Inspirational 48 Hours.....

This past Saturday......Fiber on a Whim went to Washington DC. To experience this event with my daughter made for a very emotional 48 hours and one I will cherish forever.  It was a fabulous experience to be a part of and we loved seeing so many people in one place treat each other with love and respect. It didn't matter one's gender, race, religion, nationality, or sexuality. It gives us hope that we as a nation can be united no matter the powers that be. We the people....all of us....matter.

Now I will return to the post I was planning on writing for Friday when we found out that we would both be making the trip to Washington DC. 

Reviewing the different watercolor mediums I used to create the first month's pages in my 2017 Planner.

First I will admit that I changed up the color scheme...just couldn't help myself. I love color!  Last weeks page spread was done using Caran D'Ache Neocolors.   Soft, yet enough color to give the page interest before even beginning collaging onto it.  From my stash of scrap papers came pieces of a French map, a fortune from a fortune cookie and I ripped a piece from my tea bag packaging. 

Since I'm behind I think I will include this weeks page spread today too.  For this set of pages I used my Derwent Inktense Blocks.  In this case I wasn't as thrilled because I seemed to need too much water in order to soften my marks made on the pages and the pages warped a bit more than I would have liked them to.  This may have been different had I loaded my brush directly from the block and then applied the paint to the page, so I may try that out next month or at some point during the year.  The pages were divided using washi tape and painted lutradur.  Lutradur is a stabilizer, but has so many other uses, you will frequently see it "pop" into my work, especially since I save painted scraps like they were gold.  For me the way it takes paint makes me look so much more talented that I have been known to spend an entire day painting yards of it.

Beside painting on lutradur you can use an inkjet print to print directly onto lutradur giving an ethereal look to your photograph.  Use Transfer Artist Paper to transfer a photo onto it, which gives you results entirely different than that of direct printing.  You can stitch, using natural fiber thread and then use a heat gun and burn it, the stitching will act as a resist leaving you with a cool pattern.  Create 3 D pieces....it does not tear, you will need to cut it; the 100gram weight is perfect for this purpose.  I'm sure there are other uses...these are but a few and if you haven't tried it you may wish to play with it a bit.

Time to call it a day; as we will be on the road tomorrow evening for a guild program in Anderson, South Carolina.