zentangle ATC exchange

 

 

 

 My  first two attempts to make Zentangle ATC's

 went by the wayside, into the ditch,

off the road...
I filled the backs of  envelopes with  black lines but nothing surfaced .
my doodles ended up needing to be quilted and after starting out with a piece o plain muslin, the  black thread I used  kept breaking . I switched over to a variegated blue called de Nile by Superior of the king tut line that I got a cone of because I like it so much, then  the quilting /doodling went much smoother. free motion quilting is so like the doodle marks we made in margins of our note books as students in  class or on the phone with a pen or pencil. The this case the fabric is the paper and the needle is the pen only reversed because the thread is stationary and I move the blank fabric beneath the needle. the foot peddle got hot . I quilt barefooted.

 

When the quilting and cutting into sections was complete  I was thirsty for color so I painted the cards colors in  magenta, sky  and golden yellow and colors they make combined . I sprayed water and let the colors run outside the lines

 and the next morning..

 they had  dried and curled up like so many chips in the sunshine!
 that is not a problem with a hot iron on hand. I  fused some of the art paper made from those  painted coffee filters, again, on the backs and placed a weight on finished cards to flatten them for the mail, overnight. 
 

the finished ATC's

all ready to mail out.

 

 

and now

 that age old question

egg or chicken?

 

ATCs from recycled items

                                               reduce reuse recycle

my first trade in this group is right up my alley. it is about using up stuff

that some just toss in the trash or recycle now a days. ATC refer to Artist trading cards and are 2  1/2" by 3 1/2" in size.

this trade was with  the http://artisinthecards.blogspot.com/  group i recently joined.

i started with some fabric paper i made using torn tissue from last Christmas packaging and other thin papers painted that were thin glued to a fabric that was destined for the yard sale. half white glue, half water

painted on cloth and over papers randomly placed.

beach glass is what i thought background looked like. and i love beach glass!

some machine free motion quilting in variegated thread to doddle about shapes came next. i have saved can pull tabs for a while and they were attached with thin ripped fabric remnants. some gold paint and a bit of glitz added here and there. i glued them to the backs of a ginger ale carton cardboard cut the same size as ATCs and then zigzaged machine stitch all around.

i had a colorful 2005 AQS calendar that i cut up to make envelopes and sewed the cards into them  and off they went with a first class stamp .

i enjoyed my first round with this group even though i had a hard time deciding which of these to keep and which to send so i did it randomly.
sonja