Great Adventures in Fabric Painting Newsletter!

Our First Issue -- REVISED           Spring

Hello there Everyone!

With the coming of spring, I find myself musing of flowers and sunny, breezy, fragrant days. What a great time to be in the mood to paint something colorful, even if Spring actually hasn't quite sprung here yet!

The more sunlight hits my work table, the more I want to use it to create something bright and uplifting! If you also feel this way then you will like the things I will share here! :-)

Every year, St. Patrick's Day presents a creative challenge to me. My mind wants to know: What can I do to bring something wonderful (to wear) to my life and yet have it be green, too? :-) Well, I think I have a couple of bright ideas which I will share with you here.

In the past, I have made some nice designs onto green blouses by just finding new ways to apply hearts that become shamrocks when arranged right. But the best answer was always (literally) right in front of me: Combine methods used before to create a wonderful vest this year. This year, I am combining freehand shamrocks with sponge-painted ones with fantasy painted ones with shaded/blended ones in bouquet arrangements on different areas on the vest!

I am having a ball doing this! What I love about vests is that you can wear them all-year round and look dressed up even when you aren't really.

I am thinking that adding a rainbow and a few little single flowers nicely placed, will really make for a nice vest. I will try to place a picture of the finished vest up for you all to see when I finish it.

Here is a nice project for St. Patrick's Day

*** Shamrock Keepsake Corsages ***

In the past,  I have gotten together with others and made these wonderful layered shamrock pin-ons by first cutting a shamrock shape out of cardboard or Medium Weight Plastic Sheets # D881.  Then using the Erasable/Disappearing Ink Pen # D590 to trace the shamrock shapes out of different shades of green fabric (or other materials), we then cut them out, and painted delicate little designs on like spots, hearts, daisies, etc onto each one making the pieces each a little different.  We then sealed the edges with Glitter Or Dimensional Paint .  You can also use Shiny Clear Paint # J720!

We then glued 3 to 5 (depends on the total fabric thickness) layers together by placing a drop of fabric glue (or other glue) right in the middle. Stacking them together and letting them dry. If you have soft material, you can starch it first and/or glue one whole shamrock piece [each] to a piece of poster-type board to use as the bottom piece. They need a just bit of stiffness to work well.  It works best to put your stiffest piece as the bottom one and the softest in the middle.  I like to use nylon mesh netting in the middle.

Lastly, we attached little gold shamrock tie pins or little paper bouquets, from the craft store, into the middle.  We used coursage pins where needed to pin to lapels, etc.

We gave them to guests as gifts at a meeting we had on St. Patrick's Day. They were so well received! They looked like little keepsake coursages (sort of) and everyone loved them so! We even attached gold ribbon and bows to some of them. Each one was unique. And because we made them from fabrics (woven and non-woven, like white Decoron) they were lasting keepsakes. The guests felt so special and it really put a nice mood into the whole evening. One guest became a close friend and still has her keepsake from that evening!

It occurs to me that I can also make a beautiful spring scarf by painting a plain one with Cameo paints in just the colors I want and then outlining designs on it with #131 Metallic Gold or #130 Metallic Silver.  That way, I can own a scarf with only the colors that I want on it! I love scarves but can never seem to find just the right one with just the colors I like. With a nice, handpainted floral neckscarf, I can add any green blouse and pants to that and look stunning. And I can even add that vest, too!!!

For the kids, one could place different (smaller) shamrock designs onto a t-shirt or top and even fix-up a stained one that way! 

For Easter, I do show my "Bunny Tendencies"alot! I am fan of cute, cuddly rabbits and flowers!  Washable Glitter and Crystal allow me to add some really jazzy embellishments to my favorite stencil or transfer design.  And I love to use the Sparkle Accent #340 and Gold Accent #341 to make some outstanding highlights.  First, I paint a nice spring bunny scene onto a T-shirt, blouse, tote bag, or placemat using a nice blending and shading technique (Cameo ballpoint paints). Then I ''dew'' the flowers in the scene by using the Sparkle Accent #340 and Gold Accent #341 over some of the pre-painted (dry) areas to highlight them. The results are wonderful! Not too sparkly and yet nicely irridescent!

Ask your local instructor to show you how to Color Blend and Shade, if you do not know how! You will enjoy it and learn something very valuable. And, of course, you get to create something wonderful and take it home, too! If you do not have a local instructor you can contact us for one.  We also have materials you can buy or download to help you learn it.  Just ask us!  See our online Resource Library at: http://FabricPainting.org

For Moms: Nothing gets you more smiles than something hand-made for Spring. Make your mom a wonderful hand-painted scarf or buy a lace dresser scarf and paint some of the areas in with her favorite Spring color.  Use Cameo ballpoint paint and brush them on . WOW! what a difference. Start by just painting in the edges of the lace ruffle and seeing if you need do more than that. You will create something wonderful that is unobtainable anywhere else this way!

It is NOT too early to think about Mother's Day!  And remember how much she likes Easter?!

I like to make little goodie baskets ups for the adults as well as the kids for Easter and one way to give the adults a sugar-free and fat-free one is to buy small baskets and decorate them with what ever you might already have around in the way of ribbon, bows, small silk flowers, etc. I then paint a nice hankie, fabric napkin, dresser scarf, cloth doily, or scarf up with a nice spring design and arrange it inside and add fun supplies like brightly colored pens, pencils, notepads, colored paperclips, flowery stationery, and maybe even a small craft item I made or bought.

If Spring brings up your level of spirituality, why not paint a wonderful religious scene.  See the wonderful religious self-shaded pictures and paintables in my Vintage/Collectibles Selection by clicking [HERE].

Spring represents the end of winter and the beginning of new ideas and attitudes! Time to awaken all those creative skills and urges and let them take you to a new level...no matter what YOU like to do!

Submit your great fabric painting ideas to this newsletter!  Contact me at 866-533-8218 (tollfree VM) or by email to info@fabricpaint.com and I will send a gift chosen especially for you to you for each submission that I use.

Thanks for subscribing to this newsletter!

- Best Wishes!!

Diane Seveland

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