Friday Egg: Summer Sunset Persian Flowers

Happy Friday, everyone! Hot summer day colors to me are reds, oranges and yellows. Today is an especially hot summer day here in Texas (104 degrees Fahrenheit!) and in honor of that, I offer a basket of flowers in summer sunset colors inspired by the colors and stylized shapes of Persian carpet florals. I started with a goose egg dyed with Goldenrod, waxed the outlines and then washed the dye off with Ivory dish soap. I then dyed the egg with Asparagus: a quick dip makes a light green with a gray cast that complements the flower colors. The flowers are made of Carrot, Scarlet and Dark Red dyes.

I will be migrating my blog over the next few months, so please make a note of the new name and address: http://katydavidart.blogspot.com/ 

Thanks! And Happy Friday!

Friday Egg: Simple Design, Muted Colors

A simple egg for Friday Egg this week. I started with a brown chicken egg, waxed and then etched with vinegar to the cream colored background. Then it sat in my box of eggs in progress for a couple of years while I worked on other things and then the day came when it landed in my hand and I finished it! I dipped it in Dark Red very briefly for a lighter and more muted raspberry color, then in Patina. I'm in love with that color right now and want to paint my front door with it! I like how this little egg turned out, with the muted New Mexican colors looking a little sun-baked piece of pottery.

Happy Friday!

Friday Egg: Granny Square Circles

Hi, my name is Katy and I am addicted to this pattern! I don't know what it is about this basic pattern, but I keep coming back to it to rework it with different details and colors. This one reminds me of colorful crocheted medallions or granny squares like this:

Image from of A Common Thread

I like that the lines are not perfect and the circles are wobbly. It helps the egg look more like a textile or crochet and less like colorful gears. What do you think?

Happy Friday!

Friday Egg: June Wedding

Friday Egg today is called "June Wedding" and it is my second attempt at this lace design. My first attempt was not successful. I may post that next week so I can show you yet another example of over-etching. Sometimes I can achieve a really interesting effect with a little bit of over-etching, but this one did not turn out as desired. When that happens, I usually try to put the egg away for a few months until I forget what it was supposed to look like and then I can see it for what it really is. Does anyone else do that?

This is an etched goose egg in the simple white of the shell with a robin's-egg blue background, achieved with a very quick dip in Patina dye. I really love how this turned out, delicate but with a nice color contrast. I worried a lot about that correct intensity. Too bright and it would not have the effect I wanted of an elegant lace overlay. I think the color achieves this perfectly. 

Happy Friday. 

Friday Egg: Prickly Pear Cactus

Happy Friday! I've been working on a series that I will talk about at another time, but out of it has come a design that I am really happy with and will be pursuing further in the future I'm sure. This is a fun design to look at and a fun design to create, with all the bubbly cactus ears and spines traveling up the egg. The greens are different values of Key Lime and the pink of the cactus flowers is Rhodamine.

I was so tired last night that I forgot that the egg was still in dye, so the usually tiny imperfections where I didn't cover evenly and perfectly with wax are magnified after an overnight in the dye. Pysanky dyes are made with vinegar, which eats at the eggshell and gives it some "tooth" into which the dye particles can settle. The long bath in vinegar last night means that the egg was etched a lot more than normal. After too long of an etch, the vinegar begins to undercut the areas that are dyed. You can see that in some of the color change areas in the cactus ears, where the black dots are eating into the white lines. Not the end of the world with this sort of free-form and cartoonish design, but an interesting example of over-etching.

Have a great weekend!