Finished Florida fabric book

And another one done!

I showed you the start of this book in my last post: Florida Inspired. 

I had some metal shells that were charms on a charm bracelet from Primark.  They sometimes have inexpensive jewellery that you can take to pieces for elements for scrapbooking and mixed media that are cheaper than buying from art shops.  I painted these shells with acrylic paint.

I ironed Bondaweb on the back of each page and then ironed the pages together trapping the hinge/spine inside.

I sewed the signatures together using the sewing machine.  Here they are clipped together.

I used a preset stitch and variegated thread.  Sadly the stitching wasn't very straight on the third row.

And inside the book.

I'm really pleased with this book.  I've still got lots of squares left of the same fabric.  Shall I make a hanging?  Or make another book?  Or both?

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Florida inspired

I still have one more canal-inspired book to make but I thought I would make a Florida-inspired one instead.

I can't remember when I dyed and printed this silk noil which I recently tore into 6 inch squares.  I had used Coral Sand and Robin Eggs Blue procion dyes that I had bought from Hilary Beattie.

In a recent online poetry workshop with Sara-Jane Arbury we were looking at list poems.  In particular we looked at 'Blackberries' by Rhiannon Hooson.  The lines of her poem started with 'I bring you' or 'I give you'.

Using that format I wrote 'Shells'.

I bring you shells.
I give you rippled waves on shingle.
I give you sandpipers running in an out.

I bring you boardwalks on sandy tussocks
And searing heat from the sunshine state.
I bring you remembrances of childhood.

I give you the sunrise glinting on tumbling waves
Easter morning dawning, singing
In praise of the risen Lord.

I bring you pelicans flying in formation
Sweeping low across the shoreline.
Daughter-in-heart, I give you shells.

As the fabric had been printed when I was working on Florida based ideas I decided to add the words of my poem onto the pages of the book.

I printed the poem on paper first and cut it up to make sure the font was the right size and the sentences fitted.  I printed the poem onto organza onto which I ironed Mistyfuse. I cut up the sentences and ironed them onto the silk noil.

I made sure that the pages are in the correct order and decided on a 'hinge' for the joining together.  I'm not sure what else to call the joining piece other than a hinge.

I'm a dab hand at thinking about the finishing of a book almost after the fact but with this one I worked on how to join the pages together to make the book.  I used some left over silk noil to make the hinges.  I bonded two pieces of the fabric together.

I had already bonded cotton fabric on the back of each square of silk noil.  I stitched through the fabrics using the printed lines as a guide.  I will then bond the back and front of each page together trapping the hinge inside.

Come back next week to see the finished book.

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

Dis-ast-er daa-rling!

Can you tell I'm a Strictly fan?  I wasn't dancing I was preparing a screen for breakdown printing.  And I mixed the dye too wet and then tried adding more manutex powder.

Which didn't really work.  I ended up with some very thin dye on my screens.  Then I added the shells.

The shells were an experiment.  I know how flat things work on a breakdown screen, but who knows what the shells might do.

Lots of the dye leaked through the screen.  Then I left the shells on for too long so that when I came to pull them off they pulled up the dried dye which was paper thin.

It looked like this when I'd pulled off the shells.

So all in all - a dis-ast-er!

Although to be fair the shells looked quite cool.

So what happened when I tried printing the screen, I hear you ask!

Well!

Not very well really!   This was using print paste.  The coral sand was a bit random and then I tried the robins egg blue over the top.  This is while it was still wet.  I wasn't holding out much hope for what it would look like when washed.

I mixed up some dye with the print paste and printed through the screen on the left and used a thermofax screen on the right.

 I used the thermofax screen over the blue.

 Lastly I scraped the dye onto the silk noil using an old credit card.

Thirty six hours later I washed the fabrics out.  And most of the blue had disappeared as I had thought it might.

However they are in a similar colour palette to the silk noil I had already painted at a previous session.

I need to add some more blue to these fabrics or to another piece of fabric and then I'll be set to make something.  Or start again!

I'll let you know.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice