Dream Coming True: Tokyo!

Part of an applique design that appeared in my book 100 applique motifs.

For years and years i've been wanting to travel to Japan. I have said many times to my husband, who is a musician, that if he ever had to go to Tokyo, i would go with him! He then just smiled and said yes dear. Since there was no indication that a trip like that was on the horizon.
Until a little while back. He started working with a Japanese producer, got released on a compilation EP, asked to do some more work, and now invited to come over to perform! Whoohoo! I knew it would happen some day!!
My dream is coming true, we are flying to Japan at the end of this month!
Since it's been my dream for so long, i already know about a lot of places that i want to visit, a lot of shops i want to go to, i even already know what trains to take! I'll be arriving prepared!

The flight from NY to Tokyo will be a whopping 14,5 hours so i'm definitely bringing something to craft on to pass the time. What is a better inflight craft? Crochet or embroidery? (can you even bring embroidery needles on a plane nowadays?) Any suggestions?

Valentine's for Charity

Looking for a perfect Valentine's card to send to your Love? Keep an eye out on the Fred Flare website. They will be selling handmade cards for charity! All cards will be sold both online and in their Brooklyn store.

Above is my entry for Valentine's for Charity. Sweet squirrel illustrations i made, transferred them into felt appliques, did a bit of embroidery and placed them on the card (which is a lovely blue on the back). Take a sneak preview at some more of the cards that will be in the 'collection' in the special Flickr Pool.

My card on the Fred Flare blog. Hope that means they liked it!

Bookstore and Winner

Made a quick visit to Barnes & Noble today to pick up a christmas gift for my love. Wondered off to the crafts section and spotted my book on the shelves! It was a funny feeling seeing my work displayed. There were only 2 copies, did they stock only a few or did they flew off the shelves?

Speaking of my book, the giveaway has ended and a random number generator picked a winner! Comment number 19 is the lucky one: Catherine! I will send you an email to get your mailing address.

Those who didn't win, you can ofcourse get your copy at your local bookstore, or order it from my site and get a signed copy!

Craftershock Review

No matter how happy i am with my own work, i think reviews are a scary thing. What if the people doing the review don't like what you did? When you sit down and read it and it says they hated it? Luckily this didn't happen. There's a review of my book on the Craftershock blog! Visit the site to read what they have to say (good things!) and to check out some preview pages!

Bookrelease 100 applique motifs

I was thinking of doing some sort of virtual book release party here on my blog, but i wasn't really sure how to go about it and what to do and what not, so forget about it. It's here. It's out. My first book. In print. On the bookshelves. I'm doing a happy dance. I haven't stopped by the bookstore yet to spot my book, but i will do soon!

So what about a giveaway? Sounds good? Want to get a free signed copy of 100 applique motifs?

I'm not gonna make this hard for you. Leave a comment here to enter. If your write a little something on your blog (or myspace or what have you) about this giveaway or about the book and then leave a comment here, you'll get an extra entry in the drawing! Entries will close at Tuesday December 16th at midnight. Winner will be randomly picked and announced next week Wednesday! I'm sorry to say, but for now this giveaway is only for US addresses. (i promise, next giveaway will be international again)

My crafts in print!

I think yesterday was the best mail day ever! Ever. In my life. My publisher sent me the first advance copies of my craft book! "100 Applique motifs. Cute, creative ways to enjoy applique". It was such a long journey and seeing all that hard work all finished in print is so rewarding i don't even know how to express it.

There are different covers for different parts of the world. I'm still waiting to see one cover in person, but i bet i will love it as much as these two. I posted the first cover on my blog before and now i can reveal another one. I like them both, but i think this second one is a little bit more 'me'. Or maybe that's because it's new to me too. I'm not sure and it doesn't matter, since i adore them both the same. It was tough to design all projects but not designing the covers myself.

(from the back of the book:) 100 Applique Motifs
All the instructions, tips and super-cute patterns needed to create hundreds of projects.
Crammed with scores of easily transferable designs, 100 Applique Motifs allows you to customize everything from T-shirts and skirts to bed linens and bags, hats, neckties - even quilts!

From cute creatures to funky fruits, funny florals, adorable critters, retro motifs and "cutting edge" modern designs, you will find endless mix-and-match possibilities in 100 Applique Motifs, in addition to a full-range of stand-alone designs. Each applique motif is shown in full color, color wave (fabric selection), method of construction (including embellishment) and black-and-white illustration. Bonus gallery sections provide ways to mix and match the applique, in addition to extra project ideas, Additional sections include: tools and materials, tips and techniques, a design and pattern directory and an index.
No prior experience with applique required!

I hope that people will enjoy my book and all the projects and templates inside as much as i enjoyed putting it all together. If you want to pre-order your own signed copy, you can do that in my shop of course!

Here it is: My Book Cover!

Here's for the big unveiling, my first book cover! Don't even know what to say. It's here. All the work is done. Everything is off to the printer. Now it's waiting to get the first copy. I feel overwhelmed. All the work i've done is there. 100 Applique Motifs, cute creative ways to enjoy applique. To be honest, there are even more then 100 motifs in the book, there are actually 103 plus mix and match examples and projects. If you don't know how to do applique, not to worry, i have explained a number of ways to do them.

The cover was a big surprise to me too. I had all the freedom to design all the motifs inside the book, but the cover was designed at the publishing house. It is growing on me.

This is what amazon says about the book:
"Editorial Reviews - Product Description: Crammed with scores of easily transferable designs, this book will teach crafters how to customize everything from T-shirts, skirts, and bed linen, to bags, hats and neckties – even quilts!
From cute creatures to funky fruits and florals, and from retro motifs to “cutting edge” modern designs, you will find endless mix-and-match possibilities in 100 Applique Motifs, as well as a full-range of stand-alone designs. Each applique motif is shown in full color, color wave (fabric selection), method of construction (including embellishment), as well as the black-and-white illustration. Wonderful side-bars provide ways to mix and match the applique, as well as project ideas. Includes sections on tools and materials, tips and techniques, design and pattern directory, project ideas, and resources, as well as an index.

About the Author: Born in Amsterdam, Deborah "Ismoyo" Green traveled around the globe before settling down in New York in 2007. Known for her broad range of creative skills, she prefers spending time with her sewing machine, transforming her illustrations into beautiful applique patches. Encouraged by the readers of her website, she decided to gather her cute and contemporary designs into book form for the first time. She resides in New York City."

Oooh, they mentioned the readers of my website! Yes, that's you! You are on Amazon too! ;)

Figuring out what name to put on my book as my author's name was quite a story. After some consideration decided upon Deborah "Ismoyo" Green. Deborah is the name i got at birth, Green is the name my Love gave me when he married me, and Ismoyo, of course, is the name i go by now, my personal rediscovered creative name.

The book is available for pre-order on most (online) bookstores already, but if you want to get a signed copy, wait for my shop to open (next week?) and put your pre-order in with me plus let me know who to sign it for! I'll do free shipping within the US for all pre-ordered books.
It will be out in the UK on October 31st, in the US and Canada on December 9th!

Mini art with appliques

New pieces of mini fabric art i made.

These are two nature/environmental conscious pieces. Want expand on this idea a bit more, making notes in my idea journal as we speak. Both images are part of an illustration i did a while ago "I think Green". Transferred them onto white felt and turned them into appliques.

I also did two pieces with big eyed girl illustrations i made. I don't think i have showed those here before, they are from a series i did. Oh, a pink version of the girl on the left was featured here, on sort of cherry notepaper like illustration.

Fabric mini art

I'm working on a bunch of these fabric mini art pieces. The base are 3"x3" canvasses with fabric wrapped neatly around them. I sewed on the appliques that i made from my own illustrations transferred to white wool felt.

The yellow deers i did for a pattern of which i wanted to have fabric printed from. (Maybe a great idea to go and try my Spoonflower account)

These deers come from the illustration i did some time ago for a birth announcement card for a friend of mine. I think used as appliques here they would make a sweet babyshower gift. Yes, did give my friend the first edition of these mini arts to put in her little girl's room.

Happyness

My work in progress is making me happy today.
Prepping ismoyo illustrations to be transformed into felt appliques.

Sneak Preview Book

When you think you're done, there is always some more unexpected work still to be done.
A couple of additional projects were needed to fill the pages of my upcoming book, so i found myself thinking of new things to add again. Here is a sneak preview of what i'm doing. (another one here)
I so hope it gets the needed approval. Planned release date is still fall of this year as far as i can see now.
Yesterday i received the first draft layouts for the project pages and it's making me really excited. It's starting to look like an actual book!

Special Day Preview

Today is a special day.
The first batch of projects for my book have been picked up by the courier to be sent to the publisher for photography!

And see, the tiny butterflies flew into one of the projects!
Little sneak preview for my loyal readers here.

Guitar appliques

When Love came back from his European tour a couple of weeks ago, he brought home a couple of new patches from the cities he had visited. I had sewn on a few on his guitarbag before, which was already not a joy to do. But these, further down the bag were horrible to do. Especially since my current craft space doesn't involve a lot of actual space. And you need to turn the bag totally around while sewing, meaning the whole thing has to go through the open area of the machine. How? Well i don't know either. With a lot of energy, persistence and a bit of cursing along the way.
But my Loves excitement and happy smiles made it all worth it in the end.

Secret Sneak Preview

A lot of my creative time lately has been going to a project i can't actually say anything about yet.
I would really love to show what i did so far but i must leave it at this secret sneak preview picture for now.
What will actually come out of my work for this project isn't sure either. So pray for me will you? Thank you.
As soon as i can disclose i will update on this!
Don't you love secrets?

Fabric collage wall art

This project was a work in progress for a long reason. No particular reason, you know, sometimes you just have a project that's just there all the time waiting to be finished but never really gets the priority to finish up. Finally i have. I think the girl turned out cute. Since one project leads to another, i'm thinking of doing some more smaller pieces with only cute girls. With this project i didn't have a set idea of how i wanted it to end up when i started. I've put some fabric on a framed canvas and opened my fabric scrap box and let the fabric pieces lead the way. Next time i will draw a sketch first and start cutting and sewing next.

Would be nice as nursery art, but if your anything like me, always a kid at heart, you don't need a nursery to put it up on the wall! hehe

cute as a button pouches

I thought i had already posted about these. Just realized i hadn't yet.

Each pouch has cute inside lining and it's own matching button. Either on the pouch or attached to the zipper as a cute zipperpull.

Blank cards + Fabric

Blank cards + Fabric and a little bit of embroidery = Animal fabric collage postcards

mini art

mini fabric collage, felt chick with tiny embroidered eye and feet on small canvas frame (4x4" / 10x10 cm).




I have one more of these small canvasses. I'll surely be on the lookout for more. I think they're sweet and i have more ideas for them!

Potential progress

When i close my eyes i see the potential. I see how i want this work in progress to end up.
Making a white and brown vinyl bag. I did all i had to do, drew up the pattern, cut all the pieces out, did all the preparations. And now i feel stuck. Maybe because when i close my eyes i see a gorgeous bag and with my eyes open I'm not totally sure how to do it...
The thought that i might mess it up and all the prep work was for nothing scares me a little bit. Oh i wish i had it finished already.
Got to do what i got to do, take a deep breath and do the best i can. Hopefully it will work out and i'll be able to show the new bag soon!

Quilting the fog away

Update on the patchwork blanket I'm making for my love.
Made some good progress but doubting if i get it finished within the next days.

Today with every block i finish i wish that the fog will go away above London.
Why?
Love is going to be flying from NY to Amsterdam tonight, with a stopover in London tomorrow morning. Problem is that there seems to be too much fog above London so almost all flights are being cancelled today... Hope tomorrow the sky will have cleared.

>> update: the fog didn't want to move, so my love was stuck at heathrow way too long, but eventually got on a plane and made it over to Amsterdam! It's a merry christmas!

Another quilt in progress

Since I'm not all selfish and i enjoyed making my pink quilt so much, i have started on another one! Making a green/blue-ish version this time.
For my Love, hope to have it finished in time for our 7 year (!) anniversary in January. Hope i can find enough green scraps of fabric in between all the pink piles i have!!

I am making some progress already. The little owl has already found it's place in between the squares.

I'm currently being surrounded by squares and squares of green and blue.

In need of some pink....

hihi

Fabric wallhangings

Still catching up here. I have been wanting to put up these pictures, and I don't know why I couldn't find/make any time to show them. So finally.

They are fabric covered canvases. Can't have enough wall art. I was reminded of them by Meshell's creations a while ago. It took me awhile to get to take pictures of them.


I've gone wild sewing on buttons, fabric, trims and other decorations. I enjoy making color compositions. It feels like everything has it's specific place, even before I even start, their own spot where it belongs. My task is to get them there. Sometimes it works and I get it, but sometimes I don't and that makes me sad..

The girl with the geese on the checkered fabric is a picture I found on one of my vintage children's postcards. I got her onto the fabric trying out the freezer paper fabric printing for the first time. The border under the ducky, or is it another goose? are three different trims stacked on top of each other. The flowers on the right fabric canvas were printed on iron-on paper. Used some scraps of white felt to iron them on to. (think I'll make more of these 'appliques', I like!)

More decorations on fabric. It's like making a collage. One of my favorite pastimes! The lady on the right canvas is my mom. I used the same image on my very fist handmade bag too! And same as with the flowers above, ironed the image onto white felt.

Promo banner/table cover

Not very much to tell about this. My Ismoyo banner/table cover that i was working on, is now as good as finished. It makes me so happy entering my livingroom and seeing the pink banner! It came out almost like i wanted it to. I just need to figure out if, and what i want to put in the center of the flowers.
For now, I'll leave it like it is.

Vintage Fabric Messenger Bags (3x !)

Three times original vintage fabric!
How happy was I with these great finds on the market the other day! I can hardly choose in the morning which bag I'm going to take with me for the day.

Pink goes with everything! The flower is on a pin, so it's removable and or replaceable.


I totally fell in love with this vintage fabric. You remember Sarah Kay and Holly Hobbie?
The birds and the bunnies are just too cute!


I especially get a lot of positive feedback on the strap I've put together.
The green works really well with the brown color of the bag.


I found a semi-large scrap of this thick fabric underneath a very large pile of raggedy scraps. It really does pay off to take a little bit of time and rummage through the pile. You might find something gorgeous!

I used plain black lining with fusible. Didn't want the lining to distract from the flowers, so i kept it simple like that.
At the same time i didn't want to feel overwhelmed by all the flowers coming at you all at once when looking at the bag. That's where the application came in. I used photoshop to make the words and printed it out on transfer paper. Ironed it on yellow colored felt and sewn that onto the front of the bag.

All bags have an additional cardboard bottom in between the outer fabric and the lining. This gives the bags more shape and strength.
I like my messengerbags to have straps which are a bit longer then they regularly are. These three have straps of approx. 100 cm. (40 inches or so?)

Furry Pink Pillow

I had some furry pink fabric laying around and thought of making a super soft pillow from it.
But why make it a plain, square one if you can make it into the shape of a sweet character?



My boyfriend called me a danger to myself: I cutify everything!

I like making Bags! (a 'deer' one)

I'm so happy with this one! It looks black in this picture, but the felt like outer fabric is very dark grey. The inside lining is pink cotton.

Collecting tiny embellishments (and having a mom who collects for me too) finally pays off. I think nobody ever really understood why i wanted to have all those small thingies and beads and stuff. I loved looking at them and i love using them now even more!

On this bag i used some tiny 'pearls' tied together forming the eye, a sparkly bow around the neck and two small pink butterflies to finish it off.

Inside the bag i've put two smaller pink pockets for extra handy storage.

Felt Flower Applique

Don't know where i will use it yet, but just finished this yesterday.
I made it from scraps of colored felt with an iron embellishment that i still had laying around.

Crafting for Boyfriend's Birthday!

October 18th, the day my boyfriend was born! *doing a happydance*
But i'm not too happy, since we're not spending the day together this year, him being in New York, me in Amsterdam...
But i did make him something he can really use. As a musiscian he always carries cd's around. No cases, just loose cd's in his pocket. So based on the idea of the ipod cozy, i made him a double cd cozy. I wanted to use felt again since it's so soft and strong at the same time. Most of my felt scraps are in the pink, purple range and i didn't want to do that to him. lol. So the cozy has a retro feel to it due to the orange/brown colors.
Oh yeah, obviously, his name starts with a G.

I know not to put too much embellishments on it because they will come off eventually when he puts it in, takes it out of his pocket much. But i just had to place something for good luck on it, so i used the holy maria for it.

Inside is where the cd's go. I don't want to give it empty, so i'm making him a cd with concert recordings of some musicians/dj's which i know he likes.
Michael Franti, Gangstarr, Mr. Wix, Brainpower, Pete Philly, haven't made it yet, but it will be something like that.

Hoping he'll love it!