Tuesday, November 26, 2019

Yet another bowl.

I have played with silk roving and made more silk paper, this time with some Angelina Fibre between the layers.
That didn't work perfectly as it tended to keep the layers of silk from binding, especially when I put in clumps. I decided not to iron the Angelina Fibre, to just sprinkle it in. After the silk dried, I ironed it and that seemed to help bind it.
But one lot of silk paper was a bit too fluffy and I thought it would not hold. I sewed a little pattern all over the silk paper and that seems to have worked.
Two new bowls! Not sure what I will do with them.


The angel bowl is made too!


Sunday, November 17, 2019

Experimenting - maybe a bowl.

I found a site with a downloadable PDF that gave instructions for making a felt bowl using a variety of shapes.
It encouraged people to try their own designs. So here goes ...
It is coming up to Christmas. The Alcove Art Shop, of which I am a member, is having a Christmas exhibition. I have been playing around with silk paper. I have been playing around with bowls.
Today I played around with making an angel shaped bowl. I am not sure it is going to work but I have made 6 angels.

Having some left-over silk paper, I used a template I designed to make 6 little angels. I am not sure if they will make a bowl or not. If not, they may make small Christmas tree decorations.

It must be coming up to Christmas, our hydrangea is getting ready to flower!
Thank goodness we don't have Thanksgiving to cope with, it is enough to have morphed straight from Halloween (which is gaining traction here in Australia) to Christmas.

The first go was to try cutting some paper shapes to see if they would make a circle. Yes!



The next step is to make some of the angels. They are currently drying.

We used the oven for dinner, so one lot is in there as it cools down, hopefully drying and not cooking. (Impatient, me? Never!!)
Just out of the oven! Not quite dry.
I realised that it would be much easier to do three at once rather than individual ones as above.  Learning as I go.

Once they are ready, I will see if they can connect and what size circle will be needed to be the base of the bowl.
That may happen this evening or it might be tomorrow's adventure.

Saturday, November 16, 2019

And another bowl

I am not sure why bowls are my thing at the moment but they are.
Today I tried another template. It was actually for paper people and had a little bit that could be glued onto the different pieces of the bowl.
I thought I wouldn't need it so cut them off my template.

I sewed my design. It is based on the Silver Princess but I decided that being precise was beyond me, especially given the size of the bowl.

I used some silk paper that I had made some time ago. (In the mists of time! I need to make some more.)

I drew part of the design and then transferred it to soluble fabric. I am only using one side of the silk paper with soluble. I have found that it changes the colour of the silk paper and wanted to minimise that.



I didn't cut out the pieces in between the sides of the bowl when I finished sewing but decided that  I really needed to.
I was feeling impatient so put it in the oven while it was heating up for dinner! Seems to have worked.

It is not a very big bowl. Because I decided not to use the flaps it is only sewn up on the sides partway. But that gives it the chance to open out a bit, which I think was a necessary design decision.

It is really quite small, so I am not sure what it could be used for, apart from simply being decoration.
Next time, I would sew more on the base to make it more substantial.





Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Yet another bowl

I decided that, since I am rather lacking in oomph at the moment, I would use some silk paper that I have had lying around and make another bowl.
I used the same design as previously but only put the soluble fabric on one side. It has made a difference to the colour of the bowl. The side with the soluble fabric is darker.


I don't think it is a problem, I just have to decide if I want the darker side on the inside or outside.

I left it to dry overnight, then started sewing the sections together.
I was interrupted and left it for most of the day. You can see why the sewing is necessary, it started to collapse.

Now I just have to see if I can find a use or home for it. Then I can lash out and make more!
It is quite simple and relaxing to make.

Thursday, November 7, 2019

Trying another bowl

I thought I would have a go at another bowl.
It hasn't turned out that well, it is rather flimsy. It is probably because it is made of silk paper (fusion, as I have been finding it labelled).

But here it is anyway.

I drew my design on paper, using the cone shape I devised recently.

This time, I tried a different design for the image, based on some silver princess flowers I photographed.



Once again, I used soluble fabric to trace the design and to give added strength to the finished piece.

I rinsed off the soluble fabric and put it out to dry. I forgot that the it dulls the colours, so I will consider not using it at all next time, depending on the image I want to do, whether I can do it freehand.
I may have been better served to have ironed it a little before sewing it together, it is quite wrinkled. Something to try next time.

I am still struggling with how to make it stable. I have used the same circle around the base but I am not that happy with it. It will be ok in this instance as you could not possibly use the bowl for anything. But I may have a play around with other templates to see if I can work out how to have a more solid base.
There are plenty of templates around, I just have to adapt them to my silk paper and work out how to make it more solid.

Or maybe I should work on my previous bowl and see if I can design a better image for it.