Elise Miller, Fiber Art

The Duvet is Finished

All about comfort here. I hate duvet's that are made with super heavy fabric that weigh down the down comforter. I used a king sheet set that was a sweet score at Ross. The fabric was blue on one side, tan on the other and the top of the sheet had a nice pattern. I cut 12" off the top of the sheet to use a a "buttonhole bar", cut the rest of the fabric in strips and used a dark brown fabric for the edge trim. The buttons were from my "stash". (Why buy buttons if you have a box of really cool ones?) And yes I did make the headboard quite a while ago. When we remodeled the bedroom./bathroom I decided to recover it and the one thing that is just awesome is the pocket for the remote.

Also...if you haven't voted for what scarf I'm wearing to the Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival, you only have 5 DAYS left!!! Come on and humor me!!! I'm hoping besides the contest to have some other special news that weekend!!!

Facebook Fans Contest!!!

Hi everyone. The Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival is on Saturday/Sunday May 1st and 2nd. I will be shamelessly promoting Truly Unique by Elise by wearing one of my new nunofelt designs and handing out cards with my blog link in the hopes to increase my fan base. (Obviously I hate marketing and will only do this if approached).

So...I want to have some fun with my Facebook Fans and let them guess which scarf I will be wearing for this shameless promotion.

What's in it for you? I'm giving away a 3 pack of my wonderful felted soaps. It's shorts and cami season and what better soap for doing a little bit of exfoliation, and has all natural ingredients that don't dry out your skin. There’s nothing worse than an ashy haze on fresh shaved legs. Tell your friends to become fans and vote also. Who know's? If they win maybe they'll share the prize with you !!

So post your vote to the Fan Page Thread. I’m going to post this to Facebook Monday April 19th and the contest ends midnight on April 30th, 2010. Names of Fans that correctly pick the scarf will all be put in a hat and a name will be drawn. Good luck and thanks in advance for helping me increase my fan base!!!

Here's a peek at what I'm thinking about for my 2010 laminated line of scarves. (Click on picture to see all scarves)

1 Black Circles
2 Salmon Ruffle
3 Mardi Gras
4 Tranquil Waters
5 Denim Cowgirl

Just Playin'

and making a few felt flowers because I feel like it :)

My 2010 Men's Collection is taking shape!!!

Team inspired and bright colors for fun is the theme for my Fall 2010 Men's line of hats.

Hats can be found at http://www.1000markets.com/users/trulyuniquebyelise

The fingers behind most of these hats...My mom Dottie...84 years old, and clicking those sticks every day. I joke and say that I have a "senior sweat shop" , but Dottie does do most of the production knitting of all my lines. She's finishing up the ruffle edge candle holders and I've re-designed the vessel with a new top finish.

and finally my reluctant hat models...gotta love um :).....

Color Correction

I'm one to waste not want not, especially when it comes to fiber. Sometimes a dye bath or paint job goes bad. One thing is that you can turn anything brown and that works for men's wear so that's the worst that can happen to an overdye job. It's perfectly ok with me because I prefer to use different shades of browns and blacks when I'm doing multiple yarn knitting projects. So here I am...fessing up on how I corrected some ugly colors....

Here are the uglies.
I overdyed the greenish yarn olive...

The pink/orange got a bath of royal blue

The blue/brown hat got a wash of golden ochre, then a rinse in chartreause

The brown hat had some white specks that I didn't like, so I colorwashed the hat in a bath of burnt orange.

The Results

The olive wash came out perfect...

The royal wash solved some of the problems but I feel I should have purple washed it because I don't like the blue. May purple wash it later..turn the blues purple and the greens brown...that would be better

Fun with this hat!!!...I love the outcome!!!

Finally the burnt orange just added that little halo of color to the hat and took care of the white spots.

Playing with new ideas in my head....

And POWER....yea....the cordless sander for starting the felting process is awesome....I'm carding some merino with silk, angelina, angora, mohair....whatever will give me the texture I want...these are still a bit larger than I wanted them to end up so a bit smaller on the next batch of them.

Man head needs a paint job....

Finally got the man head for displaying my men's hats. Good old styrofoam...lightweight to carry to a show but seriously...can they do better with the colors....so...he's in the paint shop now...debut soon....

The Wall Art is FINALLY Done!!!!

Yea!!!...I'm pretty pleased with the results for my 1st attempt at acrylic with glazes. Now...back to fiber art and oh...yea....that duvet cover I want to make.

Sneak Peak of New Felted Vessels

Ok..the wait is over on my texture teaser from January. I've finally got a few of my new felted vessels finished and more are coming in different color stories. Yankee Candle cozies, perfect for the large jars and funky spiked desk pencil holders. Or you can use them to hold and hide anything.