Butterflies in March

As spring approaches, the beautiful butterflies will soon start migrating back to our area. What better way to welcome their arrival than making lovely butterflies to adorn our clothing and art projects? This is Harlene's speciality, and she graciously offered to show us her techniques for making them from fabric and paper for this month's enrichment session. Thank you, Harlene!

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Calendar

April 9 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together 11:00 to 1:30, Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M. Enrichment by Sally featuring watercolor painting. The "Women's Work" challenge item will be due. Make something from items found around the house and include the colors red, yellow, blue, green and black in celebration of the recent Olympics.

May 14 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together 11:00 to 1:30, Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M. If you are participating in the "Bag Challenge," bring a paper bag with 6 items in it. See the March minutes for details.

  Show and Tell 

This is one of the paper butterflies Harlene brought to the meeting. Her printed directions and demonstration make it a possibility for all.

Sally's acrylic, watercolor, ink and collage paintings like the ones above and below, continue to evolve to an ever-higher level. What an eye for composition. 

This is close-up of one of the two "Little Star scent blankets" Donna made to donate to Stone Mountain and Daughter's community outreach program. 

Above is a photo of the most generous and lovely quilt Suzanne's cousin recently made and sent to her. Lucky Suzanne—what an amazing gift. 

Suzanne also recently received this lovely birthday card from our former member, Kelly, who now resides in Washington state.

Kathy brought this very large quilt she is making for a family member. The pattern is somewhat similar to Suzanne's. Another labor of love.  

We were all thrilled to see Betts at the meeting and she brought so many beautiful things she has made in the past few years.

Each item, like the journal above, incorporates some of the many antique items she has collected in her world travels, including the vintage book. 

This shadowbox piece features some of her French antique silver flatware. 

An avid collector of buttons and charms, Betts cleverly chose a coin holder to display the charms shown above.  

Betts recently participated in a "Moth 
Challenge" with some of her artist friends and shown above is the Luna Moth she created and displayed in an exquisite antique frame.

Her keen eye for beauty also resulted in this beautiful fabric book cover. 

Bonnie is also an avid collector of buttons and decided to display some of her favorite antique ones on this fabric strip. 

Marcella was thrilled to receive a birthday card from Kelly. A clever composition of fabric, flowers and buttons. 

Together Again in February 2022 with Hearts and Flowers

 In celebration of Valentine's Day, Caroline led us in a fun enrichment session using heart-shaped fabric cut-outs. She supplied each of us with 4 hearts and led us in gathering them down the center to create two petals each and sewing the 4 pieces together to create a flower. She also supplied buttons to sew in the center. 

Sue gave us a double treat by bringing her paper cutouts and showing us how to weave them together to make paper hearts. They can be woven to make a paper envelope and she gave us each one that was filled with chocolate kisses.

Both Caroline and Sue deserve a big "Thank You" for their demonstrations and generosity.   

Calendar

March 12 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together 11:00 to 1:30, Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M. It's St. Patrick's Day! Let's all wear green to celebrate. Enrichment by Harlene featuring making 3D butterflies.

April 12 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together 11:00 to 1:30, Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M. Enrichment by Sally featuring watercolor painting. The "Women's Work" challenge item will be due. Make something from items found around the house and include the colors red, yellow, blue, green and black in celebration of the recent Olympics. 

  Show and Tell 

Geri brought this cute little bear to share with us. His name is "Smudge." She also shared the adorable little paper dolls she often uses on her beautiful cards.

(see below)

 

This is the beautiful 3D butterfly pin Harlene made to give Marcella as a birthday present. Looking forward to Harlene's butterfly enrichment session in March.

 Donna recently finished her padded heart project and will be giving these to family and friends on Valentine's Day. They are the last of around 20 or so she made. They have pin backs and also a tiny ring on the back for hanging.

 Harlene is the "Queen of Vests" as well as the "Queen of Butterflies." She has now made over 70 vests and every single one is as stunning as this one.

 Suzanne, our favorite Oakland Zoo docent, created these beautiful animal-themed greeting cards for a February card exchange. Great composition and design.

 This is one of the many fabric journals Sharon has made over the years. They have been all sizes, each unique, and filled with beautiful cloth, paper, vintage trims and ephemera. They are true labors of love and take untold hours to complete. She has successfully sold many at craft shows over the years. This one was a present to Donna at Christmas. 

 

 Colleen has been so inspired by Anne's ceramic, tin and found objects dolls that she wanted to make some of her own. So, in homage to Anne, here are five photos of just a few of Colleen's recent creations. 

 

 Caroline and Jennifer are constantly coming up with new and unique projects that they find online and in magazines. A recent project involved making cloth bird pin cushions and attaching them to stuffed tins. It is a Virginia Roberts pattern, "Spam Can Birds."   Very cute!

 Kathy has diligently been working on completing this Queen size ombre green quilt to give to a family member. A big project, indeed!

 She also shared these articulated unicorn/bear dolls she made for Christmas gifts. Grandchildren would surely love them.

 These tiny—1" tiny to be exact—patchwork squares were sewn by Marcella. The squares and the extremely small hand stitching are truly amazing!

 Rosie and Anne were recently having fun playing with alcohol inks. This is just one of the numerous beautiful results. 

 Sally never stops impressing us with the colorful journals she creates using bits and pieces of her paintings, along with other collage materials. She is a master of composition and color balance. Each page is definitely a work of art.

 This is the cover of one of Sally's journals. Her painting demonstration in April is something we look forward to.

Sue created this lovely face made entirely with clay. The thin clay around the face really looks like fabric, even up close. She's lovely!

The Bright Side of a Return to Zoom

 

After traditionally not scheduling a club meeting during December, we were looking forward to meeting in person in January of 2022. However, due to the cold weather and a surge of the Covid virus in our communities at large, we decided to take precautions and schedule a virtual meeting instead. While Zoom is far less enjoyable than a group meeting where we can visit with and inspire each other in person, it is still possible to photograph the wonderful art we bring to share with each other. A highlight of the meeting was the show and tell of the New Year's greeting cards we had made and exchanged. On the bright side, we have managed to gather enough photos to not only show most of those cards, but also some of the items recently created by both current local Bay Area and out-of-town members, and former members we still keep in contact with. Above is a beautiful alcohol ink flower painting from our dear member, Rosie, in La Quinta. 

Calendar

February 12 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together starts at 11:00A.M. Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M.

March 12 (Saturday) at Marcella's. Drop-in Social Get-together 11:00 to 1:30, Business Meeting at 1:30 P.M. Enrichment by Harlene.

New Year's Card Exchange

Created by Bonnie and sent to Caroline. Another lovely collage of signature buttons and shapes beautifully brought together in harmony. 

Created by member Elise (Washington State) and sent to Harlene. A very lovely and extravagantly embellished paper collage.

Created by Geri and sent to Bonnie

An inside view of Bonnie's card reveals the complexity of multiple layers, a pocket, and many beautiful die-cut embellishments.

Created by Harlene and sent to Rosie, it's much more than just a card...

Harlene actually made a multi-page calendar book with pages for each month of the coming year. It included personal messages, notations of birthdays and anniversaries, and a huge number of collaged embellishments. 

Made by Marcella and sent to Elise. A magic mixture of paper and fabric. Love that rabbit!

Made by Donna and sent to Sally. Manipulated acrylic in background with 3D paint and birds.

Made by Rosie and sent to Jennifer. Created with a combination of alcohol ink, a stamp, embossing ink and gold foil. 

Made by Sue and sent to Donna. Includes a photo (lifted from FaceBook LOL), great embellishments, and a beautiful skirt made from a vintage handkerchief. 

Made by Suzanne and sent to Sue. While Suzanne's love and preference is quilting, she always comes up with creative and beautifully crafted cards. 

Show and Tell

A recent fabric collage by Barbara, beautiful as always, and perfectly crafted from lovely French trims.

Laurie, our former Phoebe President now residing in snowy Portola, has been hunkered down and spending her time making paper houses with her new Tim Holtz die set. 

Her ingenuity led her to create these wonderful Christmas gifts.

A watercolor painted card sent from Donna to Rosie with Christmas wishes.

Donna's local watercolor group had a January challenge to study Georgia O'Keeffe's life and painting style and paint a couple of examples. 

These are the two she painted for the challenge.

Here is a second beautiful alcohol painting by Rosie. She has definitely mastered her technique of manipulating the ink with a soda straw.

Sue recently finished her amazing "Coming Home from the Craft Store" original doll. We can all relate to this!

Rosie recently heard from former Phoebe (our dear Zanaib's close friend) Sherrye (in Wisconsin), who has recently painted this lovely picture of birds and flowers on a slate roofing tile. 

 Rosie also received this photo from former member Von Zetta (Los Banos) showing some of the beautiful quilts she has made and exhibited. We miss all of the dear members who have moved away, but we hope they will continue to stay in touch and share their creations with us. A big thank you goes out to Rosie for encouraging them to do so, and for sharing the photos. 

  I don't know how any of us would have survived these past several years of Covid restrictions without each other—our arts, crafts, and our Zoom meetings. We have become a close family, with many still connected after all these 30-plus years. Thank you to one and all for your unwavering support, encouragement, and friendship. Wishing all of us a healthy, happy 2022, with the return once more of Joyful memory-making moments.