Translating a Charmed Life into Textile

 A NEW SERIES!

 'Carol & Sue'

Kootenay living, for me has been a wonderful life and over the years I see people, particularly friends, doing things that reminded me of how fortunate we are to be living where we do. Things such seeing a friend's kitchen counters lined with jars of canned salsa, taking photos of friends as we are hiking through the mountains, watching the progression of wildflowers on spring walks, admiring vendor's wares at our local market,.....and the list goes on.

 

The series was envisioned in watercolour and although I won't discard that thought, the first of the series is done with thread sketching on textile. Why now? Some of the things that finally pushed me into starting the series were:

• Sketching one of the artists at a weekly sketching session in the fall.
• The interest of a student, from the Friday watercolour group, in drawing figures.
• Looking through my sketch pad and adding the chicken to the watercolour sketch done several months earlier.  Choosing the chicken to reflect the model's love of her farm.
• My friend wearing some beautifully flowered rubber boots to an art show we went to this fall. Loved those boots.
• A fellow quilter sharing some very small print fabric with me two weeks ago after I exclaimed over it.
• Recently thread sketching on some textile cards got me excited about creating in thread again.
• A desire to create some larger textile pieces. 

The watercolour sketch upside down as I follow along as I thread sketch with my machine.

Watercolour sketch (left) that inspired the textile art. Oops, too much thread to the upper lip looks like a moustache and that chicken is a bit fat.

Chicken slimmed down.

Mouth fixed and background stitching added in white thread.

Do you have any ideas for a title for this series? These are my ideas so far: Kootenay Charms, Kootenay's Charm, A Kootenay Life, What a Life or The Kootenays' Charm.