Recent Creative Pursuits

I've been creatively busy. Can't tell you about everything, but these photos show some of the things I've been up to.  I made some Christmas cookies, inspired by the stocking I made recently. (No, they're not edible. They're fabric ornaments.)

I made new changes to my summertime cat's face. I think it's finally finished this time. As usual, Matilda (not Olive, the cat who inspired the quilt) had to get in the picture.

Here's the view from our hotel in Pacific Beach last weekend, when we were visiting our son. I played with it in Photoshop a little, can you tell?

Here I'm trying to find inspiration in the koi swimming in the dirty pond next to my gym.

I've been working on finishing the Christmas cards I started in the Experimentations in Letter Press class. The words of the inside message were done in class, and I made a block print of the Christmas Cactus design.

I made a few of this design, too. The "Noel" is Letter Press. The red design is screen printed using paper snowflakes. Each paper snowflake wore out after about 12 cards, so I needed to use two snowflakes. I still need to glue them onto cards.

Man, these cards are work! Can't wait to get back to quilts.

It's been a busy week! Tuesday night, I finished my Experimenting in Letter Press Printing class at the Irvine Fine Arts Center. I never did get around to printing words on fabric, because we were kept so busy with other projects. There were so many new terms to learn, my head was spinning! But now I know what a quoin is, do you? (It helps to lock the type into the proper position on the printing press.)

We made our own business cards in assorted colors, including cardboard. We also made note cards with our names and a motif on them.

I got a head start on some Christmas cards! The inside message is letter press. The front of the card will be printed with two block prints as shown on the left; one was made from a rubber block and linoleum cutting tools; the other one I made with fun foam, because it was getting frustrating cutting the flowers with my ancient lino cutters.

So this is just a sneak peak.

Finally, everyone in the class made a page for a book that we collaborated on. We each were assigned a word to print, and we added our own background and our own print from a rubber block. Can you guess? Mine is the one with the baby hummingbirds in a nest! I haven't put my pages together yet, because I was busy printing my Christmas cards. I'll show you when it's done.

In the bottom of the photo I showed where I printed the new hummingbird block on Dupioni silk. I'll probably do more of that.

Anyway, the teacher, Madeleine, was really good, very knowledgeable and patient with those of us who were slow to catch on. :-) And the students were really friendly and eager to learn. It was a great experience, and I recommend it.