Paint a picture with fabric or Romero Britto in cotton

A long time ago I found a picture of a painting in some magazine and loved it so much I tore it out and carried it in my wallet. It was a colorful painting of a boy reading a book ...

I knew I could not copy it on canvas, as my painting skills remain at a level of a house, a flower and a snowman, but thought I could reproduce it in fabric somehow. Years later I watched the show of Bethenny Frankel, when I saw the painting she gifted to her husband to be and new immediately it was by the same artist. As I found out, the painter is Romero Britto and all his paintings are virtually painted for those like me - color lovers with zero ability to paint but love of fabrics. 

I decided to make one of his works for my mom's birthday and chose this one  ... 

I uploaded the photo saved of the internet to BLOCKPOSTERS.COM and made sure it will print in a size I want. Once printed, I cut off the sides of the pages to make the poster and sealed it together with a clear tape ...

Afterwards, I cut up the poster to trillion little pieces. Be careful here, because you have to add the black line to either one of the bordering pieces and once in a puzzle form, it gets a bit hectic! Being this my first puzzle painting I cut up the entire poster at once, but I suggest you go step by step - bottom to top to avoid spending hours googly eyed figuring out where each piece belongs as I did ... 

I sorted the pieces by color and by pattern and rummaged through my fabric stash to pick and choose the fabrics. I had to buy many quarters, as I wasn't able to find the pattern I liked or the one that would match. As you see, the vase rests on two different patterns as a base. You will need the most of these two fabric. I chose a blue and black polka dot and a grayish blue flowery kind for the base. 

I measured the size of the poster and cut these fabrics to coordinate the size of painting I wanted. 

And now the most tedious part ... piece by piece I ironed a two sided heat-and-bond to the fabric, I used my puzzle piece to trace the shape and cut it out. 

Look at this chaos ...

Trying to figure it all out without a headache ....

The fun part ... putting it all together one ironed press at a time ... 

YAY .. almost ready ... 

 Lastly, just zigzag through the entire thing line by line by line as in any applique, sew sides to it so it can be stretched to a wooden frame ....

HAPPY belated BIRTHDAY MOMMY!

I am so thrilled the way it turned out, I can't wait to start our bedroom picture ... 

Which one shall I do???

Kisses????? 

Or "Tonight"????

Lo(Lo)V(i)E to you all from Slovakia, 

LV

P.S. Will post the painting hanging on mom's wall, but still waiting for a gentle-man to hang it for us ... 

Coney Island by LoLo

Daddy finally stayed home from work and took us with mom to Coney Island. It was mom's idea, because she secretly likes taking photos of amusement parks and loves cotton candy 

(though she would never eat it in front of us, because we are not allowed to eat all that sugar ... )  

It was really boring to wait for daddy to buy tickets, but he told us we'll be able to ride on the train, so I didn't get upset and was a patient little girl even though it was so hot

and I never like to wait for anything in general.

I am obsessed with fire trucks. Every time I see one, I go "viieeeeuuuuuu vieeeuuuu" and all at once, everyone else goes "viiieeeuuu viiiieeeuuu" back - like I taught them something ...

Lola:

This seems to be the single most exciting event for London, so we all pretend to be equally excited (we are not really, but don't tell him, ok?) I only get excited about shoes and make-up and watches.
Many, many, many watches!

And candy sometimes ....

London: After the fire truck, we boarded the train. We sat in the conductor's wagon and went around about 3 times in a circle. It was a bit boring, because it went soooo slooooowwww, but daddy and mommy seemed to like it a lot going "choooo choooo" every few minutes, so we played along ...

Lola is so wild! She wants to try everything, but I am more cautious - like my daddy. Mommy and Lola tried out the big wheel. Mommy told me to say here, that this is not the only dress she owes and that not all her dresses cost 6.99 USD - just for the record.

Although, you may think that way because of her previous post ..

London, of course wanted to go also after he saw how brave and happy I was. So, I lucked out and got to do another round .. The world was so different from up here!

Like from an airplane but not quite!~

This thing was HUGE, huh?

Here are all the details for you intellectual folks ... 

Then it was pizzatime! We LOVE pizza and think it's the best food ever made. DaMo (Dad and Mom - well, if they can call us LoLo we can call them DaMo, right?) doesn't think it's really healthy for us, so we always want to go to birthday parties, because we know that there will be pizza and cake and a candle at some point during the celebration and they will never say "NO" at a party ...

We've got it all figured out!

The corn was also delicious!

After all that food we could barely walk, so we took a horse drawn carriage ride instead of a stroll.

And a boat ride on a fake lake going around and around!

 Lola kept ringing the bell and I just kept dreaming, like the boat's name ....

Finally, mom wanted her share of fun and caught a frog and a prize of an ugly green fish, that nobody wants and will most likely end up in the charity store nearby.

Then it was off to LoLa's shop "Lola Star" on the boardwalk - I mean not really LoLa's, but mom had a t-shirt with "LoLa" on it from here before she was even born. Don't worry, she also has a "London" t-shirt .. though no "I heart Geoffrey" kind just yet ... 

We boarded our car seats, fell asleep in a second and arrived home in about half an hour ...  

What a great day!

Kisses, LOLO

T-shirt pillow - my new obsession

Yupp, so easy to make, a great gift to give and so cozy to cuddle with :) 

I bought them at my favorite dollar store for 2.99 USD a while ago.
Three, to be exact. 

One with I HEART NY 

Another with something something in blue ink NY

And yet another one, my favorite with a vintage boom box print ... Here it is stretched over our rattan dining chair ... You didn't really want to see me wearing a shapeless white t-shirt did you? 

Cut, cut, cut and cut the four sides ... Sew it together leaving some space for the pillow insert bought for 1.99 USD at Ikea (while husband makes remarks on how he doesn't understand the point of many pillows, because you really just need ONE single one and how from now on he'll have to spend half an hour just taking off all the pillows from our bed before he can actually fall into it and sleep .. and so on and so on ... blah blah blah ... :) If you know of a man, who actually likes pillows (I mean many, many pillows) please send him my way, I'll make him my poster child for this post (pun intended :)  

Once ready, all I had to do was take a picture of it, which turned out to be a longer project in itself than making the pillow. I love all things pretty and can dress myself all right (I think), but when it comes to styling a photo it gives me headaches and I just can not understand how all those crafty girls and boys do it for their blogs? Do you have a house full of props and backgrounds or what's the secret?

Can somebody please advise? ... Otherwise you're stuck with this .... 

(I really wanted to get all sorts of tapes and make a messy suitcase with them and my boom box, but could not find a single tape?!!! in the house ... ) 

And here is a bit of trivia: 

I got my first boom box when I was 14 years old. The day we could travel across the Austrian border from Czechoslovakia for the first time, my mom called me at a boarding school and ordered me home saying: "We are going to see what's it like to be rich!". We waited endless hours on a bus with other people going to see "The West" for the first time and spent a day window shopping (we could not afford or believe the prices) around Vienna. I remember admiring the Christmas decoration and being stunned that despite of the fact, that it wasn't bolted to the ground or had a watchman over it, nobody was stealing it :) - something that would not be imaginable in our part of the world ... 

We then boarded the bus again in dark and travelled to the outskirts of the city, where we got dropped off somewhere at a local supermarket.  I've never seen a supermarket before with endless isles of food, clothes, shoes, paper goods, housewares .. you name it ... etc. I can't recall the name of it, but thinking back it must have been a Wallmart sort of place, though at that time it felt more to me like Dior on 5th Avenue would today (that is if I ever dared to enter). Mom sad I could have one expensive thing from the store (additionally to my favorite pack of gummy bears that were luxurious goods at the time). I finally chose a long, black Panasonic stereo with green turning buttons and it was my most valuable possession for a very long time .... 

 See how times change? 

Now I wouldn't trade my new pillow stereo for the Panasonic if you paid me for it :)))

LO(lo)V(i)E to you all, 

LV

Have you also made a t-shirt pillow? Send me a link, please I would love to post your pillows here, just to see all the varieties (ok, and props :).

 And regarding those "other" t-shirts ... the NYC is still work in progress, 

the other one on the waiting list ... 

Also on Link Party here:

Devotion (?)

Photos taken during Semana Santa in Antigua, Guatemala