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Author: ruthlane

When I discovered felting in 2007, I finally found the creative outlet for which I had been searching. I love that the versatility of fiber allows me to “play” with a wide variety of materials including wool, silk, fabrics, yarns and threads. Creating one of a kind fiber art pieces to share with the world fulfills my creative passion.
Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.
Grove of Trees – Part Two

Grove of Trees – Part Two

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I’m working on my grove of trees nuno landscape slowly. I think that some of you may think that this is a “find the difference” in the photos as they look pretty similar. But this is how I work, I add something, take a photo, look at the photo to see if it works, then add something else etc. That means there may be only one small difference from photo to photo, maybe I took something off, maybe I added something.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

I had the background “horizon” and the large dark tree on the left when I left off. Now to add more trees. There are three little lines added on. These are the folded edges/hems of the nylon scarves I use to add layers of color. I usually just cut them off and don’t use them but I thought they might work for background trees. I tried maroon, yellow and orange. Not exactly what I wanted.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

Then I added a mid tone grey one. I liked that better as it pushed the line further into the distance.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

I added more mid tone grey trunks and moved the orange one closer to the “sun”. That looked better.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

The I added a few more orange ones keeping them on the right hand side where the light is coming in.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

I wanted to use more of the silk organza for a few more bigger trunks in the mid ground to foreground.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

And a couple more smaller ones in the same deep red color. I was happy with how it was coming along.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

Here I have added a few white “branches” to see what that would look like. I am inspired by Wolf Kahn’s tree paintings and was looking at several that showed white marks to denote branches like in this painting. I would need a lot more of the white lines to give the same effect. I will be pondering on that idea a while yet.

Nuno felted landscape background with fabrics added for background horizon and tree shapes.

I decided I didn’t want to add too many layers without starting to stitch down the under layers. So I stitched the darker “horizon” background down to the nuno felt. Now I need to stitch the skinny trees down. I still need to figure out the foreground and there will be more layers of fabric on the larger trees. Still a long way to go. But I’m happy with my progress.

Nuno felt background with distant "shrubbery" and added tree trunk on left with silk organza.
Grove of Trees Nuno Felt Landscape Part 1

Grove of Trees Nuno Felt Landscape Part 1

Comments 26 comments

It’s the new year so it seems appropriate that I am starting a new “grove of trees” nuno felt landscape. I am trying to be a bit more abstract so I thought I would start with strips of silk instead of one piece of silk and see what happened.

Strips of yellow and red violet dyed silk laid out on white background.

I had a lovely dyed piece of silk in my stash from my friend Paula. So I tore it into strips and laid it out horizontally. I wanted to emphasize the lighter area at the top as sky.

Red orange, tan and yellow wool laid out in rectangle.

I laid out some short fiber merino batts with more yellow at the top.

Silk strips laid on top of wool layout.

Then I put my strips in place, ready to felt.

Silk strips nuno felted on to wool background.

Here is the felted result. The ends of the strips didn’t felt in well although the middle portions felted fine. I worked on the ends as much as the middle so I’m not sure of the difference. Oh well. Then I started trying to ‘see’ my landscape. I didn’t take photos but laid some fabrics on top to get started. I didn’t like it. I trimmed the visible wool edges and started looking from different directions.

Nuno felted background ready for applique with edges trimmed and oriented vertically.

After reorienting the piece, I “found” my landscape. This direction gave a feel of trees in the background and the sun shining from the right. This was much more exciting to me. Here comes that vertical landscape again.

Piece of nylon sheer scarf laid over bottom of nuno felt background to give horizon line.

Here’s a piece of sheer nylon scarf (dark blue) over the bottom portion to show the horizon. Yes, this should work.

Layers of nylon sheer scarf laid over nuno felted background to create horizon line and distant "shrubbery".

I cut and frayed four pieces of the nylon scarf to give a feeling of ground in the tree grove. I will work more on the foreground as I get there. But I need to get some trees defined.

Nuno felt background with distant "shrubbery" and added tree trunk on left with silk organza.

I used the strip of nuno felted fabric on the left as a guide and placed blue violet silk organza into a tree shape. I have loads more to do as I want to put a lot of applique texture and hand stitching into this piece. But I have the idea going which sometimes is the hardest part. What are you working on in the new year? We would love to see, submit a photo of your work here. 

Learning and Experimentation with Online Classes

Learning and Experimentation with Online Classes

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Have you wanted to be a little more experimental in your fiber art practice? Do you want to learn new techniques and add embellishments to felt or other fabric? Why not try an online class all about embellishing felt? Anyone from anywhere in the world can take these courses, no need to show up at a certain time (you can even wear your pajamas) and the classes are 6 weeks long so you have plenty of time to learn a new technique and try out an experimental approach. My online courses are 4 stand alone classes under the title Embellishing Felt with Surface Design Techniques – A Mixed Media Approach.  You can take just one or work through all of them. The classes are only $45 US which is a tremendous deal for 4 weeks of video and written PDF’s plus 2 weeks extra time on the class website with full instructor support. Registration is now open and the class begins on January 10, 2025.

The first module is called Nuno Felting with Paper Fabric Lamination. The bark I created above used this technique.

You will learn the technique of Paper Fabric Lamination and then how to use these pieces in nuno felting. As you can see from the examples above, there are many possibilities with this technique. Click here for more information and to register for the class.

The second module is Experimental Screen Printing on Felt.

You will also be able to use these techniques to screen print fabric such as silk to use in nuno felting. These same techniques can also be used on cotton fabric to use in fabric collage or quilting.

You will learn how to create thickened dye, make your own screens and many ways to use these screens in an experimental approach. Click here for more information about Screen Printing and to register for this class. 

The third module in Embellishing Felt with Surface Design Techniques – A Mixed Media Approach is Printing, Stenciling, and Playing with Thickened Dye on Felt.

This one is really fun and experimental. Learn to make stamps, stencils and how to use a variety of objects from around the house to create your own unique surface design on felt. Develop your own style with designs you have created.

The techniques you learn in this class can be used for felt, other fabric types and even paper. The stamps and stencils can be re-used over and over and applied in different ways to create exciting patterns. Click here for more information about Print, Stencil, and Play with Thickened Dye on Felt and to register for the class.

The last module in the series is Free Motion Machine Stitching on Felt.

In this course, you will learn the basics of free motion machine stitching and how to use this specifically on felted projects. Does the thought of machine stitching seem a bit scary? If so, you should take this course to get a handle on how to use your sewing machine to create wonderful embellishments on felt paintings or other felted items.

We’ll start with how to set up the machine and some great practice techniques that will build your skill level until you feel comfortable with your machine. Then you’ll learn about machine lace, thread sketching and how to incorporate machine stitching into felt paintings. Click here for more about Free Motion Machine Stitching on Felt and to register for the class.

I hope you want to expand your fiber art skills. If so, click on any of the links above to read more about the classes, see the supply lists and to register. I look forward to “seeing” you in class!

And don’t forget, if you are a beginner, our online class Wet Felting for Beginners is always available.

This class teaches you all about wet felting. You’ll learn how to make a piece of felt, how shrinkage works and how to calculate it and the basics of felting, fulling and creating felt from wool fiber. Click here for more information and to sign up. 

 

 

 

Green "branchy" background added to purple ornament card.
Painting Christmas Cards

Painting Christmas Cards

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Happy Winter Solstice! It’s the shortest day of the year so we’re on to longer days now. Yay! The shorter days make it a bit dreary sometimes but I decided to create some Christmas cards to cheer myself up. I saw this method on numerous posts and videos online so I can’t credit one person for the idea. This method makes it fairly simple to create ornaments or baubles for a card with watercolors.

Artist's workbench with watercolor set up for creating cards, including palettes, brushes, water and paint rimmed jar.

Here’s my set up in the studio. I had several palettes of paint and it works best with two brushes I found. I didn’t use the very thin detail brush until the end. Also, two sources of water, one kept clean, work well too. I found a couple of glass jars in different sizes that would work on my 5″ x 7″ cards.

Glass jar rim being painted with red watercolor paint.

Get some “juicy” watercolor on to the edge of the glass jar and print it on to your paper or card.

Using clean wet watercolor brush to "grab" red color from edge of printed circle.

Then quickly add clean water around the edge to get the paint moving. You can also use your other “juicy” brush to add in more color while the paper is still wet. Remember to leave some white spots for the “shine” on the ornament.

Using gold gel pen to add ornament top to purple round ornament.

I painted sixteen of these in four different colors. This photo shows using a gold gel pen to add the ornament top and string.

Four pieces of watercolor paper with painted ornaments in a variety of colors.

Here’s what the cards looked like after that. I wanted to add something in the background or something more festive. I started with the “gold” ones.

Golden ornaments decorated with pine greenery and splatters.

I added greenery and some splatters. But I wasn’t particularly happy with the look.  It’s okay but I decided to try something different on the other colors.

Green background added to red ornament card.

I started with the red ornaments, added water to the background and dropped in some green paint. Okay, but still not exactly what I wanted.

Green "branchy" background added to blue ornament card.

I changed my green color and then worked on trying to make the background look more like pine branches. This was looking better.

Green "branchy" background added to purple ornament card.

So I finished out the purple ornaments in the same way. Then I glued them down to a regular 5″ x 7″ greeting card with Yes Paste. I have found that is the easiest glue method with cards/paper. So now, my Christmas cards are off in the mail. It was a fun activity and really pretty simple. If you want to try it, there are quite a few YouTube videos showing the process.

Green nuno felt with stitched flowers with stems added in wool couched stitching.
Painting the Landscape

Painting the Landscape

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The last time I showed you my Indian Paintbrush piece, I was undecided about the way the stems were ending so abruptly on the background. So I left it for awhile before making a decision on what to do.

The first thing I decided to do was add some stems to the blue flowers. I didn’t want the stems to be too visible so I chose a thread that was close to the background color. You can click on the photos to see them enlarged.

Green nuno felt with appliqued Indian Paintbrush and small blue stitched flowers with stems added in wool couched stitching.

It’s probably hard to see here but I did think that the stems helped the piece feel “more grounded”. But the stems of the main flowers still looked like they are not integrating with the background. So I decided to add paint to cover the end up a bit. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a photo with just the paint over the bottoms of the stems and over the lower third of the piece.

Green nuno felt with appliqued Indian Paintbrush and small blue stitched flowers with stems added in wool couched stitching. Addition of paint and stitched flowers to the stems of the Indian Paintbrush.

I added more blue flowers with stems over the base of the larger flower stems and the stems are looking better. I have decided it’s finished and now need to find a background fabric so I can finish it and get it ready for framing. This one is named “Painting the Landscape”.

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with tree appliqued in place covered with gold cut purl stem stitched garlands.
Holiday Card Exchange

Holiday Card Exchange

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For the studio holiday card exchange, I had Tesi’s name. I was in a bit of a hurry to get it finished so I chose a simple design, a holiday decorated tree.

Pieces of nuno felt, screen printed felt and stitched felt chosen to create holiday card.

Looking through my stash, I found a couple pieces of nuno felt, a screen printed piece of felt in green and a tree trunk that was already stitched! I love when a plan comes together this easily re-using bits and pieces from my horde of “stuff”.

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with screen printed felt tree shape and stitched felt trunk with wool "snow" at bottom.

This was the beginnings of the idea. I had some “wads’ of white wool that I thought I could use for snow and the background looks kinda snowy.

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with tree shape appliqued in place and red nuno felt "ball ornaments" appliqued in place.

So I stitched down the tree and added some circles from the multicolored nuno felt. Then I wanted to add a garland. As I was looking at what I had, I remembered my goldwork supplies. That would definitely add sparkle!

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with tree shape and ball ornaments appliqued in place. Addition of yellow felt padding stitched at top of tree.

So I added some yellow felt padding at the top of the tree to give a raised effect. Then I could cover it with cut purl.

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with tree appliqued in place covered with gold cut purl stem stitched garlands.

I used Gilt Bright Check Purl for the garland stitched down in “stem” stitch. The photos aren’t the best as the felt and the shiny gold make the camera confused and unfocused.

Background of light blue grey nuno felt with tree appliqued in place covered with gold cut purl stem stitched garlands and gold cut purl tree topper.

Now on to the tree topper. The hardest part in “cut purl work” is getting the sizes correct so that they fit correctly over the padding. I used Gilt Rough Purl for the tree topper. I decided against using the snow at the bottom of the tree as originally planned. I thought it was unnecessary.  I glued the entire thing down to a blank greeting card and sent it off to Tesi in the mail and it arrived safely. Yay!

 

Handmade book spread with cutout printed leaves on blue plaster page and painted pinecone on opposite page.
Tree Specimen Book

Tree Specimen Book

Comments 15 comments

I started this book in October of 2022. I have been adding things slowly and painting pages when I had leftover paint from other projects. I had thought I would sketch on the blank pages covered with a mix of plaster and matte medium but they were too rough and difficult to sketch on. I haven’t shown you the book since last year and I decided to “finish” it up because we are starting on a new book project that will be made differently and I didn’t want to try to keep working on this one. I will be able to add things into the book if I like but it at least has color on all the pages and some with more ‘design’ than others. I had to cover a couple of pages that were not in the main color scheme. Somehow I got off track and added red which I shouldn’t have done. The book is mainly browns, blues and greens. The red/pink that resulted from painting a couple of the plaster pages was just not doing it for me. That’s what happens when you aren’t really thinking about what you’re doing!

Handmade book spread with a page that looks like tree bark with lichen.

I am not going to explain each page but you will notice the piece of blue glass and a small rock on the left hand page. I am using these as weights to hold the page open. The problem with this style of binding is that the book doesn’t open out flat unless you hold the pages. So you will see the page weights throughout. You can click on the photos to see them in more detail. Please feel free to ask about specific pages or techniques used.

Handmade book spread with a page that has cracked green and yellow and pine needles on the right.

Handmade book spread with a teabag leaf and dark painted plaster page.

Handmade book spread with a page of ink samples from a variety of natural sources.

The page on the left is one that I covered that was too red. These are small samples of ink that we made from natural ingredients.

Handmade book spread with a print of black capped chickadee artwork and cut leaves behind handmade paper grid.

Handmade book spread with cutout printed leaves on blue plaster page and painted pinecone on opposite page.

Handmade book spread with painted green leaves on blue sky background.

Handmade book spread with dark brown painted plaster opposite a leaf collage.

Loads of tree bark interpretations 😉

Handmade book spread with green painted paper opposite painted "bark" on plaster page.

Handmade book spread with painted plaster page opposite handmade paper grid threaded with orange/brown feathers.

Handmade book spread with sample strip of pea pod ink mixed with various agents.

More sampling of ink.

Handmade book spread with light blue painted plaster page opposite green deconstructed screen print on paper enhanced with paint.

Handmade book spread with lino cut print of birch tree.

Handmade book spread with green painted plaster page opposite hand dyed hemp canvas page.

Handmade book spread with teal painted plaster page opposite teal painted paper page.

I made an error here. Do you see it?

Handmade book spread with deconstructed screen printed page opposite painted canvas page.Handmade book spread with painted plaster page opposite 'bark' collaged to ecoprinted paper.

The bark paper is from a napkin.

Handmade book cover made from deconstructed screen printed hemp canvas and bound with copper wire.

And for those of you who have forgotten or never saw the cover, here it is. On my monitor, the book cover photo is not showing correctly. If yours is also weirdly stretched, please click on the photo to see the book cover.

If you search on the terms “tree specimen book” in the right hand sidebar, you can see all the other posts about this book where I have given more explanation about it.

Upcoming Textile Online Auction

Upcoming Textile Online Auction

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The Gail Harker Center for Creative Arts is having an online textile auction beginning Friday, November 15 and ending Sunday, November 17, 2024. Previously, I showed you the artworks I created for the auction but I thought you might like to take a look at some of the wonderful auction items created by Gail’s students. The theme for the textile pieces is The Enticing World of Plants. There are more than 50 textile artworks that are 5″ x 7″ with beautiful plant designs. If you are in the USA or Canada, you will be able to register and bid on items. Sorry to all of you across the pond, but the bidding is limited to the US and Canada due to shipping costs/concerns. I still thought that you would want to see all the lovely artwork.

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These wonderful floral pieces are by classmate Christina Fairley Erickson. She has used a variety of techniques to create these small pieces of art. You can read the descriptions of all the items on the online auction site by clicking on the photos there.

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These pieces above are by Penny Peters. She was one of Gail’s original City and Guilds students when Gail first came to the US and is now an instructor at Gail’s center.

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Here are three of the pieces that I created and I have three more in this series in the auction.

I hope you will go and take a look at the auction and if you’re in the US or Canada, that you register to bid. There are some beautiful pieces that would make great holiday gifts for your friends and family!

This center is where I take classes and it’s one of my favorite places. Thanks Gail for everything you have taught me. I have really appreciated and benefitted from your expertise and knowledge of all things textile and embroidery.

Giant pigeon feet.
Public Art in New York, New York

Public Art in New York, New York

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I have had a busy past couple of months including going to my class in La Conner, WA, getting Covid (again) and traveling to New York City (NYC). I haven’t had much time for any fiber art. So today, I thought I would show you some of the public art in NYC. We go to NYC once a year since my parents had a time share there and they gave it to us. So I get a bit of big city experience and culture annually. Since we have been there many times, we have done most of the popular tourist activities and now we look for things that are free or less expensive to see. There are actually many free things to do in NYC, you just have to look for them and be prepared to do some walking. Google informed me after I got home, that I walked 19 miles the week we were in NYC. We actually walked a little less than usual as my sister caught a cold and wasn’t feeling well. Now on to the photos!

The view out of an airplane window with a moon and moon's reflection.

We had a red eye flight to NYC and I saw this double moon image out my window as we were about to arrive at 6:20 am. It’s a reflection of the moon in the window but it looks like two moons.

Dennis sitting in an indoor POPS in NYC.

Since we got to NYC so early, we weren’t able to check in to our time share. I was concerned in October that the weather might be cold or rainy and so I looked up public places to hang out. It turns out that NYC has a bunch of these called Privately Owned Public Spaces. This is a program where businesses get a tax break if they build a space inside or outside their building that can be open to the public. There are more than 550 of these throughout the city and you can look up where they are here. So Dennis and I spent a couple of hours hanging out in this lovely public space. We would have liked there to be couches, as we were quite tired, but we survived.

Statue covered with pigeons on Columbus Circle by Central Park.

On to the art, this is a statue/memorial at Columbus Circle by Central Park. I took the photo because of the pigeons. They are everywhere in NYC. Keep that idea in mind for a future piece of art.

Mural on the side wall of 'ritas restaurant in NYC.

Our first dinner was at ‘ritas and they have this fabulous mural on the side of their building. They also have great food and we ended up there during happy hour and got a great deal on tacos and nachos, yum.

The next day we went down to 14th Street at Union Square. We went to a farmer’s market (I have loads of photos from this but decided I had enough to post about with just looking at public art) and then on down 14 Street. These are three buildings along the way.

The reason we were on 14th Street was to see Art in Odd Places. This is an annual event and combines visual art, activism and performance art. These are a couple of the ones that we saw but apparently we missed many more. Most of the art moves around on 14th Street and interacts with people walking on the sidewalk.

One wonderful thing that happened was we ran into these elephants from The Great Elephant Migration. They are created from the size and shapes of real individual elephants and made from lantana camara which is a noxious weed. You can read more about the project on their website. While I was looking at the website, I realized that these elephants are coming to the Blackfoot Indian Reservation in June of 2025. That is only about 2 hours from me so I hope to see them again.

Another great place to see public art is on the Highline. It’s an elevated walkway on the west side of Manhattan from Hudson Yards down to Chelsea Market. If you click on the link you can read more about it. The newest addition to the art is ‘Dinosaur’ by by Ivan Argote. It’s a 16 foot tall pigeon and is really cool. In ode to all the pigeons (see the first photo) in NYC.

Times Square is also home to revolving public art. Here’s two that I saw this time.

There is all kinds of mosaic art in the subways. You can see it at many stations and it’s fun to watch it pass by as you leave the station or as you walk up to the NYC streets. I have many photos of all the different stations from year’s past. After looking at the link above, I have many more to see!

Macrame art at a coffee shop in NYC.

You can even see art in a coffee shop!

Mosaic art in St. Patrick's Cathedral in NYC depicting a tree.

This mosaic is in St. Patrick’s Cathedral. I needed a photo since it is a tree.

There are museums for everything in NYC. We have been to many of the art museums but decided to try the AKC Museum of the Dog this time. It is not a very big museum and was a bit tricky to find, but it was fun. The last photo is of a dog on the subway that I had to include.

We had never been to the NY Public Library either. We had walked by numerous times but hadn’t gone inside. I was enticed this time by the Line + Thread exhibition. It was about print, textiles, and stitch. The little psalms book with the embroidered cover was my favorite with raised work and metal threads, it’s gorgeous.

Copper, bronze and nickel screen by Harry Bertoia located on the upper floor of The NorthFace store in NYC.

We happened upon this piece in the NorthFace store. It’s by Harry Bertoia who was commissioned to make it in the 1950’s. It was taken down when the building was renovated but it was brought back to the same building recently.

Grafitti on a building in NYC.

And here’s the other type of art that you see in NYC, street art/graffitti. I hope you enjoyed all the art. If you ever get to NYC, keep your eyes open as you will see many works of public art worth taking the time to find or perhaps just happen upon.

BarBQ Tool Holder Complete

BarBQ Tool Holder Complete

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The last time I showed you the BarBQ tool holder, I was working on the quilting lines. It was my first time using the walking foot on my new to me Bernina machine.

Bernina sewing machine with walking foot stitching the straight quilting lines on BarBQ tool holder.

I hope you can see this as the silver part that you measure your width of quilting lines is hard to see in the photo. It’s to the left of the foot. All you have to do is keep that silver piece in line with the prior row of stitching and then you will have even spacing between your quilting lines. It worked just fine. But it seemed to take forever. This is one of the reasons that I never care for straight sewing, seams or sewing clothing. I much prefer free motion stitching as it keeps my mind engaged. When I do straight stitching like this, my mind tends to wander which isn’t a good thing when machine sewing. But I managed to get the entire piece quilted without any huge errors.

Opened BarBQ tool roll with fork, tongs and spatula in pockets.

Next up, I figured out how wide the pockets needed to be. I folded up the bottom edge and stitched along the quilting lines to make the pocket seams. I was a bit worried about the thickness but the sewing machine tackled it with no problems.

Rolled and tied closed BarBQ roll.

So here’s my finished BarBQ tool roll all tied up and ready to go in the camper. As Ann B. pointed out in my last post, this qualifies for the 1st Quarter Challenge. Better late than never!