Sunday, July 11, 2010

To Market, to Market

to buy a fat hog,
Home again, home again,
Jiggity jog


"Pinky"
31" X 28"

As I said here, this was created in response to a Creative Cue.

First I drew the pig on cotton sateen (I used sateen because I wanted a sheen to the finished piece.)  Then I sewed on the borders, planning to extend the quilting out into them.

I layered it with cotton batting and did all the stitching with cotton thread.  I outlined the pig first, then did the fence.  I followed with the mud and sky background.  I used threads that were slightly lighter in color than the colors I wanted to finish with.



When all the stitching was done, I colored the pig lightly with my watercolor crayons and went over it with Golden GAC 900 Fabric Painting Medium.  Why use this one?  Because it was the largest bottle I had (very scientific, I know).  I have been working on a test piece using all the textile mediums I have available to me, but I'm not done with it.  I'll put together a post with all my findings at some point.


Then, I decided that I wasn't happy with the quilting in the sky and decided to just go in between the lines I had already quilted.  I wanted the whole background to be very flat so that the pig would stand out.  That was the reason I chose a wool batt and quilted the background elements very densely.

Then I colored the trough and the mud.  I found that I had to allow enough time to finish "painting" each section, or there was a line where it dried. I also had to be careful not to use too much medium because if it got too wet, it bled.


After I finished the sky,  I let it dry overnight, heat set it, then added some little tufts of grass along the fence.

Of course, all this begs the question:  Why use the crayons at all?  Why not just use paint? Well, the short answer is: Because it's fun! These crayons rock!  And who doesn't like to color?

Actually, I like the look of the water color crayons after the liquid has been applied.  Also, it's fun to blend the colors.  I didn't like the mud when it was done (too golden), so I added some textile paint over it all to give it that "muddy" feel.  I may go over the fence with some white paint to give it a "whitewashed" effect.  I haven't quite decided.  But these crayons are just another tool in the color tool kit.  And a really fun one, I might add.

9 comments:

Vicki W said...

It turned out great!

Terri Stegmiller said...

Pinky is so cute. This turned out so great.

Beth@IHaveANotion.com said...

I miss my sewing machine!!! Still at least 3 weeks away!

Barb said...

Oh wow,thanks for showing how you did it...

Sylvia said...

Very interesting to see how you proceed. And great result

KimT said...

very very cool!

Unknown said...

He looks terrific, lots of personality.

Michele Matucheski said...

Thanks for sharing the making of this nostalgic piece! Kind of reminds of Wilbur -- but we won't talk of sending him to market!

verobirdie said...

Nice pinky! Thank you for the explanations too.