Family Portrait

Today is my husband Jake’s birthday. I wanted to give him something special that wasn’t just buying him something, especially since I’m a stay at home mom and anything I buy for him would essentially be *from* him because he is the one who makes all the money, ha!

So I figured I would make him something! But then what on earth does he need? Sewing for men is hard to even think about! He doesn’t need a tie, he doesn’t need a toiletry bag, all those usual little nick nacks, I don’t think he would even appreciate them.

I started thinking about what he is actually into. He owns an art gallery The Austin Art Garage, so the obvious answer would be art. Then I remembered this awesome thing I saw here and decided to copy imitate this to create a family portrait, combining our loves together- art, sewing and family!

I am no where NEAR as amazing as the artist Sarah Walton, she actually made ART whereas mine looks like a drawing from a 5 year old with a crayon. But thankfully Jake loved it and that is all that matters, right? :)

The quality of these pics are not very good, I took them late last night with poor lighting, but thank goodness I did because Jake took it to work with him this morning :)

I can’t believe I’m posting a close up, but there you go, haha! You can see what a horrible artist I am! And how I royally messed up Millie’s face.. And how the thread I used for the skin blended too much with the background fabric so we all look like we are missing something. And how I didn’t capture Jake’s beard because I was afraid that would look too messy… But enough tearing myself apart, I actually really like it regardless of all the mess ups :)

I cut a square of off- white fabric I had and drew a little picture of our family with a disappearing ink marker. Then I cut little outfits out of scrap fabric I had and laid them on the picture. I used my free motion foot and basically drew on fabric with the thread, trying to outline the drawing I made. I did it with 2 pieces of fabric with batting in between, like you would a quilt. I like how it made the dresses poofy. When I was all done I just bound it up like you would any quilt type project.

The most annoying part was changing out the thread colors with all the details. But all in all this was really fun! I know my limitations as an artist so I really didn’t have super high expectations of it looking anywhere near the art it was inspired from. To be honest, it looks almost exactly as I pictured it so I am really satisfied with it!