A friend has the motto "Genius thrives on Clutter" I'm sure getting my share of clutter these days. I spent some time at my daughter's house again today. They are trying to pack away everything they won't need until after the move, to sort out the junk, and paint everything that isn't nailed down. Both of the children are unwell--not seriously ill but just not well. The baby is "snuffly", and just wants to be held. The three-year old is whine-y. While I can't help with the sorting and painting, I can hold the baby, and make appropriate noises to the older one.

BUT--I spent part of the day in Dianne L-J's studio. We were trying gelatine printing. Now neither of us have ever done this before, but at least she had read the instructions. I used my gelatine on the table and she kept hers in the tray. My started to deteriorate almost immediately, but I got over a dozen good prints off it. For the first time I tried thickening my paints so as to have better control while I worked--and it was a good idea. Since we were working at her place we had access to a variety of leaves. Not only did they make a good mask, but I also tried to print with a leaf that had paint onthe surface. Very nice effect! She even let me bring a few home. I will press them and use them in the future. Once all of my pieces are dry, and I've had a chance to heat set them, I'll try to take pictures and put them up here on the blog. I think that my best option will be to use the individual prints as part of a collage. I did 3-4 in each of four colourways, so should have lots of material to develop a collage around. I want to take the process a little further and make more surface modifications to the fabric. I've already antiqued a few of them with walnut ink, but stamping and over-dyeing would lend themselves to this as well. Maybe I can take pictures along the way, and put them up. Now putting up pictures is my nemesis, but we'll give it a try.