DIY Pillow Covers

Another one of my projects was making these nice pillow covers for my friends. I bought pre-made plain pillow covers from Ikea (around $6 each), but you can make your own with the fabric of your choice.

For the quote I used black fabric paint and my letter hand-made stamps (to learn how to make your own stamps, click here). Using a small brush I applied the paint onto the stamps and then placed them, one by one, on the pillow. Make sure to lightly trace where the letters are going to go with a pencil first, that way your lines will be straight and you won't run out of space in the middle of a word. You can also use letter stencils if you don't have stamps (learn how to apply stencils, here). After you are done applying the paint, let it dry, and then iron with another piece of fabric in between. This will seal the paint onto the fabric.

For the elephant string detail, flip your cover inside out and trace the shape or silhouette of your design with a pencil on the space you want it to go. Using needle and string, simply make your string travel from different intersection points throughout the border of the design. Make sure to keep your fabric stretched at all times, so you'll have a nice flat surface afterwards.

You can choose to do the string design first and then place the quote around the design, or write the text first and then make the design in the space that's left. Either way works.

You can also use the letter stamps in different ways. One of my co-workers liked this project so much, she asked me to stamp the names of her family members interconnecting each other, "Scrabble" style.

Nature Study I

Inspiration from Linda Ravenscroft's How to draw & paint Fairyland.

Watercolors - Flower Studies II

Watercolors - Flower Studies

Beautiful Hikes

Now that the weather is getting decent -because let's face it, it took a while for the sunshine to reach us here in Toronto- it is the perfect time to enjoy hiking. Perfect weather, no mosquitoes, and beautiful views.

Sneak Peek

Here is a sneak peek at some illustrations I'm working on for a children's book. Once finished they should be up on the official Paperback Media website. Woo hoo!

Image Transfer on Wood

I just finished doing my first image transfer on wood, after seeing the how-to here. 

I had previously attempted to do it on canvases (see image below), but this is by far my favourite result. I used a black and white photo I took of my brother and his girlfriend walking in Bruges, and I gave the piece as part of their Christmas gift. They loved it. I will do a couple more for my fiance and me from some of our trips.

The wood piece I got from Michaels, I used Glossy Mod Podge, and printed the image on regular paper using an inkjet printer.

DIY Stamps

Creating my own stamps has been a recent passion of mine, and in the last few months I have created over 300! I will post some photos of my stamp collection soon, but for now I want to show you how to make them. It is super easy, fun, and you can make whatever designs you dream of and use them in many MANY ways (I used mine in my wedding invitations - also an upcoming post).

You can make stamps out of different materials like linoleum, potatoes, styrofoam, etc, but my favourite materials are erasers and Speedy-Cut rubber blocks, which have a similar consistency to erasers. If my designs are small, I tend to use erasers bought at the dollar store (like the round ones shown in the third photo below - you can take advantage of these shapes and use them as part of your design!).

You will also need something to carve them. Speedball's linoleum cutters are very practical, they come with a variety of cutting sizes and are pretty easy to use. You can get these at your local art store, or online.

Finally, you will need pretty inks and surfaces in order to use your stamps. Inks come in a variety of colours and textures, and have different uses too. I have also used fabric paint to stamp my own designs on pillow cases and other fabrics. Your options are plenty!

Other optional materials include a pen, pencil, and tracing paper. These will make it easier to transfer your design onto your eraser before you start carving away. 

Once you have all your tools and materials ready, it is time to begin (I have posted a series of photos of all steps below for your convenience!). You can play around and create your own design on a clean paper or decide to use another design. I played around and came up with a simple fox design. Place the tracing paper on top of the design and trace it with your pencil. Then carefully place the paper, tracing face down, on the desired location on your eraser. With the back of your pen or your fingertips, gently press down on the paper, transferring the image on to the eraser. Make sure you hold the paper with your other hand so that it doesn't move around while you are transferring it!

Using your lino cutter start carving the design on the eraser, being careful not to cut yourself and making sure you are pointing the tool away from you. As you can see by the photos below, since I chose a circular eraser, I could choose to leave the stamp with the circular border around, or I can choose to carve the outside of the fox figure so that my stamp will only be the fox without the border. I think both are beautiful and will give you variety in your designs, so you can decide what looks best to you. After that, you are done, feel free to ink up and try out your beautiful stamp!

TIP: After you are done stamping, you can take good care of your creations by gently washing your stamps with warm water and liquid hand soap, that way they will last you longer. For really intricate stamps, I also use a soft toothbrush (you can get it at the dollar store), and rub softly in circular motions to get the ink out, specially in the corners.

Reminiscing Fall

Snowy Day

Where does the roof end and the sky begin?

Site Plans

Reminiscing Summer

Vanishing Ice

Yesterday my husband and I had the pleasure to revisit the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario. This is where we got married. It is also where the new exhibition Vanishing Ice is taking place, showcasing art from 1775 to 2012 that depicts beautiful yet sometimes worrisome icy 

landscapes. The show is a combination of breathtaking beauty, a sense of exploration and adventure, but also a wake-up call to the dangers of climate change and the fragility of these ecosystems.

Some of my favourite pieces include Alexis Rockman's Adelies (2008), a demanding painting depicting worried penguins atop a drifting piece of ice. The size of the canvas and the seductive hues of blues and greens draw the viewer's attention among a sea of art. Each penguin's expression is unique, and the eye of the viewer jumps from one to the next. The detail of the drifting ice however, is what makes this painting stand out, it looks as if actual ice crystals were slowly melting away into the sea.

Cynthia Camlin's Melted 4 (2008) is another highlight of the exhibition. Her use of watercolours and acrylic paints to illustrate a melting iceberg is as exquisite as it is striking. The boundaries of this gigantic iceberg, softly complemented by the ephemeral watercolours, contrast with the geometric shapes and darker tones of its interior, giving the viewer a sense of grandeur and of the opposite forces at play in nature.

A hundred-year-old photographs by Frank Hurley and Herbert Ponting, and classic painting's like the Group of Seven's Lawren Harris' Isolation Peak, Rocky Mountains (1930) allude to discovery, exploration, and the undeniable awe of nature. However, the viewer's attention is carried elsewhere with pieces like Paul D. Miller's Manifesto for a People's Republic of Antarctica (2011-2012) and Jean de Pomereu's Fissure 2 (Antarctica) from Sans Nom (2008), which clearly illustrate the speedy melting of the ice caps and bring awareness to the action that must be taken to preserve this awe-inspiring landscapes.

Vanishing Ice will be on at the McMichael from January 31st until April 26th, 2015. For more information you can visit their website at: http://www.mcmichael.com/vanishingice. The exhibition was originally organized by the Whatcom Museum in Bellingham, WA. You can see the individual works at their website at http://www.vanishing-ice.org.

"The ice and the long moonlit polar nights, with all their yearning, seemed like a far-off dream from another world - a dream that had come and passed away. But what would life be worth without its dreams?" - Fridtjof Nansen, Farthest North (1897).