Adventures Galore!

Back to back quilting adventures!  On Tuesday, I had the opportunity to spend some time with Rayna Gillman in her studio.  We chatted and laughed about how much we have in common (we are both ENFPs...another story).  Afterwards, I got a chance to "save" a piece of fabric.  I wondered where this fabric came from...in no way, at no time, was it my "type".  I happily went at it with some thickened dyes.  First I used a stamp I created by heating and impressing some architectural thingy into it.  Following that, I used a wonderful "Klimty" stamp purchased at a scrapbooking store in MD.   Rayna showed me how simple it is to cure my fabric using steam.  I'm definitely going to try that again.  I left her with a surprise...no I can't tell--hopefully you'll see how she used it in one of her future blog entries.   It's not finished yet; I see some paintstiks and metal on it before I'm finished.  I'll keep posting it as I gild the ugly duckling.

Here are  photos of the layered design cloth (LDC), one before I added anything, and one after I stamped (thickened dyes) dried, steamed, rinsed, and ironed it.  It's now ready for another layer.

 

My second adventure, yesterday, was a trip to NYC to see Mom.  I passed by an African shop, African Masidi & Co on Broadway and 231/232 Streets a couple of weeks earlier, and vowed to come back and shoot some photos.  When I went in today, the owner, Cheik,  was not in, but a lovely woman, Belco (shown in photo), called him and asked if it was ok for me to photograph the astounding mask collection.  When he said yes, I was thrilled. What you see is a small portion of Cheik's mask collection, as Belco told me some of the masks had been damaged in a flood.  The masks are from all over the African continent, adding variety.  I see a series, and something to use in the upcoming QCNNY challenge!  The photos of the masks are in my Picasa album, which you can see by clicking here.