Thread Painting WIP - done!

One of my goals for this year is to finish up the projects in my WIP pile. I'm happy to report, I finished one!

I love thread painting, and few years ago I had printed out a photo of Jack the Pumpkin King (from the movie 'The Nightmare Before Christmas') on printable canvas. I fused it to timtex and spent a few weeks painting it with various threads. I loved every minute of it.

Once I was done sewing, I set it aside trying to figure out exactly what I wanted to do with it. I didn't want to add it to a quilt, nor did I want to frame it and hide the stitches behind a piece of glass. So, it sat on my cutting table while I thought about it.

Then, last Halloween I came across this lace fabric with bats in it and an idea was born!

I stitched the lace to purple faux suede fabric, and then sewed it around the edges of the thread painting.

Then I waited until DH had to work late, and I snuck into his wood shop (he doesn't like me to use power tools unsupervised. If anyone knows first hand what a klutz I am...it's him). I rummaged through his scrap wood pile (he hoards wood, like I hoard fabric). I found four pieces that were the same width and thickness. I helped myself to the power tools and cut them down so that they were all the same length. (go girl power!) I glued and clamped my freshly cut wood making a frame. I let it dry over-nite. I was pretty proud of myself.

The next night I eagerly drove home from work excited to finally finish up this project. I wrapped the fabric around the frame and used my staple gun to staple it in place.

The wood was very thick, so the staples didn't go all the way in. I ended up using a hammer to pound them down. I used lots of staples so that I wouldn't have to worry about them coming out.

Once I flipped it over I realized my mistake. I hadn't tacked down each side of the fabric first - I just started wrapping the fabric on one side and went around the frame clock wise. The entire thing had shifted during this process. DOH! Why hadn't I thought to tack/baste it down with push pins or something??

I'm not a perfectionist and there was no way I was going to remove ALL those staples and re-position the fabric.

I thought to myself: There has to be a way to make this work off-centered, making it look like I did this intentionally, so that it would be 'artistic'.

I stared at it for a while, contemplating my options. Suddenly I remembered the set of Jack pins that I had picked up on sale last summer which were living on a shelf in my closet while I decided what to do with them (do you see a theme here??) I put the pins in the lower right corner and up the right side. Now it looked perfect!!

My 'mistake' had not only made the piece better, but it also gave me a great new way to display my pins! It was a win-win.  I hung up Jack in my studio...a constant reminder that mistakes, are not really mistakes. They are artistic creations coming to life.

Pin-spiration

Find your Pin-spiration...check out my guest blog post over at
 PatchedWorks , I'm sew excited to be blogging with them!

 http://fabricjules.blogspot.com/2012/03/find-your-pin-spiration.html

iPhone case makeover

A few weeks ago I picked up my iPhone and realized that the case was very dirty. It even had a chocolate stain (or two) on it. (What can I say...I love chocolate). I admit, I was embarrassed when I realized how filthy the case actually was.  Not wanting to spend thirty bucks on a new case I decided to make over the one that I had.  Below is a recap of how I transformed my dirty case into a fabulous case.

First step - removing the fabric backing from my case. I gently picked at one corner of the fabric with my finger nail and I was surprised at how easy the fabric came up. It was very easy to gently pull the fabric back and remove it from the plastic case.

I tried to use goo-gone to remove the dried glue from the plastic case, but it didn't work.  So I just left the dried glue on the case.

Next, using the old stained purple fabric as a template, I carefully traced the shape onto my new fabric. I had decided to fussy cut out one of the skulls from the Alexander Henry 'skullduggery' line of fabric.

Using permanent markers I colored in the rose next to the skull.

Before cutting out the fabric, I traced around the lines with Fray Check and let it dry.

 After I cut out the fabric I put more fray check along the fresh cut edges. I did not want to take any chances of having the fabric fray while working on it.

Originally, I thought I would mod podge the new fabric onto the case, but then I remembered that I had Nunn Design UV jewelry resin which I had not tried yet. I decided this would be the perfect project to test out the resin.

I followed the steps in the kit, first using the glue to adhere the fabric to my plastic iPhone case. I put the glue on using an old paint brush. I had a hard time getting the corners to stick down and actually put a bit of glue on top of the fabric (as if it were mod podge) in order to get it to stick. I let it dry overnight.

The 2nd step is a sealant, that only needs 20 minutes to dry. Again I used a paint brush to apply it, but I let it dry overnight.

The 3rd step is the UV gel. The gel was a bit smelly, I recommend doing this in an area with ventilation. I also wore latex gloves to protect my skin in case I got messy. Let's face it...I make lots of messes. The gel itself was very thick and a bit hard to apply. Then again, the gel that I had was two years old, so a newer bottle might spread more evenly. After applying the gel with a brush I put the case under my UV light. It "baked" for 20 minutes. When I took it out, it was slightly tacky. The instructions said it would continue to harden for the next two hours. I decided to let it sit overnight.

The next day it was hard and shiny and pretty. But I could see where I had applied the gel unevenly. So I did a second coat...again letting the case harden overnight.

The end results are great. The case looks cool, and it's unique. The gel isn't 100% even, but I'm okay with that. I think it turned out fantastic for my first attempt using UV gel resin.

The case has also been holding up well to normal every day use. It's been tossed in my purse, pants pockets, gym locker and even spent some time in an ice rink and it's just as shiny and new looking as the day I made it. Overall I love it the case and I'm impressed with the Nunn Design UV resin.  I can't wait to make more stuff with it.