Fabric journal cover

Since my husband's cancer diagnosis, I have kept a journal of all his medical appointments.  I note his vitals, comments from the doctor, weather, funny stories, personal feelings, etc.  The journal is rather loud in color and lacking in appeal.  I had been thinking about altering it but wasn't sure if I wanted to use a medical theme or something more pleasant...like flowers, etc.

To the rescue comes the most recent challenge (#4) on the EverythingWendyVecchi Yahoo group - incorporate fabric into our art piece.  Being a huge fan of denim I sewed a cover (remember covering books with brown paper bags and doodling all over them?) then stamped some images from 8 Studio 490 sets using Fabrico black fabric ink.  I used Ranger Adirondack Acrylics (now called Adirondack Dimensional Pearls) to paint  the images.  The leaves were stamped in a light paint, colored in to be solid, then overstamped with a darker green paint.  Once all the images were dry I went over the black lines with a Micron pen so the images would show up better on the darkness of the denim. The flowers with the rounded petals lost the words that are part of the image so I just painted them solid.  All images have at least 3 colors of ink on them for depth.

Here's a pic of the entire journal cover.

And here's how it looks when the journal is closed.

Studio 490 stamp sets:  Rose Art Part 2, Let Your Art Have Wings, Dreams Of Art, Be Inspired...Make Art, She Created Art, It's More Flower Art, Speaking Of Art

Funky Flower Art

On the EWV Yahoo group Allie (list mom) challenged us to use one of the older sets to make art. We're to post any pictures by Sunday noon as there are some giveaways to be had. Not one to shy away from a challenge involving Wendy's images I leapt at the chance to make something that has been on my mind for a while. I just hadn't taken the idea far enough to figure out which set would work best for my idea. So, I flipped through the sets and decided 'Funky Flower Art' would work just fine.

I ironed Heat-Bond to the back of some homespun fabrics then stamped Wendy's images on the front using Fabrico ink pads. Cut out the images then placed them coming out of the pocket I made from muslin. The pocket is actually the background stamp. Carefully I ironed all the flower pieces onto the sweatshirt, trying to keep the arrangement in place. I tried stamping the text directly onto the pocket but it just didn't work too well. So I kept stamping it onto more muslin until I got the clearest image, cut it out, then framed it with more homespun, raveling it a bit. I did machine stitch around all the pieces; I'm sure that Heat-Bond won't stand up to the use I'll be giving the sweatshirt. I don't care if there is some fraying at the edges, it will just add to the handmade charm. I didn't use the small circular stamp (flower center?) because I wanted to use old buttons tied on with embroidery floss as the flower centers. The petal stamps just seemed to cry out for button centers.

I'll be meeting EWV friends tomorrow at a stamp retreat and then again next Saturday at a class Wendy is teaching (the mini fat book) using Maya Road products, her stamps and the new Distress Inks. I am no fashion plate but I do love my Wendy sweatshirt!

Edited: I did end up using the small circular stamp! I stamped the image onto black shrink plastic (Lucky Squirrel) using Ranger Snow Cap White Pigment Ink. I adhered them to the last 2 posts I had (gasp - this sure worked out well!) and they're a perfect addition to my new Wendy fashion line!