A Bag from a Baggo

 A fiber artist's group that I'm part of online (Fiber Pirates) does a fairly regular swap of art making known as a Baggo.  We fill a gallon zip bag with "stuff" and send it off to a central person who then anonymously hands them out to the participating artists.  We each are to make a quilt and then send the finished quilt to the originator of the Baggo.  This is what I got back this year from Dolly, in addition to an absolutely amazing quilt (which I haven't photographed yet, will share it as soon as I do.) 
A beautiful bag made with all the extras she didn't need to make the quilt.

It is all kinds of pretty.

 With lots of details and pockets everywhere, inside and out.

Counting myself lucky, I'm going to have fun using this bag!

Stylin' Recyclin'

 No I didn't make this myself, I actually bought it recently in San Francisco at the St.Patrick's Day parade art/craft booths.  From a company that is set up to produce recycled purses and other things that they design here, using young adults in a rehab center in Mexico City, Eco Fashions.  

I was really taken with the effective use of the UPC codes as an overall design.

Plus it had one of my favorite greens on the inside.  Most of their products are made out of candy wrappers or magazines.
It is very well made and it looks like it will last for quite a while.

Recent Additions

All of these were purchased back in January in Half Moon Bay while I was there for the CQFA retreat, at a little shop called Tokenz.
First is a big anti-evil-eye glass charm to hang over the front door.  This is about 3" wide.  One of my favorite symbols.  Never had seen one this large before!

T

 I'd never seen cone shells sliced like this before, thought the shapes were really intriguing.  Probably too delicate for quilt embellishing but maybe for printing or stamp carving?

Who doesn't need a lightweight bracelet of skulls?  Well not me really, not something I'd wear except maybe in October. I predict that these will end up on the next Dia de los Muertos quilt that I make.

Teeny tiny doodads for embellishments.  This store had a wall of big jars of this things, it was fun to go through and pick out a few I thought I might use at some point on a quilt.

 A right hand figure, to help me meditate on upcoming re-repair tendon pinky finger surgery.  But now that I look at it more closely, maybe not such a great model to use as I'm not planning to have the pinky finger removed. hmmm

A pony-tail holder of felted green woolen spikes.  Not so easy to spot against t

green background.  So here I am against the more neutral house.  Except for the purple window trim of course.  Are you surprised I insisted on purple trim when we repainted?

Stars For San Bruno

 My friend Jaye is making quilts for a few of the people who survived the San Bruno gas explosion but lost everything in the fire.  She asked for quilt blocks that were yellow stars on dark blue backgrounds.

 I hand-drafted these (thanks to the degree angles on my Omnigrid ruler), and cut them out of fused yellow fabric.  I just didn't feel like piecing for some reason.

 I zig-zagged the edges just to be sure.  I never trust fusible completely.  Unless of course if it is for sticking something to the ironing board....forever!

 I think I liked this one better, the two fabrics combined made me thinking of Van Gogh's Starry Night a little bit.

I can't wait to see how the quilts turn out, she's almost got one whole quilt top put together.

Flowers Inside And Out

 I'm so lucky that I've got a whole lot of flowers these days.

 Inside

 And

Out.

Primal Green

You're invited to come to the panel discussion and artist's reception for Primal Green.  It is this Sunday, April 17th at 1pm,  in San Francisco at the Main Library. 
I'm really looking forward to being on the panel with several other CQFA quilters, the discussion will be interesting and informative and hopefully entertaining.

Sun, Clouds, Sea

The Pacific ocean

on a January afternoon

in-between rainstorms

as seen from the side of Highway 1

near Pescadero

Sketchbook Project Part Three

 The rest of the pages from my sketchbook that is part of The Sketchbook Project.  I realize now that I skipped two pages in my photo taking, so I'm really glad I paid the extra $ to have the organizers of this project scan and put images on a DVD.  Plus I bet they'll look better than these photos too (hope so!).
This page uses a scrap from an old collage with a magazine picture and watercolor crayons.

 An old tissue paper collage with watercolor crayons and pen work.

 Writing, tissue paper clothes patterns, cancelled quilty postage stamps.  This is one of my favorite pages in this book.

 A two page spread that has a paper napkin in a toile pattern, acrylic paint, cigar labels, game cards and a vintage label.

 Cheracol, yum...

 The whole two page spread.

 The last page of the sketchbook!  This page was based on the watercolor paper that makes up the pocket, it was a scrap left over from something else, so I painted the background to match it.

 I love pockets in altered books so I thought why not on this last page of the sketchbook.

 I made one two sided tag to put in the pocket with vintage pictures from ArtChix, gold-leaf pens, acrylic paint.

 Why Should? vs. Why Not? sides of the tags.

I'm really glad I did this project and actually finished and submitted it! 
I am really looking forward to seeing the exhibit in San Francisco in June.  Check the schedule and see where the tour is coming near you so you can riffle through and handle hundreds of artist's sketchbooks!

Sketchbook Project Part Two

 More pages from my submission to The Sketchbook Project.  This one has cancelled postage stamps, words from a magazine and a paper napkin.

 A cancelled playing card with mulberry paper.

 Painting with metallic acrylics.

 More of the same painting.

 The whole two page spread.

 Too much paint on one page leads to this on another page.

 A whole bunch of images of this one group of pages.  Mulberry papers, Caran d'Arche watercolor crayons, stamped words, and pages cut with fancy scissors.  The two page spread is shown here.  On the right you can see there are a couple pages that have been cut into three sections.

 Words were stamped onto each of the three sections, front and back.  I intended them to be able to flip back and forth and say different things.

 Some hopeful.

 Some not!

 Some more angsty.

 Some direct.

 Some hopeless.

The page underneath that has tarnished copper tape.

More pages tomorrow.