I used fabric fixative mixed with regular acrylic paints for my color palette. There is not a product in the world that smells worse than fabric fixative!
I didnt want to go overboard with my distressing so I used a simple set of colors. I toned down a brown with yellow and created a dusty blue for a highlight color. I tried the silver and liked it, but was afraid it was too much and decided this was a good time to edit.
As always, I tried a sample first. I'm so glad I did. I wasn't nearly aggressive enough with the moisture of my sponge and my first attempt was way to heavy and didn't create the finish I was looking for.
I worked with my fabric over parchment paper to keep the mess down as much as possible (it is really messy!). I then used a lightly tinted water on the sponge to make the fabric very wet. I then tapped in some thicker paint with the very wet sponge creating a new color fabric with some spots of heavier color. I added a tiny bit of the blue and a few spots of a reddish brown and called it done before I got out hand and ended up over prepping.
Because it was so wet, I was worried that if I hung it to dry, it would run and the dark spots would turn into dark lines. I took a blow dryer to it on low heat and dried it enough that is was what I would consider damp. I hung it up and left it for an hour. The fabric fixative requires heat setting to make it permanent. Typically I use parchment paper between my iron and fabrics when the fabrics have some sort of treatment in an effort to protect my iron. For some reason, I forgot the parchment paper and learned that direct heat from the iron, changes the color of the paint. Fortunately, in this case, it diminished the brown and popped the yellow. While I would have rather it not happened, it didn't really hurt anything either. Lesson learned - don't forget that parchment!
I basted in vertical lines at the center, right, and left of where I wanted the bat to fall into the fabric. I could have put in the horizontal lines as well, but felt like I didn't need them for this particular project. I was going to cut it down to fit into my scroll frame and realized my frame is about 2 inches too short. I'm going to have to use my large scroll, hand tension, or hoop. The large scroll frame is really out of the question. I would like this project to be portable and that frame is certainly not portable. I don't think I would be able to keep the tension the way I want with hand tension which leaves the hoop. I'm not too thrilled. The pattern is bigger than the hoop and I don't like moving hoops. Guess I just cant have it all so I will have to do the best I can. Since I need the extra inches for the hoop to grab, I only cut it down enough to remove the already frayed edges. I then used a double overlock stitch around the edges to prevent fraying while I'm working on it.
FINALLY, time to transfer the pattern to the fabric. I have a clear plexiglass sheet built into my desk (thanks IKEA, love it!) which made it really easy to lay out the pattern and fabric. My light was bright enough that it shined right though the typing paper and I did not have to retrace the pattern on a thinner paper (yay).
She's finally ready to start stitching, though I can't lie, I'm a bit nervous now. I know what I think it is going to do, but I'm prepared for unexpected surprises anyway!
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