Spring is sprung

   Hello everyone! Welcome to my new followers - So glad you are here....Only one more to go till I reach the magical '50'! Magical to me that it is - When I first began blogging my dream number of followers was 50 (I sure know how to 'think BIG'!) To me the number 50 seemed so far off and hard to reach it yet seemed like a perfect target and I can't believe I am nearly there!....

     My project for today has been inspired by two challenges...The first is Vintage Stamping Challenges which wanted 'Spring is in the air' creations...My first thought was, of course, flowers. If someone needs a trademark style I guess they are becoming mine!

    The second inspiration was over at Eclectic Paperie which is to create something using fabric. The demo I saw was by Micki Harper who is just so fantastic at mixed media - she is such an inspiration to me. So I wanted a bit of a mixed media feel to this project and having done a few canvases recently I was looking for something else to work on - and fabric seemed perfect.

     So I began to think about using fabric paints. I own some Pebeo paints and I have had them for years. I used to do a lot of fabric painting, but haven't done much in the last few years with the exception of the two t-shirts my children pleaded to have last summer...My son wanted a Scooby Doo T-shirt and he chose a picture from his favourite Scooby Doo book. My daughter is a Moshi Monsters fan so picked her favourite character - They have two very unique articles of clothing!

 






















I have done many fabric paintings in the past - My mother-in-law has several of them!

     I have some lovely cotton bags that were very kindly sent to me by my Mother-in-law's wonderful best friend. I have been told that she does read our family's blogs regularly and if she does peek in and read this I really hope that she will like this transformation of one of those bags.

      I have done Servietten technique on fabric as it is one of my favourite things to decorate with serviettes. However I have never mixed the two together - and dare I try some stamping too? That would be fun! It did occur to me to perhaps add in some buttons and some stitched elements but I think I will leave that for another time ;o)

     Here is a peek at the finished bag - A spring decorated bag! Normally I photograph things indoors but there was no way the picture was going to be lit well enough...so outdoors into the freezing, yet sunny day and here is the 'Spring' bag - pictured in very wintery temperatures!

    I got the fabric paints and watered them down, adding some white so it was a paler colour and dabbed and blended to create a hazy background. I normally wait for the paints to dry by themselves but this time I was impatient, so I blasted it with the heat gun.

    When the background was dry I got the antiquities stencil and dabbed Frayed Burlap DI over parts of the bag....I didn't really consider the machine washing resistance of the ink - I just wanted that exact colour!

    Then I used a script stamp and began to stamp with Frayed Burlap ink over parts of the bag...carefully drying with the heat gun each time to prevent smudging.

Then I applied some pale green fabric paint over a flower background stamp and randomly dabbed some of it over parts of the images.

    Now all of the background elements were done and the flowers needed to be added. I chose Rose and Daisy serviettes and got the fabric serviette glue. I cut out various roses and daisies and arranged them on the bag and then glued them down.

The daisies of course were practically invisible as they were white and didn't show up against the colour background. Because I didn't want invisible daisies I brushed the petals with some very watered down white fabric paint - I didn't want any of the flowers to be totally opaque....I wanted some of them to blend in with the background and also be able to see a hint of the background detail through them. I was trying to get the effect of some of the flowers almost merging into the background and also for there to be some contrasting elements of a more opaque colour.

    When it was all done I painted some swirls with green and white fabric paint and I also very gently stamped some white fabric paint on the floral background stamp, just rolling it over various parts of the image so that there was a layering of effects....

....My first ever mixed media bag!  That was so much fun - I want to make more!

       Thanks so much for being here to have a peek - Hope you will come back again to see what I make next time.......

    I am entering this into the following challenges -

Vintage Stamping Challenges - Spring is in the air
Eclectic Paperie - Get Altered - Fabric
Artistic Inspirations  - Flowers
Simon Says Stamp - Chic to be Shabby
Country view challenges  - Pick and Mix