Tea cups

I have been making more little tea cups. I have six now and plan to make more. I love the shape. And it is quite nice to make them one at a time, choosing the fabric, cutting, shading, ironing, fusing. I am digging through old boxes of fabrics and surprising myself by what I choose. I am not trying to duplicate the exact patterns that authentic Chinese cups would have, but rather to capture the kind of spirit they might have. Hard to explain. It is a "know it when I see it" kind of thing. Here are the new ones.

The third one is my favorite. I don' know why. I began to think about what kind of background any or all of these might work on. I dug through the stash and nothing spoke to me, so I painted some fabric this afternoon. It is what you see behind each of these. Nothing is final. Nothing is sewn, nor is it decided, but I do think I like the fabric I painted.

Here are all the cups I have made so far.

 I am not finished making cups. Or bowls. Maybe other kinds of vessels. I think this is something I can explore for awhile. Joanne asked, "100 bowls?" Maybe. Is there a significance to 100 bowls? I feel like that should mean something.

One thing I should mention. I was using Crayola crayons for the shading. June warned that they might not be as permanent as they should be for this. I told you she was smart. I have gone back to using my paints and watercolor crayons and pastels. I know they can be made pretty stable.