The Play

Several of you asked for photos or video of the play.  Sadly, I have no video of the show, but I do have a few photos.  Since I am a total ham, I am including a video of me singing my solo. It was recorded the day after the final performance. 

First is one of me, in costume playing my baritone ukulele. 

This is the tableau at the end of the play. 

Here is the video that I prepared so you can hear my song.

Next up is a photo of much of the cast during the song

"The Sword of Damocles" 

And finally two snaps of me in costume with admirers

after one of the shows. 

First up, a total stranger.

Second, a longtime friend whose daughter I have acted with in the past. 

We had a great time performing The Rocky Horror Show 

for the weekend leading up to Halloween.

At the cast party, one of the younger performers told me 
"You have been a constant in my life. I think of you as my grandfather" 
I have mixed feelings. I am mostly honored,

 but it does make me feel really OLD.

Until Next Time,  

Stay Creative 

 Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

Altering Fabric

As some of you kind readers know, I like to play at dyeing fabric.   So when I was shopping and discovered a product called deColourant, I had to try it.    I have been wanting to do some discharging of color, but I can be so sloppy that I was afraid to try it with household bleach.

(note: discharging is simply removing color from the fabric)

After I ordered the deColourant, I did some research on using it. Yes, I know I should have done that first, but I was impetuous this time.  I found that it is supposed to work nicely with rubber stamps.  Cool, I could use some of my hand carved stamps to print designs on the fabrics.  It can also be brushed on.  And it is designed for natural fiber such as cotton.

So I got a piece of dark purple fabric to play with.  I think it is cotton, but I would not swear to that.  I put down some wax paper under the fabric and stamped and painted on the fabric with the deColourant.  Then comes the hard part.  You have to wait for it to dry.  I played it smart and left the house.

When I got back it was dry. The patterns were stark white and felt like --uh- toothpaste dried on the front of you shirt that you find after you get to work. It was kind of stiff and grainy. The next step is to iron over it until the color is lifted to your liking.  It mentions on the label that you can use steam for extra lift. So I started ironing. The white started to disappear and the effect looked weak.  I started steaming - with the iron of course.  I wasn't sure if it was where I wanted it or not.  Still, I took it to the sink and washed it out. Then I decided to iron it mostly dry.  The designs did show.

I hung it to dry - and promptly forgot it.  This evening I took a picture.  Due to the flash you can see the shiny white board it is hanging on thru the cloth.  But you can see how the designs came out also

 The brick lay pattern and dots were just painted on with a stiff bristle brush.  I love the pale warm purple tones and interesting edges that show in this.

 The leaves were added with a stamp that I carved. So was that little flower on the right.

The last picture is probably a little more true in color, although it is not quite that light.
This was fun. I will definitely try it again.  Next time I will likely use a lighter color of fabric just to see what happens.

I guess I am still a little boy when it comes to playing in this type of thing. Being childlike in creativity is a good thing.  Let your inner child loose and tell me what happens.

Start Me Up

The play with the fusible applique cat has sparked an idea.  A while back, I read a book Simply Stunning Woven Quilts by Anna Faustino. I kept thinking that I would try the techniques in the book -but I never did. 
Since the play sparked my "why not just try it" mode, I took some batik fabric and tried it my way.  I did not reference the book at all since, although I own it, it wasn't close at hand. 
I put fusible on two pieces of fabric, then did the cutting and weaving. Then I fused it all to a piece of cotton batting. 
Wanna see?  Of course you do. 

Woven Batik Background

This will be the start of a fun applique piece. I plan to redo the Silly Play Saturday cat design.  However, I will make it a bit more fun and whimsical.  Several people thought the yellow cloud was blonde hair - those comments inspired me. Thank you! Your comments mean more than you know at times.  And you never know, I might do a giveaway based on comments made in the past!
Did you do anything fun this weekend?  Oh, and what do you think of the woven background?


If you don't hear from me for a couple of days - fear not - something fun is going to be going on.  (((grin))) I will tell you later!

Silly Play Saturday - Lessons Learned

Sometimes it is great to just play. So for fun  - to let my inner child play - I took some fusible web and a few pieces of scrap that I thought would probably never be used and played. 


I fused the scraps to a piece of Wonder Under (double sided fusible) and let it cool.  *Lesson1: it is easier to fuse a full piece of fabric than it is loose pieces.  


Then I sat down with my scissors and started cutting. I tried to do a circle - not exactly round  *Lesson 2: for perfect circles use the AccuQuilt GO! cutter and the circle die. 


Hmm... this not so round circle reminds me of a cat  - a particular storybook cat. 


I cut more pieces and made more mistakes *Lesson 3: making mistakes is a part of learning. 


I put together a silly storybook picture and took it (carefully) back to the ironing board.  I fused it.  See how silly:

The yellow cloud behind his head is just there to add contrast. 


Laura Wasilowski suggests always using hand dyed fabric.  I didn't have any in the scraps I was using.  Had I had some for the background, here is what it may have looked like:

It would definitely have made an improvement. (and the yellow cloud would have been totally unnecessary!) Maybe I will keep this piece and try using paint and textile medium to "dye" the background. 

Do you ever just play? If you do, good for you.  If you don't, you should try it.  It opens doors in your creative mind.