Thursday, September 8, 2011

Mama you paint so SLOW!

Over the weekend we went to my sister's house is Raleigh NC for the baptism of my nieces. A fun family time was had by all. We left Sunday to come home so that we could avoid terrible Labor Day traffic and have a nice day at home all to ourselves. It was a brilliant idea. After a couple nights of no sleep and a full day of kid play it was nice to have a non-stressful drive home. We even stopped at the outlet mall and went shopping since it was so easy breezy getting home.

Monday Marion and I decided to do a little painting. I had purchased several Halloween themed embroidery patterns from my fav little company Urban Threads. I printed them out to work on and since they do rather look like coloring pages I ended up letting Marion use them as such.


While I was rather meticulously painting my pumpkin she produced several works of "art". Apparently speed and quantity are the things she admires most in the production of art. While I was trying hard to make sure I was staying in the lines.


I am working on making trick-or-treat bags to sell with some of these designs on them. Since I did pay for the designs, Urban Threads is cool with this I checked. I am trying to use their designs as inspiration and make them my own but I do have to give them credit where their credit is due.  Plus their stuff is awesome and I could not have done it better so why not start there?

For this pumpkin I hand painted it and then I sewed over each of the black lines in sort of an applique / embroidery combo. I think it turned out pretty neat.

I hand painted this skull and reverse / appliqued it behind some felt. The outer of the bag is felt and the lining is the orange and white sort of floral damask I used to make the pumpkin bag. I think it turned out pretty fun.

This last one is not made into a bag yet. But I basically did a rough sketch of the original design and then thread traced it. I do not have an embroidery machine so I did all the tracing on a regular old sewing machine. Sort of like drawing with thread. It is not as detailed as the original design but I like it and think the abstractness actually adds a little creepiness.

I am really enjoying making these. Even though I had a little help with the designs I still feel like they are more creative and more unique than a lot of the things I have been doing (napkins, snack bags) and I am enjoying making some one of a kind pieces. I feel all artsy and creative rather than just pumping stuff out. The downside of course is that I have fewer items ready and I have no idea if people are going to like these. Only one way to find out...... I will be bringing them with me to the Folk Life Festival at The Atlanta History Center on Saturday. See you there!



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