This year I have only one real goal and that is to delve deeper into my creative side , do my art and see where that leads in my life. I feel successful in my business, I'm very very proud of my child, and I'm happy. To soon my daughter will go off to college then on to her own life and I want to be doing what fulfills me. Therefore, more projects.
So to begin I have started a sampler of sorts, basically I'm embroidering a printed fabric I found at Ikea. It is a perfect canvas to practice stitches on. I have always admired embroidery, it is
so textured and needlework can be really amazing. I want to be able to manipulate fibers in ways that are lush and full of life.Here are a couple of pictures of the stitches I have learned. The leaf to the left is not as wonderful as I had imagined it would be but it is not finished and that will defiantly help.
The pomegranate above is composed of buttonhole stitches, lots of them.
The leaf is a square filling stitch and the stem in the middle is couching.
Im my quest to explore art more I am taking an online class, it is called Color Theory it is taught by Judy Perez a quilt and fiber artist. I just received the textile paints that are for the class and immediately got to playing.
I found right off that the paints bleed all over the fabric when I added water to thin them. I briefly read that there is other ways to thin them so they don't bleed... so I will have to look into that.
Anyhow, after a few little mistakes and learning opportunities I painted a hummingbird, a beetle and a dragonfly. The dragonfly was my fist attempt and you can see how much improvement there was between it and the others. 
After painting I messed around and sewed some scraps around the pictures... pretty cool so far.
These will probably be post cards for my parents. I think they will enjoy that.
