Messing around with felt and stencils on paper

Quilting the bag sides

This week I finished the bag I showed last week. You will recognise the photo above from my last post. I handed the bag over on Wednesday. It was part of a Christmas present from the Recorder Consort to Kathryn who leads us admirably.

The pattern is an adaptation of the Stowe bag by Grainline Studio. I first made the pattern here. I have fully lined the bag and added a single zipped pocket instead of the collection of small pockets of the original.

Finished bag

 Now you can understand why the music fabric was important. Kathryn was delighted with her bag and her other presents too. These included some fruit cordials which she supplies us with during the break during rehearsals and a gorgeous music decorated set of notelets.

Zipped pocket inside the bag

 I've also been playing with nuno felt using the techniques taught by Vivienne Morpeth. It remains to be seen just how successful I have been.

Starting to add the fleece round the silk pieces

 As you can see I have used the same colours I used for the felted top I made during the workshop with Vivienne. I have added some scraps of sari felt from my stash.

The back of the nuno felt before work starts

The finished nuno piece - front

 The nuno felt is still wet at this stage and the colour may well lighten by the time it is fully dry.

Nuno piece showing the back

 The squares are caused by the pieces of felt added beneath the sari silk. I decided to see whether using squares would work.

Messing around with stencils into my sketchbook

 After a lengthy session making two pieces of felt - the second piece I can't yet show you since it will become part of my pages for the Pinfold Challenge. The theme this time is "Trees", hence the following experiments.

Stencil onto paper using fabric paints

Trial run using an acrylic spray

Kitchen paper used to clean the stencils

I had a lot of fun messing around with a couple of my stencils. I really like the patterns left on the kitchen papers used in clearing up. I can see these being added to my sketchbook when they are dry.