Rainbows and Doodles

Subtitle: Problem Piece

I picked up a rainbow of veggies from a small farmer's market while I was out visiting...and doing a few errands.

I've never bought purple cauliflower before...but it's what they had. I just read it has the same pigment found in red cabbage. As long as it's not dye...I'm good with it.

Is there anything cuter than a tiny radish? I still make my pickled vegetables at least once a week. It's interesting that the radish skins turn white in the vinegar/water brine....but recently I've been adding beets...so everything turns purply/red.

I'm anxious to see the color of the already purple cauliflower from the beet juice. 

Speaking of rainbows.....I shared a fabric piece that I've been practice doodling on with free motion stitch a few days ago.

Since then I've been playing around with some of my supplies to see what works best for coloring in the stitched shapes.

I tried watercolor...both pan and liquid, posca pens, colored pencil, regular sharpies, and some new sharpie paint pens I got from Becky. I labeled all the sections.

The clear winner this time was watered down watercolor ink using a glass dip pen gifted to me from Brenda. 

The tip has ridges that hold the liquid paint well....and the tiny tip could get into all the nooks and crannies.

 

I was able to paint these little purple loops...and vary the color based on how watered down the ink was. 

The stitching acted as a barrier...so it was really easy to paint with the rigid dip pen pushing the paint into the fabric. A brush worked...but harder to work with on fabric.

I'm not sure how colorfast watercolor on fabric will be...but I'm not making archival art. Posca pens and the sharpie paint pens worked well too...but the pigment is very dense. And some of my pen tips were too big for tiny spaces. 

I liked the way these little leaves turned out....which led me to another project. Turns out....fabric matters. 

My practice piece was on unbleached muslin. 

And the new project was on a cotton quilting fabric with just a hint of writing on it. The watercolor bled right through the stitching lines...but I just kept going. I'm not sure why it bled on this fabric and not the other...and I'm not sure why I kept going.

I added some watercolor splashes to try and distract the eye...and it just looked messy...and way worse. I tried several more things....and it would have been faster and easier just to start over.  But I was....and am determined to find a solution for this little problem piece. If I'm successful...I'll report back in....but I may to set it aside for a few days. I will certainly test fabric before I do anything like this again with watercolor.