Rain!

It's finally raining here in sticky, hot Indiana! After three weeks of mid-90s weather, early morning attempts to revive the flowers with the hose (the hosta's a goner), and boiling drives in my rat-trap car without working AC, I am soooo happy! We should have a one-day reprieve from these nasty temperatures on Saturday, when the high should only be 83! The kids were wishing for snow yesterday...

Ginger asked to see some pictures of the samples I was playing with the other day. (Thanks for asking, Ginger!) I was in a rather feverishly productive mood for a couple of days, which unfortunately results in piles of dirty laundry, dishes overflowing from the sink, and processed food-based meals. Oh well, can't do everything all the time. Really, I get most work done in spurts, usually in conjunction with the kids' bath times, lol. (My studio is next to the bathroom, so I can keep an eye on them and stitch a little, too.) Making "art" (geez, that sounds so arrogant--I'm just getting used to calling my sewing room a studio!) seems like a good excuse for generally poor housekeeping. Unless you ask my husband...

Anyway, the top left sample is black cotton covered with painted WonderUnder. I'm not sure yet what I'd like to do with this. I'm thinking it needs stamping or foiling or more paint. The colors of the paint are actually brighter than the scan shows. The top right photo shows oil pastels on the same black fabric. I think this little heart may become a postcard. The bottom left photo is painted cotton batting (Setacolor on Warm and Natural) with needle-felted wool yarn, wool roving, cheesecloth, silk ribbon, and novelty fibers. The piece is actually bigger than the scanner bed. However, I like this portion of it most, and once finished, I'll probably crop it to this size. It needs more work, probably more needle felting and fme/fmq. Maybe I'll have more ideas about what to do with all of the samples after they've aged a bit on the design board.