A Work in Progress

This picture is a work in progress. I'll post the finished piece after I've finished it but I thought you might like to see what a picture in the making looks like.

Dulcimer Picture

This picture is made of: forget-me-not, tendrils, brown hydrangea leaf, money plant and heuchera.

My First Appliance

The other day one of our good family friends asked if we knew anyone who could use a microwave. It turned out we did know someone who could use a microwave...me. I often press big batches of plant material in a microwave press. But I can't press in one long session because I know from experience that if I press in too long of a session and let the plate get too hot the microwave catches on fire and then you have to buy I new one (oops). I don't want to do that again so I press a few mushrooms and then come back later and then press a few more when I'd often rather be able to do more in a session. I thought about how nice it would be to have two microwaves so that when one got hot I could let it cool while I press with the other and just go back and forth. Well now I have access to the family microwave and one of my very own! God provides!

Little Blue Lady

This picture is made of: delphinium, corn husk, bark, onion roots, Queen Anne's lace, aucuba, corn silk, cantaloupe, alyssum and spiraea.

Learning How to Make Shirts

We're starting to figure out how to use the heat press. Above are some of the shirts and the tote bag we've made. We're still working on centering the transfers and we've put pictures on upside down, crooked, had them come out dark and had them not completely adhere but it's a learning process.

I'll tell you one funny thing we did just after getting the press. We printed the image we wanted to transfer at 200 DPI like we'd been told, placed it on the shirt with the little protective sheet over it and pressed it with the heat. We counted to 20 and nothing happened. The transfer was not sticking at all. After a few attempts we realized that instead of printing the image on to the transfer paper we had printed it onto the protective cardboard packaging. It works better when the image is printed on the transfer paper.