Sue Bleiweiss

Two Creative Studios

Terri Stegmiller and I are excited to announce our new website at www.twocreativestudios.com. Terri and I have been friends and business partners for several years now and we decided to combine our efforts to bring you the very best online learning opportunities in a wide variety of Mixed Media and Fiber Art subjects.

Please come and visit us on our new website, browse a bit and take a moment to sign up for our newsletter. Email us tell us what you think of the new site and what classes you'd like to see offered. We're looking forward to hearing from you!

And a couple of reminders about my classes:  The Journal Making for the Fiber Artist online class starts on Monday June 2 and there's plenty of room in the class.  Click here for the registration details.  Click here to visit the flickr group to see some of the journals made by former students of this class.

And the Creative Mixed Media Journaling Techniques online class begins on Monday June 9.  Click here to see a complete description of the lessons in this class and for registration details.

More books and some fabric dyeing...

I've been working on a few different projects this week and finished up a couple this morning.   I made a couple more of the coptic stitched journals.  I think I'm finally getting the hang of this binding technique.




















I used the Sweet Spring line of papers for this journal.  The inside is a combination of cream colored writing paper and some hand dyed fabric pages:




















Along with envelopes and writing paper I also stitched some of these cool 2 piece flip up tags to some of the pages:


















And for this next journal I used some of the Basic Grey Archaic papers:


















The inside of this one is a combination of cream colored writing paper and some hand dyed fabrics that were dyed with walnut inks and Coffee:

















Both of these journals measure about 9"x6"x2".  I am having fun combining the fabric pages in with the paper pages.  I think it adds a nice textural element to the inside of the journal.

Earlier in the week I came across some bottles of Tsukineko walnut inks that I had stashed away and forgot I had.  I decided to try staining some cotton fabric with them and I'm pretty pleased with the results I got:
I used Java on this first one:














and Terra Cotta on this next one:
















I had left these out in the sun to dry and I think that some of the Java from the piece above ran into this Terra Cotta piece which is why I got some great brown highlights.  At least that's what I think happened! 
For this last piece I used Walnut Ink:















I am very happy with these three pieces, not sure what I'll end up using them for but they're great additions to the stash!

The coptic binding...

I mentioned a few weeks back that I was starting to work on developing another journal making class.  Like the first journal making class this second one will be geared towards the fiber artist and will incorporate techniques that combine fabric and paper.  One of the techniques I would like to include is the coptic binding technique.  Since I had the entire day today to play in the studio I decided to work through a sample for the class:





















I used some of the Basic Grey "Sugared" line of papers in this journal. 

This journal has 5 signatures between the covers and each signature has a different decorative paper wrap from the Sugared collection.  Since I didn't use any fabric on the outside of the journal like I usually do I decided to include some fabric pages in each signature:



















I used some linen that I had painted a while back for some of the pages.  I decided to embellish the fabric pages with  pockets and I stitched some blank pieces of paper to them for writing on:















And on some I created flip out pages....


















And this one has two long pages sewn to it that are also pockets...















And here's one with 4 small pockets.  This piece of linen was dyed with walnut ink...
















and a couple more pictures of the inside...




















































I had a lot of fun putting this journal together.  Stay tuned for a couple more versions of this one over the next few weeks. 

And a couple of reminders:  The Journal Making for the Fiber Artist online class starts on Monday June 2 and there's plenty of room in the class.  Click here for the registration details.  Click here to visit the flickr group to see some of the journals made by former students of this class.

And the Creative Mixed Media Journaling Techniques online class begins on Monday June 9.  Click here to see a complete description of the lessons in this class and for registration details.

velvet dreams

Hand dyed silk velvet journal...






















More photos of the inside in the shop here.

The velvet I used for the dream journal above was a piece that I bought from Joggles.com I decided that I wanted to make a few more journals using silk velvet so I went through my stash and came up with a piece of white silk velvet that I had bought a while back.  I tore it into fat quarter sized pieces and painted each piece:




















 




















































I am very happy with these pieces and I can't wait to use them!

my house...

is actually a journal...

I couldn't resist using this fabric to make a house shaped journal and since I've been playing around with the tri fold design it seemed like a good pairing.

And I bought a few pieces of this very fun paper that has a floor plan sketch on it. 

And on the other side:

some more blank pages and 6 envelope pockets.

what a week!

It has been one of those weeks filled with errands and appointments and everything but studio time.    I've managed to grab a few minutes here and there which probably explains the current chaotic state of my worktable:

What a mess!  I am hoping to work through some of the in progress projects that are on there today.

One of the brightest spots this week was mail from Terri.   I couldn't resist snapping up one of her latest art quilts last week when I saw it added to her shop:

It's absolutely gorgeous in person and I love it.  The color combination is  fabulous and the stitching which you can't really see in this photo is awesome.  I just love it.    She's got a couple more in her shop so pop over there and take a look.

And in the land of Fibre&Stitch we've just put the finishing touches on issue 4 of which publishes on May 28th. 

Click here to see the table of contents and take a peek at what's inside.  It's a great issue and you'll be  amazed at how many projects and techniques we've packed into it.  There's enough in this issue to keep you busy all summer!

Now I'm off to see if I can bring some order to that chaos on my worktable, have a great weekend!

The winners and a new journal style

Well with 61 comments I decided to give away 3 notebooks so without further delay the winners of the notebooks chosen by the random number generator are...

Lise of http://lise2007.blogspot.com/

Ruth of http://ruthsfiberphotos.blogspot.com/

Cindy of http://crftyscrapper.wordpress.com/

Congratulations you three!  Please email me at suebleiweiss@yahoo.com with your mailing address and which notebook you'd like and I'll pop it right in the mail to you.  Thanks to everyone who commented and played along!

I worked on a new journal style this past weekend - the tri-fold:

I used a gorgeous textured silk for one side that I got at Joggles.  Lovely fabric to work with, I'm going to have to get myself some more!

And opened:

On one side 2 single signatures and on the other:

A signature made with envelopes: 4 small ones and 4 large ones.  And I couldn't resist filling the envelopes with some note cards:

Lots of variations can be made with this style journal and I'll be working on several over the course of this week so stay tuned for more photos!

Notebooks & it's time for a giveaway!

I've been playing with the bind-it-all machine for the last few days.  I love this little binding machine!  It works so well.  I started with these large 8"x8" notebooks:

Had a blast making these up.  I used some recycled wall paper samples for the covers.  It was a vinyl wallpaper so it makes a nice sturdy smooth cover.  I put these large ones in the shop here.

Then I thought it would be fun to make up some smaller ones so I put together these 6"x6" ones:

And then I found that I couldn't stop so I made up these 5"x7" ones:

All of these notebooks have 60+ pages in them along with some coordinating colored card stock pages.  Of course there are some pockets and I threw in some journaling tags too.  I thought it would be fun to give a couple of these away so if you're interested in having one of the 6" square or the 5"x7" ones leave me a comment on this post between now and Sunday.  I'll draw a random name from all the comments on Monday morning.    How many am I going to give away?  Well it depends on how many comments I get!

 

In the meantime, it's nose to the grindstone for me now as I start working on the new Journal Making II class that I'm hoping to have done for the fall.  I've spent the last couple of weeks making note and sketches and I'm ready to start testing some new ideas!

just puttering about...

I haven't done too much in the studio this week other than some straightening up and organizing.  I recently got my hands on a couple of discontinued wallpaper sample books and this morning decided to use them to make up some new notebooks using my Bind-it-all machine.  I have decided I love working with these wallpaper sample sheets.  They've got nice texture and they're sturdy enough for stitching with.  I've got lots of ideas for these!

inside is filled with some blank white paper and some colored cardstock along with some envelope pockets:

and the back has a little pocket with a mini notebook tucked inside:

I'm keeping this one for myself but I did prep a couple more sets of covers to make some more:

I"ll have those done in a day or two and hopefully into the shop by Friday.  I also managed to get some paper bags painted up and distressed for another project that I have in mind:

Some great color variations in these papers.

The Mixed Media Surfaces for the Fiber Artist class officially starts today.  There's plenty of room if you're interested in joining the class.  All the registration information is on my website here.

It's a beautiful sunny warm day here so I'm heading out to enjoy it, have a great day!

Building a prototype

I mentioned a few posts ago that I had a stack of sketches and notes for some new journal designs.  I've been working my way through them slowly picking and choosing different elements to work on.  Whenever I create a brand new design I usually like to build a sample or prototype first just to work out the measurements and the assembly order.  Sometimes what looks good on paper or make sense in the sketchbook doesn't always translate well into reality. 

This new journal:

looks a lot like the others that I've done in the past but the inside has something a little different.  I've been trying to come up with a way to store pencils and pens right in the journal utilizing something other than a pocket:

So this one has a pencil box built right in:

Not sure if I like the ring system for the pages or not.  I'm working on a few other ideas for that too.  This design needs a bit more work but as prototypes go, this one is headed in the right direction I think.

Have a great weekend!