Wednesday, February 4, 2015

Back to Normal

Now that Christmas, New Year's and January have passed, it's back to the studio to start work for the upcoming year.  And to start off the year, a couple of weeks ago I had the pleasure of teaching four advanced stitchers. These ladies knew their stuff,  so we were able to get right to work with the different machine stitches that I use for thread painting.  After this, and a fantastic lunch, we got to play for a part of the afternoon with some dissolvable film, different threads, fibres and new techniques.


Dorothy and Donna

 Carol and Eileen











Thank you again Dorothy for the use of your home and to all four of you for a simply fabulous and enjoyable day. See you all later in the month.

 This charming abode was on the drive out to an antique/used goodies shop just outside of Davidson.  My pal Judy and I had decided to check this out to see if there were any good things that just
had to go home with us.  We had driven out in fog that provided some good photo opportunities, but unfortunately, the day grew steadily colder as it went along.  By the time we had been to the shop, where we both found something we just had to have, it was cold enough and the wind strong enough to make us realize that returning another time would likely be a better idea.  With frozen fingers, we each snapped a few photos of this abandoned house and decided to come back again when it was warmer. We stopped at the southern end of Blackstrap on the way home and took a few pictures of the frozen lake.  Brrrrrrr........



I'm very much looking forward to the coming year. I've made the decision to try a few techniques that I haven't used in years, especially for backgrounds, so will post pics as soon as I have something that I want to use.  I had also done several photo transfer pictures for my recent class and one of them just called out for a more dramatic color scheme and sky. The basic photo is one that I took at one of my favourite photo haunts, Cranberry Flats.  It's simply a tree and shrubs/grasses.  So with help from iPhoto and Photoshop Elements, I've pumped the colors up and changed the sky. I'm also considering doing it in a larger size, maybe in the 11" x 14" before framing.  I'm very excited about this piece as I think it could be really nice, assuming of course that I don't mess it up in the meantime. That's one of the first pieces that I'm going to work on, so might even have something by next week - we shall see.



This is the unedited photo - colors are flat and no sky. I'll publish the edited photo and the stitched version as soon as it's completed.












Ok - that's it for me for this time.  I leave you with a picture of one of our yellow peonies from our garden. It won't be long now!!! .... donna