Inspirations: Structures (Formentera)

 A lot of pictures but only a small bunch compared to the number of shots I had taken ^^ I love all these structures and colours you can find everywhere. With only these restricted view I find ornaments and patterns and colour combination I haven't though of before. I want to transform a lot of these structures to the stuff I do. Just looking at the pictures and my brain starts working...

I don't know why I haven't done this kind of search before but I definitly will expand my collection ^^

Small bird card

Just a first try how the paper (accidently coloured / painted with the fabric ^^) would look on a card. I love especially this gold paper! In the sun the glitter effect and the shimmer of the gold is even better :)

By the way: Thanks blogger for the new upload systems @draft.blogger! It's great :)

Side effects - painted paper

After the fabric scraps all were dry again I removed them from the underlying paper.

I had put them (for better handling and transportation) on some kind of sandwich paper. It is a little bit water and fat resistant, not completly but quite good for paper. It also has this semi transparent look so I often use it for crafting. You can make cool patterns out of it, create nice layering effects and you can use and handle it like normal paper.

You can image how cool it was to see that after painting / dyeing the fabric the underlying paper also was dyed and had some interesting structures in it.

I think I will use it as background for cards and prints. Although for small things it would also be a nice wrapping paper.

I already use this kind of paper also to wrap my soaps in it. The soaps get air and are at the same time protected against water and fat.

Soundcloud

peng by phono uno




I love soundcloud! My brother use this site and gave me the link to it. It can be easily integrated to blogger... real cool! Some of the other music players have dificulties.

I already posted some of his music, this is another example. This time more chill out... It's really great! Hopefully he will make me a little collection of his stuff which I can upload and integrate into the sidebar (also with soundcloud ^^).

If you are curious: You can find more of his music here [ phono-uno ]

Painted fabric - basic scraps

I painted this heavy cotton (or maybe linen / cotton mix) fabric with different fabric paints.

Most of the time I watered the fabric before so it was really wet and I could apply and mix the paint on the fabric like I could do with a water colour piece on paper. Took only a long time to dry ^^

I wanted to have more colourful and bright fabric to work with. So they may be the basis for painting, printing and / or embroidery, just make some patchwork stuff out of it after it or something else...

...but I love them and look forward to play with them!

..and some more...

New mini soap collection...

...just a lot of little pieces for my family to test them :) I want to make a lot of soap for christmas and still I don't know which recipes / soaps people love best.

You may recognize: The pictures on the paper all my own carved little stamps ^^


Upper row / left to right:

"Pump-skin", "allinone/one", "coffee and cream", "Just cream"

Lower row / left to right:

"Pure", "Green marble", "dark coffee", "rainbow", "Dots"

Strange bird on fabric "dots"

Another painting on batik dyed fabric... this time a bird. Mh... I am not so sure whether I like it or not. Maybe I will just make some more birds... and make of all of them together some patchwork...? Not sure...

(The leftovers of the pen I used for the outlines will disappear with time :) )

Batik dyeing with tea candle wax...

Lachafa started to dye her dress (or several now? ^^) with batik dyeing. Just making hte knots at the right place... I think you all know it and have done it once! Her dress looks really cool and cute... and it's batik is back in the fashion at the moment.

The other option for batik dying than using knots is to use wax. You drop the wax on the fabric, dye the fabric afterwards and then remove the wax by ironing it between absorptive paper (like old newspaper for example)... you can do this layer after layer... add one colour, put more patterns with wax on it... and do it as often as you like. Whether you remove all the wax at the end or at some time points in between depends on your desired colour combination.

I just lightened some tea candles in some candle holder. After all the wax was melted I hold the tea candle in one hand with a slight angle and used a brush to get the wax on the fabric.

Okay, my first atempt was just to pour it over the fabric. Bad idea, really bad idea! The melted wax just goes like water into all your fabric. Grmpf. As a second atempt I put a paper pattern on the fabric and tried this again and failed again. Hu...

But using a brush is great. Although you have to work fast you don't need to panic. Even if the wax is not really fluid anymore it goes and holds to the fibers of the fabric.

I think another really cool combination would be to use freezer paper and a brush to get the wax at the right places.

I will try! As soon as I have new candles...

And as for your choice of fabric: Take a thin type of fabric / natural fibers... if it is too thick (yes, I tried it ^^) the wax may not get through the fabric and therefore not blocking it from the paint.

And please, be careful! Fire, hot wax... may be a bad combination!

Golden one

The newest one, on dyed fabric, red and gold :)

I love the texture of the fabric with the paint!

"Wildling" - Postcard version

I just used the digitalised image, removed the colours, get the contrast higher and balanced the brightness... There it is, the b/w version for a card!

The print is not the highest quality (the opposite... hum...)... but I like to test things this way.

Just glued on black board, added some white paper parts on the back.. finished. And... the final touch: already send per mail ^^

I think I will search for a copy shop to get some cards printed in high quality!

(by the way: I have my trade licence now! Yes, you need one in germany even if you just want to sell some small crafted stuff...)

"Wildling" - new octopus / kraken painting

"Wildling"

The underground is the bottom of a wooden box (a leftover because I use the rest of the box without bottom as a rack). Painted with white acrylic paint, afterwards using a ball pen as well as water colours (aquarell) for the octopus / kraken.

At first just the sketch of the black ball pen on the acrylic background. I used a brush which made these hard lines into the paint so the colour of the wooden bottom comes through.

After that: layer after layer with water colours (in german: Aquarell... in english it seems that the normal school water colours as well as the artistic water colours which are highly pigmented are just called water colours.. although they are not the same :/ )

I used water colours so the black outlines may come through the colour! After drying one should fix the paint because water colours on acrylic paint is very damageable. But it is interesting to work with! Before the fixation you can wash it of again and again... just have to be careful not to destroy the first layers while painting over them.

Formentera: Critters

One of the most beautiful cats I have ever seen! Her owner found her in a trash can! An adorable accidental mix between some siam and a tabby cat? 

Look at the blue eyes!

GECKO!

He was in the toilet, hiding for the day...

A lot of lizards...

Out of wiki:

The Ibiza Wall Lizard (Podarcis pityusensis) is a species of lizard in the Lacertidae family. It is most closely associated with the island of Eivissa, or Ibiza, in the Balearic Islands, but has become endemic to Spain.

A sub-species, P. pityusensis formenterae, is limited in natural habitat to the island of Formentera, south of Ibiza, but has been transported by man to several other locations in the Mediterranean. The Formentean subspecies tends to be more brightly coloured than its Ibizan and mainland conspecifics.

They are really curious (I mean there could always be something to eat?!) 

Invading your space.... (in this case the terrace)

Sometimes they show a lot of similarities with cats especially if food is involved:

Are you taming them... or are they taming you...?

Yes i know, sea gulls are the rats of the sky. Still I like them!

Snails, the three on the first pictures are dead, just the houses...

But these snails are all living! Just having a break for the summer (to hot, to dry...)

Most of the time they form colonies of the same kind. But from time to time a snail wanders in the wrong colony ^^

To be honest: I am a little bit frightened of spiders. not too much... but if I don't have contact to spiders for some time it gets worse...

Having a closer look at them helps! Because spiders are real beauties! They have wonderful coloured eyes (most kinds have!) and their pattern is often ornamental! And they make gorgeous spider webs! They are all belonging to the genus Araneus but this kind of them is better known as diadem spider, cross spider or simply garden spider. But these terms are generally used for nearly all orb weaving spiders!

Have a closer look!

Another one, this time you can see her bottom...

I think they are both female because they were 2 to 3 cm big.

Again, have a closer look!

In the summer you can here this sound in most mediterranean countries: the buzz of the cicades!

A dry shell of a cicade after skinning...