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?

 

easy seeing green!

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Wholly Cuckamonga Batman!

                         

 the cucumber trade
with artsinthecards 

as is summer,

is almost over with my entry .

i tend to take a bit longer than usual as i have a few ideas stewing already

or i don't sign up.

all the ideas looked good in my art part brain, pretty good.

i will attempt to descirbe what i was thinking ..about the cucumber as a color prompt.

Green was top of the list.
well, it was the list.

then there is "cool as a cucumber in a bowl of hot peppers" a beasty boys lyric.

then Patty sent that frog card

and my imagination turned a corner.

My new mantra became

"Wholly Cucamonga Batman, it's easy seeing green!"

i just had a time of it getting my eye glasses the correct strength, but not too strong.

(my very first pair of prescription glasses
 came with red frames and i always loved them.)

i am seeing pretty good now with my new pairs of glasses.

while thinking just what my card might look like, i took a cucumber end slice, mixed some golden and navy ink and started stamping card stock for
 back of cards and envelopes.

(this round i used old stationary envelopes instead of a sewn up calendar pages.)

for the lens fabric i took more paint and finger painted circles on cotton then i sprinkled salt into center and let it dry.

i cut out the circles and placed them on background cloth and free motion sewed the lenses in place and doodled out the red frames.wabi sabi.

i added a bit of red paint and a bit of glitter paint to the frames and i was almost done. to get a bit of a shine to lenses, i painted a few coats of min wax over them.

i sewed backs to fronts after a little trimming to 2 1/2" by 3 1/2"
which is the standard size for ATCs artist trading cards
.

i hope you like my new cool shades of cucumber

 and the remains of your summer
.
what color are your glasses?