March Part 1 - Stamp Carving

March 2017 

We settled in quickly getting to work  carving our stamps!

Beth, Bonnie and Nancy working away!

Kay was very busy and had two different types of carving blocks to work with.

The top white block is made of rubber that most of us use to carve our stamps.  This rubber block is easy to carve and gives a decent print.  Kay's bottom  green carving (the opposite side is blue - but you an carve either side) is a vinyl block produced in Japan.  This type of block is used by some of your major linocut artists who print on paper.  Kay did say it wasn't hard to carve so I'm anxious to see how it prints on fabric.  

Bonnie was carving a free hand block!  It will be a great background stamp!

Nancy was working hard even carving some rubber erasers!  

The pink block Nancy is carving is a circle with rays extending out from the circle.  Should be a cool print.

The pink block and flower carvings are Beth's.  She also had a lino block  (grey) that she cut.  The lino block Beth found at Hobby Lobby.  She did a  good job of carving an interesting  geometric design.

The large stamp is one I carved back in 2009 when I took an online 'lino' class from Dijanne Cevaal.  It was a great class and Dijanne provided so much information!!  I know she offers her lino online class from time to time.  Her blog is great inspiration for seeing how stamping on fabric can really enhance an ugly piece of fabric!

  Betty Cake for dessert!    Oops...and here I thought it was a stamp!

We have been joking about what we could do with some of the carving scraps!  Oh boy!  I can honestly think of a few things but do I really need another project!  I think not!

February 2017 Meeting

We had visitors at our meeting!

Thanks to Beth!!!!!  How adorable!  

And here we are enjoying our time together and of course food!

Nancy's Show and Tell

Her deconstructed screen prints!

More prints!  Just fantastic colors!

So rich!

embroidered name tag - clever, Nancy!!

Nancy's find from the quilt show!

very cool fabric..can't wait to see what she does with this!

Another one of Nancy's finds from the show!

A piece Nancy colored with Inktense pencils/water...nicely done!

 Beth's show and tell

Adorable fairies Beth gifted us each for Valentine's Day!!  

What a cool screen print!

Love this!!

Kay suggested Beth work a series of these

Stencil applied with acrylic paint

Kay's Show and Tell

Kay's show and tell consisted of hearing about her wonderful one woman show!

  And Kay's other experiences, which we love to hear!  And Kay showed us an efficient way of piecing...I didn't document but you can figure it out, if not, ask Kay!

and it must work, since she finished her heart stencil quilt by the next day!

  And of course, it was our reveal for the challenge!  A great piece of fabric enhanced by us!

Thanks for allowing us to 'play', Kay!!!  Can't wait to see it put together for real!!!  Until then....

Robbie's show and tell

These are 12" squares that I participated in an exchange by Tommy Fitzimmons and two other ladies  

Made by Carol Phillips, CA

Made by Tommy Fitzimmons - FL/ IN!

2" exchange w/tommy fitzimmons (3) - made by MaryBeth Richardson,WY

I made 4 of these in different colors using Solar Fast and a leaf negative

Felted gift tags made by Mary Stori 

my 'Believe' challenge for online group

Just because I had to finish Beth's embroidered flowers!!

These are some of my deconstructed screen printing from last month

More deconstructed screen printing

These are my screen prints after washing, drying and ironing. Two different screens were used, both same background colors, but yellow added to one.

I received this message from Nancy a little while ago and I felt it was necessary for me to reply to the entire group as to why or why not one prewashes fabric before dyeing. I hope this clarifies my demand that fabric in a common pot must be prewashed.

Nancy's message:
Kay, I do agree with the difference in using wet or dry fabric with your shibori technique.  But>>>> I don't agree with your demand that I wash some PFD vs. non-washed PFD.  They look just the same.  I will bring them for you to judge, but today no one could tell the difference.  I do NOT think I need to wash "good" PFD fabric!

When you get home, we'll check them out again

Kay's response:

I guess not washing is a risk that one can choose to take. Once you’ve had a problem things can change. I think problems can be more obvious if you are going for even all over color and with shibori fabric spots or imperfections would not be as obvious.

It is also important if you are part of a group dyeing in a common pot that everyone’s fabrics follow certain rules to prevent problems with the fabric of others. It you came into a Jan Myers class with fabric you had not prewashed you would be required to wash it before you could use it in class.

So the choice is yours when you are on your own, but it you use a common pot rules have to be followed. There are also other stipulations when using a common pot such as NO silk and no previously dyed fabrics. I hope this gives you a greater understanding of the reasons for prewashing your fabric when dyeing.

Deconstructed Screen Printing

Some stencils  Beth used as texture for her screen.  

Getting ready to prepare a screen.

Nancy spreading thicken dyes on her screen.

This gives you a better perspective and you can see the texture showing on the screen.  The screen has to be totally dry before we could transfer the design onto fabric.

My screen 

Screens drying in the Florida sun!

Nancy's screen

This is Beth's screen.  

I'm adding thickened print paste to the top of my dried silk screen.  Next I scrapped the print paste from top to bottom several times to release the dye.  Fabric pre-treated with soda ash is under the screen (that's the white you see next to the screen).  It is pinned to a printing surface made of foam board, batting and heavy plastic.

I've lifted up the screen and reapplying more print paste releasing the dye on another area of the fabric.

I  added some yellow dye to transfer.  

I'm quite happy with this piece!

Beth made a screen using a nylon stocking!!  Results to follow 

Another fun day of learning a new technique!!!  Can't wait to see the printed results from Nancy and Beth!!!

Waste not, want not....transfer print on newspaper!

BLACK Pole Dyed Shibori - With And Without Salt

I could say we were doing an experiment to see what effect salt has on using Procion dye to dye fabric.
But the truth is I was the leader and "I" was the one who forgot to add the salt to the bucket when we did the first shibori pole dyeing last month.
So this week we redid our project and Beth and Nancy were responsible to add the salt.
It really made a difference.
The fabrics in the top row are the ones where we added the salt.
Those in the bottom row are the ones without salt.
Some of them were WET when we put them in the bucket and some were dry.
Water acts as a resist and all you have to remember is WET = WHITE.
I chose black as the color of dye to use as it is the hardest color to dye.
We used a no longer available black dye I used to get from Dharma. I believe they do have a new one to replace it but I have not worked with it as I still have a supply of this one.