Morrisburg, Day 2 and 3

Georgia Ferrell, aka Iggy, treated us to Fanciful Fabric and Other Stuff.
Georgia encouraged us to play with liquid clay and a variety of materials including yarns, thin fabrics, ribbons, sparkles and, essentially, anything we can think of.


Wendy Orlowski made a New Year's resolution to use up some of her stash before buying anything new, and as a result, came up with a class called Resolution Steampunk. We were told to raid our tool boxes and garages and to take apart obsolete items in order to find parts appropriate to the Steampunk trend. The results were spectacular.



In addition to workshops, there were a variety of swaps. Everyone was encouraged to clean out their studios and bring unwanted items for the "Table of Junque." It looked like Filene's Basement as we elbowed each other aside to find the good stuff. We also swapped canes and beads.






The queen of miniatures, Jacey Culham, showed us how to create a picnic of miniature hamburgers, hot dogs, fries and donuts. Yum. Then there is poutine - yuck - the Canadian dish consisting of fries, cheese curds and gravy.












Last year's mystery project was so much fun that we did it again. On the first day we were each given a small square of paper with a fragment of a photo on it. Our job was to duplicate the image in clay, matching colors and size. Then on Saturday night, we each stuck our square onto a larger canvas.



Margi Laurin supervised the project.


And we produced this masterpiece.

Rite of Spring

Once again I was lucky enough to attend "Morrisburg", the clay retreat held in Morrisburg, Ontario for members of the Quebec and Ontario clay guilds. Kudos to Margi Laurin and Violette Laporte for another well-organized, well-run, and FUN event. That's Vio having fun on the right.

As usual the workroom was a hubbub of creativity.



Gaby Orbach got us started with a workshop on interesting surface techniques including a silkscreen effect that doesn't use a silkscreen. We used the results to cover wooden picture frames or to make jewelry (jewellery for Brits and Canadians).



Next Sandy Willis showed us how to have fun with flakes, although at first we weren't sure if she was referring to us or the stuff from Grummer. It turns out we colored little iridescent flakes and used them to make sparkly surfaces which could be used in many applications.

Finally, Violette Laporte showed us how to create lovely books using covers made of clay. We tore or cut paper and then bound everything together using a needle and thread in a technique called Coptic stitching.



More on Day 2 tomorrow........