Experimenting with Golden Artist Medium Coarse Pumice Gel

I'm experimenting with covering some small canvases with acrylic paint and Golden Artist medium coarse pumice gel.  It's intended as a mix with acrylic paint to provide texture.   This is a 2 oz jar, part of a sampler set of six kinds of "mediums" from Golden Artist. 

 

Here's what it looks like in the jar.

Scooping some up, mixing with acrylic paint.  I'm going for a red brick stucco effect.

Mixing it in.

Still a little thin, so I'm adding another scoop.

This is the consistency I'm looking for.  Thick, yet deliciously goopy.

Have WAAAY more paint & gel than I need, so I do a second canvas too.

Here's what it looks like when it's dry.

A close up of the dry canvas.

Screen Printing Experiment with YUDU Card Shop

Screen printing can be intimidating, so the YUDU CardShop in a Box---everything you need to get started, seems like a good idea.  (Initial kit is $59.99, with additional sets of 2 screens at $19.99US).  Here are some photos of my learning experience.  Hope this will give you a good idea as to whether you'd like to start screen printing too..

Picture from the box; shows what is included (except the card)

View from above, with included screen.

View without Screen

View with top open.  The little blue pegs are registration pegs to keep the mat in place.  An adhesive mat adheres to the bottom of the machine and to the card.  It's sticky on both sides.

instructions

Includes Yudu ink, ink pad, dabber.

Hard plastic Squeegee

Taped out "Thank you"

Here's the back side of the screen; it shows where I taped.  The card shop is for 5x7 cards and I really want 4.25 x 5.5 cards.  So I'm already altering the pattern.  Who knew?

Slide the screen into the little notch on the right side of the printer

Above: I'm already dirty from opening the ink bottle.  

A box of soft paper towels or rags will be your best friend.

They say: Put an adequate amount of ink on the screen and pull the squeegee with a sweeping motion toward yourself....this will take some practice...

Here's what the above ink yielded...

and the card after a second swipe to fill in missed areas...obviously ink is still missing in some areas

another try

And another

and another...and time to clean the screen.  The detail is getting worse, and it's goopy in some areas.

New screen...with cupcake...

Back of screen

First attempt...got a little goopy at the bottom where I pressed too hard.  Note that on this one instead of YUDU ink, I'm using Speedball Fabric ink with the same results.  So although they recommend Provocraft ink, it looks to me like any water soluble ink will do.

Second attempt

and third

Here's the ink being rinsed off the screen.  It pills up and washes away.  It doesn't look brand new again, but gentle scrubbing with the fingertips didn't hurt the screen a bit.

Other stuff I've learned:  Acrylic craft paint will not work as screen printing ink.  However, it will wash off the screen when still wet.

Miche Bag Cover Knitted in Entrelac

I grabbed a skein of Schaefer Yarn's new Handpainted Chris yarn in Patsy Mink colorway.  Here's what it looks like in a skein, and then in a center pull ball.  (This is awesome yarn; very nice hand and the colors are gorgeous.)

I started on a 6x6 entrelac pattern similar to the one used here.  And the Knitty Otter blog has a marvelous tutorial for learning entrelac.  

With the handpainted variegations, something weird and magical happened...but I thought, "There's no freakin' way this is gonna be a scarf.  I can either frog it, or do something else with it."  It was too wide at 10.75" unstretched...and it would take 3 skeins to get a scarf of a decent length.  What could I make....hmmm...

Turns out, this is JUST the right size for the magnetic purse cover.  I probably shouldn't mention the name, since Purse Lawyers can be particularly vicious...but let's live dangerously.

Here's the finished fabric...weird, yet wonderful...I don't like the rough edges, so am knitting an I-cord to sew all around the edges.  My sister Jules is an extraordinary seamstress; I gave her an M-Cover and asked her to make me a cover for it in muslin, which we have on hand.  I'm hand sewing the knitted fabric to the muslin.

Here are a couple of pictures of what she came up with:

I'll hand stitch the cover to this side of the muslin (you'll notice this is about 11.5" wide.  But the knitted fabric stretches well. 

Here's the other side of the cover, which shows how it slips on & off.

Knitted i-cord, size 7 dpns, 4 stitches wide, long enough to go around the edges

Stretched out the fabric and clipped it (wrong side out) to the Miche Bag Cover

Blanket stitched the i-cord to the fabric.  I started near the middle of a long side so that when the cover is on, the seam will not be noticeable.

As I go along, I'm straightening out the i-cord so it fits both the fabric and the purse edge.

I took it home to finish stitching over the weekend, and had some help from my cat Sera.

Here it is with the I-cord stitched to the entrelac & right side up. 

Closeup of where the i-cord ends are stitched together.

Otie wants to help too...

Here's the magnetic cover attached to the purse.  I still need to stitch the fabric to the muslin cover.

The benefits of making a mistake...

So you're not big on following patterns--always taking someone else's beautiful design, and then going off into the weeds with it.  You know how to read patterns, but CANNOT follow one to save your life. (Yes, this is me, speaking about myself in second person)  

Weed-going has both good and bad sides: 

Good: You learn lots of interesting stuff about what size yarn works with what side needles, how yarn drape can be affected by needle size, etc.

Bad:  You make a lot of bad choices and end up with some weird or ugly projects.  Some you frog.  Some you keep and call it a lesson learned.

 

Here's one of my mistakes, but a beautiful one that taught me a lot.  I'll be frogging this and calling it a lesson learned.  It's two colors of Schulana Capo Nord knit garter stitch at a 45 degree angle on size 10 needles.  (Essentially every second row you increase at the beginning & decrease at the end, and change yarn every second row). 

While it does make a thick, beautiful scarf, the size 10 is too small a needle for the 45 degree angled stitch.  So it starts to curve--see picture 3 above.  Last summer I knitted a 45 degree scarf in wool boucle variegated yarn on size 9 needles and it did well.  It was looser, so it did not curve as noticeably.  But it did curve.  The original pattern where I got the idea (and went off in the weeds) used lace weight yarn.  Hence the draping issue.

Alternately, if you wanted to knit a really funky collar:

• knit the first part of the collar
• then knit increase on the "top" side  for the back
• then knit exactly the opposite for the other side

Hmm...is there a call for a funky wool collar that's thick, soft & snuggly?  Maybe...

And...I've been up all night knitting (and watching the news from Japan & keeping an eye on a sick kitty) several nights this week...so I've been working on a rib stitch scarf in beautiful Jojoland Rhythm DK/Lt Worsted weight yarn (size 6 needles) in Camoflauge color RS72.  

I visited a yarn shop Heartland Fibers in nearby Winterset Iowa and found some marvelous DK weight yarn that I'm knitting up in a modified moss stitch.  I'll post pictures when I remember to bring them in.

Happy knitting & get some sleep!

Learning cables--they're not that hard

I've been hesitant to learn how to cable knit because I thought it would be hard...duh...it's easy.  The only thing is, you DO have to keep track of which row you're in.

When I found an easy cable knit hat in my "Knit  Pattern of the Day" calendar, I decided to try it.  Not bad at all.  Of course, since I'm easily distracted, it's not done yet, but the cable band was a breeze.

The project is done in fingering weight yarn, just some I grabbed out of the stash purchased at a garage sale.  Size 4 needles.  16 stitches per row, 8 repeating rows.  On the 4th row, you move 3 stitches to another needle (dpn or cable needle works best), hold those stitches in front, then knit 3 stitches, knit the 3 from the other needle and continue on with the pattern.    The other part of each row is the same (right side knit 3, purl 2 on either side of the cable, and just the opposite on the wrong side.)  Cast off, sew together and then pick up stitches for the remainder of the hat on circular needles.  That's where I am now.

Not perfect, of course, but not bad for a first attempt, and on those tiny size 4's in the middle of the night with cats helping.  Now, of course, delusions of grandeur, and I have another pattern I'm trying that is VERY complicated.  Why do I do this?