Leaf Prints

There are a couple of small pieces on my worktable that I feel call for leaf prints, so today was the day.  The tree the leaves came from is very high, and my poor husband had to use a very long extension handle to knock the leaves off, but we got some very nice one, and the right size too!  We also discovered that the tree is infested with aphids, but that's another story.  

Since my current interest is in colouring and using older cotton Damask table linens, I used a large napkin that had been very gently treated in its past life, and was in pretty good shape.  I still stabilized it a bit with spray starch on the reverse side.

I'm very pleased with the result. My work space is fairly simple, a piece of glass to use as a palette, a bucket of water, two brayers, textile paint and textile medium, paper towel, and, of course, a bunch of leaves.  The fabric is stretched over a single layer of batting.  I put the leaf in the paint, wrong side down, cover it with a paper towel, and firmly press or roll ( using a clean brayer over the paper towel)to make sure all of the back is covered with paint.  Then, carefully lift the leaf off, position it on the fabric, cover with paper towel, and press again, ( using a clean brayer).  You'll notice that the fabric is marked to help position the various leaves. After they dry, and are heat set, I plan to stabilize the fabric with a light weight stabilizer and cut them apart with pinking shears.  They can then be raw edge appliqued over a pieced background.

I plan to link this with The Needle and Thread Network.