jennie kohl austin

When I finally got into the studio to really get started on the birdhouse (read: clock was ticking…get started or give up!) I had to spend half a day just cleaning things up enough to be able to sew! I’ll get some new studio pictures up soon, but for now let’s continue with the birdhouse progress.

I started by cutting these long, skinny football-ish shaped pieces out of a fused sandwich consisting of the outside fabric, along with an ultra-firm Pellex stabilizer and a lining fabric.

I then picked which piece I wanted to be the front, and cut out a hole for the entrance to the birdhouse. It turned out ever-so-pleasingly round!

I put all the pieces together inside out, and turned the whole thing and pinned it. Again, pleasingly round!!

Next I had to figure out the head. After a couple of completely failed mockup, I came up with a general shape that I was happy with.

I made up a head, and played with ideas for the face. I think I deleted photos for the early face ideas, which is too bad because they were pretty silly!

Next I played with the ideas for the feathers. I knew I needed some kind of a ruffle for under the head, because the head would not sit directly on the top where all the footballs intersected. I made that piece first, then a tail, then realized those two pieces would have to be all-in-one in order to work! Also, I’d made it with raw edges and they were already a bit more unravelly than I’d like.

So I ran off to the store and purchased some quilting applique stabilizer spray. There was a moment of panic when I sprayed it all down and the color shifted a LOT, but I just prayed it would dry the original colors! Especially since I didn’t have enough of the matching fabrics to redo the ruffle and tail feathers again!

In the meantime, I got out my wire and beading supplies and whipped up some beaded wirey bird legs. I loved how those turned out. After my feathers finally got dry, stacked the feathers and head onto the body (not yet attached here) and you can see the unattached legs too.

Here’s the back, you can see the pinned together seam to the left of the feathers.

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 26th, 2011 at 6:01 pm and is filed under completed artwork, fiber. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.