La plume de ma tante

“La plume de ma tante” (my aunt’s pen) is what most people remember from their early French lessons. Is that like “run, Spot, run”? Maybe.

I began learning French when I was in 6th grade, back in the Middle Ages. In the first week, my clever teacher taught us a small “play”, in which I was to go into a forest, searching for flowers to bring to my mother. I still remember how excited I was, walking home, picking some wildflowers, and giving them to my mother with a flourish and a French phrase!

Now this little life tidbit will come into play later in this post, so tuck it away in your memory, and read on!

If you’ve been reading about the sad state of my winter wardrobe, you’ll know that I’ve been working on updating my sweater collection. I found an old black hooded sweatshirt, and thought, hmmmmmmm. Blank canvas!

I found a vintage black floral pillowcase, some black floral yardage in my stash, and some butterfly yardage. I did some collage work on the front and back of the sweatshirt, covering the various stains that magically appear on sweatshirts. It seemed ok, but it wasn’t speaking to me…

Until one morning, when my turn on the French stage popped into my head! Aha!

I finished collaging with more of a plan, including pulling off the bottom ribbing, replacing it with the striped fabric.

Pour moi, the piece de resistance is the lettering I added, which has made this one of my more satisfying and personal re-models:

Je voudrais bien aller dans le foret pour chercher des jolie fleurs (I would like to go to the forest to look for some pretty flowers)

C’est mignon, n’est-ce pas?!!

So much stuff, so little room

I love to create handbags, scarves, silk cuffs, skirts…. but I live in a small house with a smaller closet (and some of you know that my closet is stuffed full of shoes–shhhh)

I had to do something to clear out a little space, sooooo– I just created an etsy shop! It was fun, fast, and intuitive (I am becoming much more computer-literate that I ever thought possible!)

Here are the photos of the items I’ve got listed. I’m not going to put a ton of things up for sale– I want to see how this goes. My kids are all excited– oooo, Mommy, if you sell that shirt for $2,000,000, can I have a new skateboard and a Wii, and a (fill-in-the-blank)? They are such wonderful, supportive children, aren’t they? And no, I did not list a shirt for 2 million dollars. Not even for a skateboard.

Wish me luck!

How to make a duct tape dress form for sewing and quilting clothing

Most people go shopping the day after Thanksgiving– the retail industry refers to this day as “Black Friday”.

My new-found cousin (who joined us for Thanksgiving, introducing us to “Tofurkey” and it’s accompanying amino acid, Tofurkifan) and I made a duct tape dressform on the day after Thanksgiving– giving birth to a new holiday, “Silver Friday”.

I love to create wearable art, especially Wild Onion Jackets or even altered sweatshirts! I was given a dressform by a friend who moved away. It was a wonderful gift, but it wasn’t really my shape. After learning about this method to re-create your own body shape using old tee-shirts and duct tape (link) I decided that this was the perfect way to introduce this new-found relative to the craziness that is my family. (Please, if you meet relatives via the internet, be sure to vet them carefully before meeting them in person, or you too could be sucked into a bizarre situation like dressmaking dummies! Fortunately for me, Michelle didn’t vet my family!!)

So, without further ado, here is a tutorial on how to make a duct tape dress form, complete with the day’s photos!

First step, choose an old tee shirt that kind of fits. You will be cutting it up, so don’t choose a shirt you love! We cut up the back so that we could then re-tape the shirt to make it tight. You want to avoid excess fabric which creates wrinkles, which creates added inches on the finished dress form.

We re-taped the shirt to fit my figure a bit more snugly.

We (and I really mean Michelle– I just stood there, absorbing the humiliation!) criss-crossed my breasts with tape…oh, look! a Playtex living bra!

Continue wrapping your breast area using diagonal strips of tape. Make sure you don’t squish yourself!

Here you see the finished first layer– wrapped vertically from neck to micro mini. (***IMPORTANT NOTE!!! Do not– NOT– think that it’s a good idea to wear a pair of leggings for your bottom layer! It is NOT a good idea– how the heck do you think you’re going to get yourself out of this outfit at the end???!!! Please know that here I am serving as a horrible warning, not a good example! Wrap a plastic bag or another piece of old tee shirt in a skirt form. Muuuuuch better idea.)

We initially thought we’d make a short-sleeved dressform, so we (again, with the “we”. Michelle did all the work, and I just stood there.) If you think you’ll make a short-sleeved dressform, cut up your sleeve and re-tape it to snug up against your arm. We ended up cutting off the sleeve for the final dressform, but who knew?

I’m pointing to the beginnings of the horizontal wrapping layer. You need to pull the waist tight– don’t add pounds to your figure, unless it’s with chocolate. Chocolate is much more fun than duct tape. You can see how much excess we got with that first vertical layer– see the gathers at my waist? Cinch it in, Miss Scarlett!

Hooray– we’re almost finished! See how much, um, curvier I am compared to the dressform? At that point, I felt like I was in a full length girdle. Thank goodness we don’t wear corsets anymore– this is not comfortable!

Okey dokey. Now we’re done with the duct tape…and it’s time to cut me out. This is where we had that sinking feeling….how do we cut me out of the PANTS??? No one’s been near me down south with a sharp instrument since I had my c-sections. How well do I know Michelle? Is she trust-worthy? Shoot– I didn’t vet her, either. Deep breath, close eyes, CUT!!

TA DA!! Here we are– Susan and Suzette. We re-taped the duct tape dress form over the original dress form, adding stuffing as needed to pad the duct tape form. We are currently exhausted from all our hard work, but when we recover, we (meaning I– poor Michelle will have escaped by then) will take measurements. By the way, how do you gain 3 pounds from one little Thanksgiving meal??? Oh, I digress.

I had never seen a duct tape dress form put on top of an existing dress form, so I thought it might prove helpful to post a how-to for those of you with an existing dress form which didn’t fit your personal body stats! If you don’t have a dress form, there are other ways to “stuff” the duct tape form: expanding insulation foam, craft batting/stuffing/foam bits, etc. You will also need something to use as a center post stand: I wonder if you could salvage an old table lamp? Try it and let me know!

I can’t wait to use the new dress form to help me out when I make my altered wearable art, or better yet, my Wild Onion Jackets. I think it will prove invaluable to learn where NOT to place certain appliques, how best to accentuate my better figure attributes, etc.  The dress form will come in handy when I make all the new Wild Onion Jackets to show during the classes I will be teaching at Quilting with Machines!

So, statistics: about 3 rolls of duct tape, one old tee shirt, one pair leggings (but you’ll be wiser than that), one unsuspecting relative, one digital camera, one afternoon, one bottle of wine. Two good senses of humor. One blog.

Addendum: I went out to measure me/my dressform. The dressform is about 1 to 1.5″ bigger than I am– I will try to re-wrap her, cinching her in a bit. Either that, or I need to start eating more to gain the extra inch on my body so we match…

Meet Doris!

I am lucky enough to belong to a wonderful group of talented art quilters, called Fibervision.

A few months ago, we decided to work on a re-vision challenge. Everyone who wanted to participate brought a UFO (quilted, unquilted, blocks, it didn’t matter. We are women who do not do rules. We have found that if there are rules, we break them, just to be ornery.) A “UFO”, for those unfamiliar with quilting terms, does not reference Roswell, but refers to the myriad of unfinished projects (or objects) hanging out in our studios.

Anyway, we gleefully put a project from our studios into a brown paper bag, and tossed them onto a table at a FV meeting. Everyone picked a bag, and we dragged someone else’s unfinished work back to our studio to do whatever we wanted with it. It was actually quite freeing to have no emotional attachment to the work, and people chopped and painted with abandon. Hopefully, by the time you are reading this, the photos will be up on our website so that you can see what happened!

Here is a photo of the quilt top I got in the swap– an abandoned project from a Ricky Timms workshop. I loved the colors and fabrics, and was inspired pretty immediately!Many thanks to the extremely talented Ruth Walters for donating her UFO!

I have been making skirts from pants since high school, and I usually have a pile of pants sitting in my studio waiting to be transformed.

I realized that I had these olive green pants (that NEVER flattered me) waiting to be chopped up, so….

I split the inseams all the way up, re-pinned them so that they would fit like a skirt with a slight flare, added some interesting batik fabric I had in my studio, and proceeded to add Doris to my new skirt:

Doris’s birthday hat is made from the “tulip” part of the original work’s applique flower. I stencilled polka dots onto the fabric using Shiva paintsticks in copper. There are beads at the tips of the hat. Doris’ face is made from ivory felt, hand embroidered with floss from an original drawing.

Doris’ body is a piece of my own hand-dye, also stencilled in a swirly pattern with the paintstick. She wears  velvet flower petals (I suppose flowers are my “signature”, since I put them in everything, somewhere or other!).

Her legs and feet are the upside down stem/leaves from the original flower.

Here is the full view of my skirt. I love it!!

The border from the original piece became the border of my skirt.

Leftovers from the original?  I ended up with a 1″ square and a 1/2″ x 1″ rectangle of original fabric– how thrifty!

Here is Doris’ blurb. It came to me all of a sudden, and I quickly wrote it down on a scrap of paper. Fortunately, I didn’t throw out the scrap before I had stencilled it onto my skirt!

“Doris is a Diva. She celebrates her birthday every day, with cake and confetti. Her motto is: Eat dessert first.”

A Winning Wild Onion Jacket!

I want to share some exciting news! One of my cyber pals, Theresa Ward, has won 2nd place in the Wearables division of Innovations, the West Coast machine quilting show! Why do I share this with you on my blog? Because her entry was a Wild Onion Jacket!

With Theresa’s permission, I grabbed some photos to share with you from her webshot site:

The above photos show off the lovely machine quilting she accomplished on this “wholecloth” version of the Wild Onion Jacket Pattern. Notice the stunning medallion she created on the back of her jacket?

I included this detail photo to demonstrate how cleverly Theresa handled the hemline of her jacket. The quilted feathers flow so smoothly, and her use of a quilting “filler” along the outer edge is a clever way to handle the binding edges–no feathers would get chopped off had she needed to take a deeper hem!

Here is a closer view of her neckline treatment– aren’t her feathers wonderful?!! Notice that she will be able to wear her jacket on the blue side OR on the black side! What a wonderful addition to the Wild Onion Jacket family!

If you want to see these photos up close, please click onto her webshot page. In addition to more photos of her winning Wild Onion Jacket, there are photo albums featuring more of Theresa’s beautiful quilts.

Again, many congratulations to you, Theresa!

orange silk tunic, redux

I have tried and tried to upload an image of my orange silk tunic so that it opens into a larger photo, and I’m finally admitting defeat. Sorry to all who have emailed me, asking for a better photo!

However, I will share with you a photo of the wonderful “ribbon” I received for winning Best of Show.

Again, I apologize for the teeny weeny photos– I think the problem is the orientation of my camera when I take the photos.

The ribbon above was made for me by the previous year’s winner.  She (I don’t know who she is!!) is a doll maker, and the creative  ribbon is a doll holding various sewing charms.  The hand painted silk ribbon has “best of show” and “wearable arts connection”.  Sheesh.  The photo is so darn small, is there any point to sharing this?

Below is the ribbon I made for this year’s winner.  It features my embellished silk, and was made like a postcard:

I love the little chiffon ruffle at the bottom of the postcard– it’s so flirty!

Orange embellished silk tunic

I belong to the Wearable Arts Connection, the wearable arts group in Los Angeles. This is a wonderful group of women, many of whom exhibit their art in the Bernina Fashion show, teach at Los Angeles colleges and fashion institutes, and sell their art around the country. It is always inspiring to attend a quarterly meeting, and I drive home with my head spinning with ideas and inspiration.

Last year, I participated in the WAC annual fashion challenge. To my shock, I won Best of Show! I have the award hanging proudly in my studio, along with a unique “ribbon”, made for me by last year’s winner.

Why am I telling you all of this? Well, after my previous post regarding my green “embellished silk fusion” vest, several of you have expressed interest in seeing my “embellished silk fusion” tunic. This orange silk tunic was my creation for the annual Wearable Arts Connection challenge, Threads, Yarns, and Strips.

The white satin pants were thrifted, with stamps and stencils. The bottom of one leg reads: fabric fabric fabric thread thread thread. The other leg reads: shoes shoes shoes. There are other sayings and leaves (my favorite artistic icon) stenciled all over. The shirt is orange crushed velvet, and used to be a dress. The blue scarf is freeform knitting.

Here are the shoes I wore:

And of course, I wore my favorite “freeform” necklace!

This was a birthday gift from my artistic feathered friend, Carla. She started it off, and I added some meaningful bits and baubles. Isn’t it cool?

Anyway, that’s the story of my orange silk tunic. I love to wear it around– the color makes me happy, and there’s always something sparkly to look at!

The silk from my header

I love the silk from my header! I created the silk using a technique that I call “embellished silk fusion”, altho I create it on my longarm quilting machine rather than with glue or textile medium.

I first became aware of turning silk fibers into fabric at the Machine Quilter’s Showcase in 2005 when Marilyn Badger kindly demonstrated her version for me. After I returned home, I began researching different fibers and materials. I believe I have now given the silk my own spin! (ha ha– get it? Silk, spin– it’s a very bad pun!)

I now have a huge pantry full of different supplies to create whatever silk vision dances in my head. I don’t limit myself to silk fibers, either– but that’s another story for another day!

OH! Would you like to see the green silk vest I created? The back view photo is what Carla and I used to create my header. And that’s where I was going when I sat down to type out this post!

I love this vest, but it lives with its new owner, so I only get to look at it in pictures! Notice how the silk is fluttering in the wind in the first photo? The silk is so flowy and drapey– wonderful to wear. And yes, it’s washable! I get to create these for customers around the country– they like the one-of-a-kind, organic nature of this wearable art. Me, too!

shoes, glorious shoes!!

Recently, Carla blogged about her sand collection. She asked what other people collect, and I flippantly commented that I collect shoes. Hmmmm. You know that saying about things said in jest…

Well, if I categorize my shoes as a “collection”, that lends a certain air of dignity to my rather addictive urge to buy shoes. “Well”, I’ll sniff haughtily when DH dares to question the 4th pair of red clogs, “I needed that pair for my collection”. DH will not be amused.

In order to defend explain myself, I must back up to the early days of my marriage. DH and I dated for almost 3 years before we tied the knot. You’d think in 3 years, he’d look down at my feet. Perhaps he was so in love that he couldn’t tear his eyes away from mine. Who knows. He’s a guy, I still can’t figure them out, even with 3 of them living in my house.

Anyway, we get married, and eventually, move in together (it’s another long story). As the movers are bringing in all the boxes, DH notices that 3 rather large-ish (would you categorize those nice boxes made for hanging clothes as large-ish?) boxes labelled “shoes” is going up the stairs to the bedroom. According to him, I kept this fetish secret until we were married. He still claims that in this regard, I duped him into thinking I was a “regular person”.

I claim that: #1, I wore shoes, and lots of them, every single day of the preceeding 3 years of our life together. It was not my responsibility to call his attention to my feet. It was only my responsibility to trap him into becoming my love slave. And B, no one, not even a “regular person”, wears the same pair of shoes every single day (if you do, shhhhh– don’t tell DH).

Each pair of my several red clogs, for example, highlights the special qualities of different outfits. Thus, a shoe collection is not only desirable, but necessary.

So, in the spirit of disclosure and fun, and because DH doesn’t read my blog, here’s a partial view of my collection:

This is a partial view, and affords you a glimpse of my summer sandals collection. The closed shoes will rotate in next month when the weather cools down.

And this, clever reader, is what I collect.

What do you collect?