CAUTION: Work in Progress

After spending a huge portion of the long night coughing, I haven't been the least bit energetic.  Work on the  rug layout that I will be felting, hopefully Monday has been almost nil.  For me, this is the time in the project that is either a make or break for a project.  I have been out to the studio, added a touch here, taken away something there, blended a color here, added color there.  For me, this is what takes my project from "that's good" to "wow!"  I am not yet to wow. 

I do have to admit that my wow is not always John's wow.  And often John will say "stop, that's perfect" and I an driven to do a tad more.  My artist daughter always says a good artist knows when to stop.  I usually know when it is time. For me, it is like having a meat thermometer in a roast. It's done when it's done.

I have been asked to explain the process of "painting" a picture with fiber.  Here is a bit of explanation of what I do.  

  Here, I am creating a blank canvas of sheep's wool in the form of  batts.  I then add a second layer from the batts in the lower left corner.









That is the easy part. 

Next I begin to lay color to begin the painting.  As I said before, this is going to be a primitive looking piece. 

This is going to take a lot of shading and I believe the water pool needs to be larger.  The "mountains" are not showing up in the colors I have here. All of this is fiber that I have dyed and processed.  When it is completed, I will share the finished product. 

Earlier in the week I worked on some felted clothing.  I wanted to try to make a shrug.  It turned out quite nicely. 

This process is called nuno felting.  Nuno felting is when you lay your fibers on fabric.  I used silk chiffon in this project.  Whenever a piece is being made, shrinkage must be taken in consideration.  Here you will see that I have laid the silk out and am applying a very thin fiber.  This shrug will be very thin and drapey. 

Here you wee the fiber laid out on the silk gauze.  This is a completed project minus the closure.  When I get the closure applied, I will also show you this finished project. 

Having projects to finish is the bane of my artwork!  I have three hats, the shrug and the rug to finish.  Next week will be my UFO week.  (Un Finished Objects week).  I have only Monday through Wednesday to finish everything since we will be leaving for COWS Thursday.

OH, yesterday I said that I could not remember what COWS stood for.  Here it is - I sure hope I remember this correctly......Let's try Creators Of Wonderful Socks. 

Regardless............this time next week we will be motorhoming!  Whoopee!

That's all tonight....be save everyone and God Bless!