Preparing for the Ruth McDowell Class

Well, I am only two weeks away from going to Massachusetts to spend 5 days with Ruth McDowell taking her Designing from Nature class. This is a class I have wanted to take for awhile but not enough to fly to California! She now offers it several times a year near her home in west central Massachusetts. From my previous post, you can see there was some prep work. Today I took it a couple of steps further.

Some time ago I did this piece during a class with Nancy Murty. We used her technique of appliqueing and creating the designs. This was a design from two different photos that I took of Birds of Paradise. I always like most of the composition but always wanted to do it using Ruth McDowell techniques. So today I took my original drawing, cropped it down so the composition was better and started setting it up for piecing rather than applique. The original is about 25 x 36 and I would like it quite a bit bigger as well. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be! I haven't done all the numbering and lettering yet but that is pretty rote after organizing of the image.

I also managed to trace several others which are candidates for the class as well. Two are of pelicans, one of a Great Blue heron and a couple of flower ones.

This is the tracing I did where I have marked off large areas. My theory is that I will print this on 8 1/2 x 11 " paper and then get it blown up at Staples where they can go up to 36" wide and as long as you need with their architectural copier. Hope this works.

I really was interrupting a class that Priscilla Kibbee was teaching on jackets. There was enough room so that I could go and enjoy the company. Another fellow RAFAian joined us as well -- another refugee from the last jacket class. She has hers all finished! This is Caris Burton with the jacket she is making out of silk -- some that she purchased from Elin Noble this summer. It is stunning and Caris looks fantastic in it.

This is Caris from the front. Doesn't she look like a model?
This was the back of Nancy Hick's jacket that she made in the last class.


This was Mrs. Whitetail who was grazing in the side pasture while we were working away inside the studio. Can you imagine an more awesome place to work? She hightailed it out of there with her fawn when I went to take the picture so it is a little fuzzy! I had seen her and her two offsprings a couple of weeks ago right before I reached Marcia's house.

This is the early part of Liz's jacket. She added green around the top and down the sides and it is just beautiful! She had it almost done by the time we left. Can't wait to see it finished. Priscilla's graduates should be able to do their own fashion show!


This was a new face for the group - Varda who is modelling her new jacket. She had decided to do some fancy fabric work to embellish the red background.




Priscilla was cracking the whip on our own Donna and she was almost done with her jacket as well. She is also using fabric purchased from Elin Noble at QBL.
This is Marcia with her new apron that she made for the Clothesline Art Show. This was hands down the fastest I have ever seen Marcia complete a garment -- Priscilla's firm stand probably has affected us all! Marcia used the techniques we learned in Priscilla's jacket classes for put the apron together!