Eileen Neill workshop

Last week at our regular Fraser Valley Quilters' Guild meeting Eileen Neill was our speaker.  She came back yesterday to do a stamping workshop with us.  She started by showing us how to cut our own stamps and by using a fabric glue and embossing powder to get some interesting pieces.  We then embellished with Lumiere or Setacolour paints.  This was the piece she demonstrated on in the class.

 Eileen is also known as the bead lady and loves to make these mini quilts for you to work upon to hone your beading skills.  These pieces are quite small as you can see by the little blue scrunchy on the table.

 Here are samples of some of her other pieces, they are about 15" square.

 This one she used commercial stamps and then beaded.

 She also does some interesting work with tyvek and other plastic based materials.

 Then we were off and carving.  Some gals chose to use original designs.

 Here is another original.

 This one is an adaptation of her pages that she allowed us to use.

 Another original design..can you tell it is almost Halloween?

 One of her shared designs.  A lot of people chose this one, it rather looks like the Dogwood flower, our provincial flower.

This was my first attempt along with a test stamp to see if I wanted to remove more background.  I decided to enlarge some of the lines to create a bit more detail.

 Second attempt, I drew right onto the stamping surface.  Remember everything will be reversed.

 A design chosen from another reference book she offered.

 By inking the back you can test stamp and decide if you want to carve out more negative space.  The white lines will be fabric and the black will be covered with embossing powder.

 Hard to see but a line drawing of a bare tree.

 Getting fancy with circles Mary!

 Doreen trying a complex Japanese inspired design.

 Eileen adding some heat to her piece.  It changes the look of the piece.

 Below she is using a paint stripper for added  power and heat.

 Embellishing with Lumiere paints.

 Setting aside to dry for stitching.

 Here is my piece dusted with the embossing powders.

After the heat the look changes, less pink and more silver comes through.

 Embellishing with different paints.

 Trialing some commercial stamps.

 Liz getting the heat on her piece.

 Ready for the heat gun.

 Mary adding some paint to her piece.

 The bare tree stamp along with some curving lines.

 Watching Eileen how she enhances the design with machine quilting.

 Here is one of Wilma's pieces.

 After some paint drying it will be ready to quilt.

 Susan with a different layout and original design.

 Wilma was very busy during the workshop.

I started to quilt my piece and the thread kept on breaking.  I guess that means it will be finished another day.

Thanks Eileen for a wonderful creative day.

Tonight there was a complete lunar eclipse. You can see just a hint of the moon peeking out from the earth's shadow. I went for a walk to watch it playing hide and seek with the clouds. Unfortunately the photograph doesn't show what I saw. There was an interesting coral orange glow to the moon in the earth's shadow. It was fun to watch and wait to see it happen. The next lunar eclipse to be seen in this area will not be until 2010 when the Olympics come to Vancouver. Click on the picture to see it larger.

Earlier this week we had a couple of lovely sunny days. After work on Monday I came home, grabbed my camera and went to take some pictures of the snowdrops and crocuses in the gardens. The crocuses look like they are reaching up to be sheltered by the snowdrops in this picture.

These snowdrops look like they are picking up their petticoats to bow before you.

I'm not sure what the name of this flowering shrub is, but the buds almost look like pink raspberries ready to be eaten. In the late afternoon sun they glowed against the blue of the Fraser River.

These crocuses were enjoying the warm rays of the sun.