Rocks & Rain

In 2014 my husband & I went on a trip to Ireland with friends. This was the first time we had ever been to Ireland as well as it being the first time we've ever taken holidays with friends. What a fantastic trip we had. Ireland is the place to go for "R & R"...rocks and rain. I've never seen so many rocks in all my life. Newfoundland doesn't even come close. I've also never seen so much rain. It rained every day. It didn't bother us at all, we just kept going & it just added to the wonderful ambience of the landscape.

Along our travels I would do my normal collecting of anything I thought was interesting. This is better than any shop if you ask me. Beautiful, free and just sitting there offering up it's glory. The feather was actually collected on the first day we arrived. Guinness...what a fantastic facility inside Dublin. The feather was along side the road sitting in water with dirt & gravel stuck to it. Well...I just love that sort of thing.

 

The dried thistle was collected on the Aran Islands. Miles & miles of rock made into pens for grazing livestock & farmland. It was so windy that sometimes I just had to sit down to wait for the gust to pass so I could gain my footing. The dried thistle was so perfect in this landscape and I had Chris cut of one of the heads & I carried it in my hand until we got back to the bed and breakfast that evening. It was so delicate I was afraid that it would crush if I put it in my bag.
Chris saw the rust piece & instantly I just had to have it.

Rocks & Rain is rough and a perfect fitting for my Irish piece. Everything except the rust has been encased in encaustic wax. It was the first time I had been in the studio in about seven weeks. I was completely in a zone & afraid to leave even to eat for fear that the moment would end.

El Grande Worry

This piece all started with a commercial that I thought was very funny...

I was so excited about making this piece that I was up in my studio painting at 5:30am so that the paint would be dry when I had more time. I started with painting a plain white Tyvek envelope, using gold, brown, rustic red and emerald green, Lumiere paints.

Then I painted a left over piece of cotton batting, brown and gold, as a back drop for the Tyvek. I cut the Tyvek into random pieces that I found pleasing and pinned them to the brown and gold back drop.

Then I got really nervous because I'd never done this before. So I thought that I would practice on a piece of Tyvek that I had in my scrap pile. I pinned it to a scrap piece of cotton batting and put some tear away on the back to give it some stability and also to give my hands more room to hold it while sewing.

Then I started stitching using a Sulky embroidery thread for the top and a neutral cotton thread in the bobbin.

Because my sewing machine automatically sets the tension depending on the thickness of the piece under the needle...I had to use a stiletto that my husband had just made me. This helped me keep my hands away from the needle and also help feed the Tyvek through the machine. I really liked the results so now I was ready to start on my original back drop.

Again, using the stiletto as a guiding tool, I stitched until I was happy with the integration of the Tyvek to the painted cotton batting.

Then I stitched the backdrop to a burlap rice sack using jute from the dollar store. Painted the title using rustic red Lumiere paints...El Grande Worry...and then attached my rope worry doll.

My worry doll is about 7" tall. She's made from course rope that I bought yesterday from The Art House Studio in Kitchener. Then I wrapped the rope with jute from the dollar store. This made her very stiff and you could actually pose her. I added the raffia hair and clothing from my stash and she was complete.