WET #57: Solace! December 17, 1999 WET 57: Solace I miss my grandma; we were soul-mates. This WET 57 gave me a chance to create a comforting memorial to Everygrandma. On a gloomy winter day, you and I can sit down at this table and soak in warm memories of Everygrandma's love. Everything here reminds us of her. The book of poems is one that Everygrandma's own grandmother gave to her on her 13th birthday because her favorite poem is on that well-thumbed page. It is one of the few things that made the trip across the ocean with her when she came to America with her parents later that year. The tablecloth is a tartan she wove on a point twill treadling threaded on her loom. The yarn was spun by Everygrandma from wool that she sheared from her family's own sheep. She dyed the spun yarn using madder for the reds and indigo over scotch broom for the greens. When she finished weaving the piece, she stored it in her hopechest. Later, she embroidered the tree designs on it with silk cord that Everygrandpa had brought all the way from France as a gift when he was courting her. The apples come from trees that Everygrandpa planted when Everygrandma gave birth to their first two children. Once the trees began bearing, Everygrandma baked an apple pie on each child's birthday; it became a family tradition that still carries on. The candy dish is a family heirloom, a treasure that has been handed down each generation to the oldest daughter. Her Mamma gave into Everygrandma's care when she became a grandmother for the first time. The home-made gumdrops are made from the recipe that Everygrandma used each year to make special treats to reflect the sparkle in her grandchildren's eyes at Christmas time. ---- I used all of the WET 57 images, plus two apples I had scanned for WET 35 and some homemade candy I made and scanned for a Christmas recipe this month. The fabric tablecloth is from the stocking sample, rotated, cleaned up, mirrored, pasted, and used to fill the background. The tree "embroidery" needed only some softening, resizing, and shadowing. The book needed only some trimming, sharpening with unsharp mask, rotating, and softening the edges a bit. Where's the picture of Grandma? She's there--in the heirloom candy dish! The dish was made by sharpening the image strongly, then layering copies in a circle. Each copy was a new layer and was rotated 20 degrees farther to the left than the one before. Each two layers were blended at 100 lighten before adding the next copy on a new layer. The process was repeated over and over till the circle was closed. One copy of this image was colorized to a red; another copy was colorized to a green and rotated 10 degrees. The two layers were blended at 100 difference. The merged copy was then added to the tablecloth background, dropshadowed, and filled with candy. Oops, some spilled! ----- This is a translation of the poem (thanks to Baerble): Wintertime, Frozen time. But the Lord gives a new frock, heavy snow, to the bare earth, warm wool to the herd, soft feathers to the flying hordes, so they won't suffer harm, people houses and hearths to you. Praise Him who is so rich in blessings. Everything on this page was done in Paint Shop Pro 5, using only the original filters and functions supplied with the program.

This is a smaller version of the original image collection posted for us to use. Thank you!

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This image was created using Paint Shop Pro 5, especially for the WET #57 project.
It is my original creation based on the original WET images obtained on-line from Debbie
through alt.binaries.comp-graphics.
Thank you!

5acreart@usa.net

All original graphics on this site
Copyright 1999
by Diane at
Five Acre Graphics