Sail Away With Me...Leo

We're nearly at the end. I'll be back soon with lots to tell, I hope. But, before that, please welcome one last special guest. Today I'm asking Leo to..

Sail Away With Me

Hi I'm Leonora but you can call me Leo :) You can find me over on the Quirky Kits Blog,  or my own much neglected blog over on Scribbles n Scrappin .

I was really excited when Sian asked me to do a guest post because I like crafting/creating with a starting point I wouldn't have picked for myself and Sian has set the theme of 'Sail Away With Me'. I guess it could be interpreted any number of ways and before I began I was toying with which way to go with it, literal or not so literal and after I'd finished creating I came to the conclusion I'd really ended up doing both.

I started out just like I always do when I need to think of something and grabbed a page in sketchbook to scribble on. I kind of have this need to make notes and do quick scribbled sketches before I make anything just to narrow down my thinking a bit I guess.

So while scribbling I thought back to a past project I did a while ago at collage which was a giant fabric wall hanging inspired by paintings by Alfred Wallis who was famous for his naïve paintings of ships and the sea. (Alfred Wallis, http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/alfred-wallis-577) I love how the paintings give you a feeling of the sea not just a depiction of it. When I look at them I can really imagine the rolling roaring waves.

I set out to make a miniature fabric collage inspired by the paintings. I pulled together a stack of fabric pieces to use and then got to work cutting out and layering and stitching.

I used a 3.5 inch square of felt as the base to work on then used a mix up of fabrics, mainly felt and denim because of the blue/grey colours.

It was really so much fun to do I’d forgotten how nice it is sometimes just to be really carefree and not really care too much about what the outcome of what you’re creating will be. Kind of another way of ‘sailing away’ too I guess. J

When I’d finished I decided to use the collage on a card so I just layered together some patterned paper scraps on a card blank and added some Thickers to finish. The same process could be used directly on the surface of a scrapbook page to make an interesting background or it could be a different way to make custom embellishments that work with a particular scrapbook theme.

Isn't it beautiful? Makes me want to reach out and touch it! Leo, thank you. You'll find lots more cool quirky style over at Leo's place. And check out her kits too