Here are a few pieces of Kimono fabric that I bought, the pattern and textures in these are just wonderful, and yes there's plenty of scope for the addition of dye if I feel the need.

Part of the Seven Sins workshop I started last year included using text as part of the work, so when I spotted this old book, I couldn't resist adding it my collection for future use. It seems a shame that I will dismantle this. As you can see  it is hand bound using stab stitch which is a technique recently featured in Cloth, Paper Scissors.

The inside cover has these cute little birds on it, will be wonderful for something.

And the writing  just flows down the page.

My other great find was this brush, it has been used for applying dye of some sort as the brush is still full of it. The head of the brush is about 7cms across and it stands about 15cms high. I am going to use this to apply dye and see what happens. If anyone knows exactly what this is or how it is used, I'd love to hear from you.

I don't know how long we stayed and browsed around Edo Arts, but before we knew it, our day out was over and we had to hit the highway and head back home. 

Over Dyes

I finally got around to doing the Indigo over dyes, with mixed results. It was just too hot to be hanging around in the back yard so the fabric was in and out of the vat much too quickly, so although some came out with a nice over dyed pattern, others are a bit nondescript and  will have to go back for another dip on a cooler day. The chemicals in the indigo vat do alter the original procion dye to a degree, but the indigo definitely adds a new dimension to the fabric.

                             

                         

                                          

The weather looks to stay hot for at least another week and I still haven't got to clean up my work room. I'll try and keep the indigo vat active for a while longer and have another go. The shibori pieces on the pole can come out looking very dramatic, if I leave them in long enough LOL