I'm a follower of Mamacjt blog. It is written by a talented artist named Carol, who lives in Wisconsin. I have enjoyed reading about her projects, and have been especially intrigued by one technique in particular...her fabric coloring with crayon process.In search of more information, I read back a number of posts and found my way to her tutorial. It seemed to be a technique I would enjoy, so I assembled my supplies and set about trying my hand at it.
I needed freezer paper, fabric, a pencil and a box of crayons. Yes. You're right. I spent part of my day Sunday coloring!I downloaded the designs - called mandalas - from another blog called eyepopart. Carol was kind enough to provide the link. (I'll add the links to Carol's blog and the mandala art at the end of this post.) Once I downloaded the free coloring pages, I could get started.
I followed Carol's instructions and began my project by taking a piece of fabric - I used a white cotton with a tone-on-tone design, cut 22" square - and placed it on my light table with one of the mandala designs taped underneath. It helps if you locate the center of the fabric first and mark it with a faint pencil dot. I then traced the design onto the fabric.Once the design was traced, I ironed the fabric to a piece of freezer paper (waxy side against the wrong side of the fabric). It provides a measure of stability for the fabric during the coloring process. When I had finished coloring the design onto the fabric, the freezer paper easily peeled away from the cotton without leaving any residue.
I have more to do before this project will be complete, but the first image in today's post is as much as I've done so far. I'll share my project as I work my way through the tutorial.
If you'd like to try your hand at this, you can read the full tutorial at Carol's blog. Click here to read more. Click here for the link to the coloring pages on eyepopart's blog. (You'll need to scroll down the right sidebar to find the download link.)
One thing that Carol mentioned - and it's important - is to keep your crayons sharp. For a person who usually colors outside the lines, I needed to control my urges! Sharper crayons would have made it easier. I'm not sure how much I'll love my very first effort (it's a bit messy), but I can assure you that I'll be making a second and third, or more. A woman could feel like a girl again, losing herself in the fine art of coloring with crayons.
