Family Textile Portraits

I've been missing playing with my beads, threads, and fabrics lately! So I decided to do the third in what is becoming a series of family/floral portraits. It has been so nice to look down at my work this week and see my sister's beautiful face smiling up at me!

But first I'll just show the first two portraits, in case new readers haven't seen them. I combine photographs of the portraitee on silk with floral arrangement "frames" that have also been photographed and printed on silk.

Here's my mother's, in progress...

Here is the completed portrait of my sister-in-law's parents. Aren't they sweet? This was a gift for their 60th wedding anniversary.

And this week it was Mary's turn to go under the needle!

The floral print came out a little muddy, so I drew a few highlights on the flowers with my water soluable wax pastels, which when ironed become permanent. I also added that white around the inside of the floral frame.

Fast forward here...I've just added a few embellishments to this piece, not wanting to go overboard. What you see here is the ribbon border, *edit* done in a herringbone stitch, between the flower fabric and its silk jaquard frame, which is sari fabric I found on eBay.


And here she is, my incomparable sister! This has been stretched over foam core, like Marne's cottage portrait was.
I am going to give this to Mary's daughter Qwen, who turns 6 today, for her birthday.
Every girl should always have their mother smiling at them, don't you think?