January Dragonfly

Although this post is seriously overdue the block was done in January and finished on time.  March and April won't be but I will get to them soon.  The good news is that we have gotten a lot done on our new home (still plenty to do.)  My studio is coming along nicely,  I am sure it will be an ever evolving thing but hopefully it will get to a more finished state soon.

If you read my Following the Inspiration series you saw the ideas that lead up to this piece and pictures that show what the whole piece will look like at least as far as the overall design.

Each of the blocks for this year are five inches square.  They will all be done using Zentangles in pen and beads from Artbeads.com that I got from their Blogging For Beads program.  I reviewed the beads that I am using in Part 8 of my Inspiration series and here in my main blog.

If you are interested in seeing more photos you can visit my Web Gallery.  I will also be posting photos occasionally on my new Facebook page.  If you are interested in becoming friends due to this blog please put BJP in the request (Thanks).

Here you can see the basics of the block.  This is the main part of my dragonfly,  the rest of him will be on the block above and below in the finished piece.  I have already inked in the lyrics on the blocks before I cut them into the 12 blocks.

Here you can see the beginning of the pen zentangling.  This fabric is a bit more course than the fabric I used on my other fabric zentangle but I am getting more used to that.  The really fun thing is figuring out how best to  incorporate the beads into the zentangles so they look like they belong together.

This far I have used some Jet/Picasso Daggers which are really cool looking (it hard to see all of the detail and variation in this photo) and some Jet AB Glass Roundels which add to the look of the dragonfly eyes.

I started the body section by figuring out where I wanted the beads and then designed a tangle to go with it so that they would look incorporated.  In some case I will be adding beads first and then tangling around them and other cases like this I will add the beads afterwords so that it is easier to tangle.

Here I have added the Jet w/ Picasso  and Crystal w/ Dark Picasso  10 mm x 10 mm lentil beads.  In this tangle they look sort of like the center of flowers.

Here you can see that I added some additional small circles to the body's tangle.  Here I have started to add more tangling.  Here I have done my first section that has no beads which I will include here and there.  The head has Toho Bead Round Hybrid 8/0s in Jet/Picasso (are we sensing that I like this finish?)

The other seed beads are from the Amber Blues Toho bead mix.  I can already tell that I am going to love the mixes I got  since they have bugles, 8/0s, 11/0s, and 15/0s in them in multiple colors.  Gives me a lot of choices.

This is January's block finished.  Here I have added the border of the piece along the left (the head will extend beyond the border.  The lower section of the body uses 1.5 mm cubes in Transparent Smoky Topaz AB.  I love the baby cubes for bead embroidery, it gives a very neat look.  It is especially good for using with the zentangling since there are several tangles that incorporate small squares in the design.

I will try to get Februaries block up with in the next week and hopefully I will get to March's block soon.

Disclosure...As a reviewer of products at Artbeads.com, I receive the Glass Beads above free of charge. I have been asked to review these products and give my honest opinion of the products...positive or negative. I am not being compensated by Artbeads.com for my endorsement as it pertains to the products received and reviewed.

January: Bison

January's block actually was done in February since I spent most of my creative time in January reorganizing my bead supplies. That was one of my goals for the new year and gave me a sense of completion that I was needing at the time. February started out fairly quickly with a terrible cold that really knocked me out for the first 1/2+ of the month but somehow I still managed to work on my block for January and finish it by Valentine's Day. I had painted it before I got sick which helped. Like the previous months the background is painted with fluid and other acrylics onto a poplin weight fabric. The Bison is painted onto interfacing and cut out and collaged onto the background. The painting is then fused to felt that acts as a mat and a support for the beading.

The hardest part about starting this months block was that I liked how the painting of the bison had turned out and had a hard time stitching the first bead onto it. Luckily, once the first bead was on the rest of the beading was much easier.

Bisons represent our sacred life and the abundance of the Creator’s blessing on Mother Earth and the respect that we should have for all of creation knowing that all things are sacred. As a manifestation of the divine aspects of our being bison teach us to incorporate our own efforts to embrace and hold life. Bison remind us to honor our path through life and ask for assistance from the spirit world as we recognize the sacredness of every walk of life and honor the pathway of others. The massive head of the bison reminds us to combine our own efforts with that of the Divine and that both mundane and spiritual are necessary to manifest what we are seeking. You don’t have to struggle to survive if right action is combined with right prayer.

Bison stands proud against the winds of adversity. The bison teaches us to temper our power when dealing with others and to allow the tranquility and peace of the Buffalo Brother to enter our lives. They remind us to look for the good in all things and to have the courage to face all of our problems head on. They help us to eliminate our burdens by directing our energies in a balanced way and to follow the easiest path and to not use force in our life, to flow with it. Do what you have to do and then let the events take their natural course.

The huge head of the Buffalo Brother signifies higher mental abilities that is grounded in Mother Earth by their tough bodies. Bison symbolize feminine courage and they teach us creativity, courage, sacred knowledge, sense of community, generosity, strength of character, hospitality, and survival strategies. Bison prize freedom and can teach us healing medicines. With their hump the Bison reminds us that we always have reservoirs that we can tap into.

Bison are known for their strength. I find it very interesting that most people who don’t know me really well see me as weak. Being an introvert and other things about me tend to make people see me as vulnerable. I have found I tend to bring out a protective instincts in a lot of people and a mothering instinct in many women. The thing is if you have any idea what it takes to be a military spouse you know that you can’t be weak and survive long. Many of the things that the bison teaches I use to get through the challenges that life offers, I always have even before I knew that the bison was one of my animals. Wayne is one of the few people I think that truly sees and knows how strong I am inside, it isn’t showy but it is there. He has told me that I am his rock and yet he is a very strong person on his own.

A Cold and Barren Place/ Winter's Details

January got an early start because I knew I would be flying back to Maryland on Jan 2nd and then Wayne would be coming back from Iraq on the 5th. With 6 weeks of mail, a husband home, and a vacation to spend time together I knew that I would have 2-3 weeks where I would have little or no time to work on my page. I got a decent start on it while I was still in Iowa and then didn't get back to it for at least a couple of weeks.

January started with 2 large stones to go with the picture of the pile of rocks. I put them in first because I wanted to know where I was putting them for the design but realized as I worked that maybe it would have been better to pencil them in and add them at the end. They are a bit heavy and made the page a bit awkward to work on.




I chose the background fabric because it looked like ice cracking on a pond to me, I chose to accentuate that by outlining the edges of the patterns with the Sulky Sliver thread that I used on December's page.

Like the previous months January has cord branches to be couched down. I like that in most of these pieces that the cord branches join the parts of the page together, they help move the eye around the piece.

I used very small star shaped sequins for my flowers and surprisingly enough Wayne was suggesting I use more of them. He liked the way they looked. Wayne is always reminding me that "More is not always Better." I used the wrap around beaded border that I had used for my July page picking up the gold/amber and blue colors of the page. Having a solidly beaded border works really well with a page that doesn't have a lot of other beads on it.