cleared the bench

I had a bench-clearing day in the studio on Tuesday. There were things pending for the guild show.The red & white button sampler:


12 x 18 inches

And
My piece for the art quilters' challenge, Forms of a Dress. This challenge was my own idea and it took me way too long to come up with an idea for my own idea.


10 x 14 inches

And
A piece for the silent auction that I started -- gulp -- last year and didn't finish in time. It's been scowling at me from the workbench for about 10 months, but I knew it's time would come.


forgot to measure, maybe 15 x 18

So those are all done and out of the house.

On the weekend, I had the idea that the line work I've been doing in ink might be interesting on discharged black duck, so I had at it with the bleach. I don't do this very often and I forgot how fast liquid bleach can be, so I ended up with black stripes on orange panels, rather than t'other way around. So I added some Soft Scrub and left it overnight.

Rinsed out, this is still not even close to what I hoped for, but evocative. Of what, I don't know, but something will come of it.

spa day

Late in the week we did waxing and bleaching -- not on ourselves but on fabric.

I had the idea that working with wax would be complicated and hard. But this was fun and easy because it used soy wax. I like fun and easy. We each glued string to a wood block in some kind of pattern to make a stamp, dipped the stamp in gently melted soy wax, pressed the waxed stamp on black fabric, then bleached and rinsed. One of the joys of soy wax is that it is water soluble so you can rinse it out in the sink with HOT running water and not clog the pipes.

I added some drips (the round spots) with a tjanting. The blotchy bits are either residual sizing or not enough patience with the bleach. I was late to the table so there was very little wax in the pan which, I'm told, is why I got so much detail in the string.

I think I will do this again. I was at Home Depot cruising for stamp supplies for a project I have in mind. The first homemade stamp, tile spacers adhered to a sheet of Lexan, is drying upstairs.