"It takes ages to finish a quilt you're not working on!"

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Another project from "Fabric Art Journals".

I borrowed this book from our local library about 3 months ago, and bookmarked half a dozen projects I wanted to do. Luckily for me, our library has been closed for renovations, and all the books out on loan keep getting extended automatically, because the renovations are taking longer than expected! But I had better buy a copy of the book for myself, as the more I look at it, the more I want to do, and it is getting in the way of my cross stitching and patchwork WIPs and UFOs.
This little project is based on a photo in the book, which actually illustrates the tea-dyeing fabrics technique, but I wasn't interested in that; I just liked the way they used layers of fabric and embellishments, to make a picture. I pulled out some scraps of fabric, buttons, laces and ric rac, and laid them out in a preliminary order. The two smallest printed fabrics are from ties that I cut up ages ago. Starting on the blue version, I tacked lace around the border of the dark blue fabric. Then I placed all the fabrics on top of each other to see how it would look. Tacked the lighter blue piece on top of the dark blue, so the lace just peeped over the edge, then tacked the white piece over that. Decided the blue in the dog pattern clashed with the blue background, so swapped it for this teacup, where the pale blue background stripe was a better match for the background fabric. That meant I had to change the red buttons I'd picked out, for pink buttons. No problems, I've got plenty of buttons. Used Herringbone stitch to attach the teacup, added the buttons and ric rac, and Voila! Isn't that sweet? What am I going to do with it? I have no idea. But I'm happy now that I've done one, and will no longer keep looking at that particular page in my library book!

7 comments:

Jane said...

What a lovely project. That's the good thing about the library, let's you try before you buy

loulee said...

What a sweet idea. Love your tea cup.

Gina E. said...

Thank you Jane and Lou! . Well, guess what - I have just ordered it from Amazon.com. for $44 plus postage. I looked at several other online bookshops including Book Depository (who didn't have it but referred me to Abe Books. They had it - for $130! And wherever else I looked, it was hellishly expensive.

Lakshmi said...

pretty idea..but really loved doggie more..
Gina many a times I do visit second hand book stores and find only huge quantity of brand new text books but never find any craft related books!!

Catherine said...

The teacup is beautiful. My favorite though the dog was cute too.

Doreen G said...

I love it Gina and the tea cup really looks great

Linens and Royals said...

Just catching up on your posts Gina and am totally impressed with your tablecloth collection and that is such a good way to display them. Do you think that mystery item might be a shoe or brush holder? Sylvia