I'll just knock up a quick tree if you don't mind?

You can imagine the scene - "oh yes, that's a good idea I will exhibit a tree in an exhibition. It's just sitting on my window ledge after it's last outing and needs a new adventure...."

Time passes......

Oh, but the exhibition is to showcase textile decoration- dying, printing and embelishment and my tree does not tick those boxes so I will just have to re-make it!! No pressure....

So last friday morning, I set about printing my 'bark-ing' design onto some previously dyed fabric, as you do. It wasn't proper fabric printing, meaning that it takes forever to dry but does the job eventually and you probably cannot wash it. This is not such a problem for Mr Tree though, he is not to be worn.

I worked out a template for a leaf which would tally nicely with it's self and set to work. The print was created very quickly with a polystyrene pizza base and a biro pen. After a day on the line and a day inside, the ink still wasn't dry so I gave it a quick go over with an iron, job done.

Now to make it pretty, or just work which ever came first.

Some machine stitching is always a good start, then some hand stitching.....and then "why not, some vintage inspired embroidered flowers" I have been looking for a reason for months to have a go. I plan out my design.

After about a couple of hours solid stitching I had great fun inventing new blooms from my limited range of suitable stitches, you can see here it is mounted onto some interfacing to give it more stability:

I found a large piece of vintage polka dot fabric to use as a backing and stitched rs together.

With the help of a bamboo cane, a bag of mung beans and alot of stuffing, the tree was standing up for itself:

Now for the leaves and a couple of friends to chat to:

Ta Dar: Mr Tree No 2 is now finished but more of a Mrs I think, plans for more when I have a bit of time in the future I hope.

Well this was my day....

There is a trend in the crafting world to show where you work, mmmm. I work in the same room where everything else happens in our house downstairs. There is only one room, apart from the kitchen. My trusty husband has gone out of his way to make space for me and the 'stuff', I have lovely Ikea fabric boxes stacked on lovely Ikea shelving. Sadly my 'stuff' takes up most of the floor space in-front of these shelves too. mmmm. Not to mention, the rest of it, the book shelves and the large cupboard in the local Community Centre I rent out! Hey, ho.

So I don't have a lovely work room and probably never will, our youngest is 6 so perhaps in 15 years time at the earliest we might have a spare room for me to work in.

This is the chaos of my day, I a too ashamed to show you the corner/pile. One day perhaps, when the queen comes to tea?

To give me space and time, Chris has taken the children out for the day! A car and train trip to Norfolk.

Hurray! A whole day of stitching. It started off well at 8.30 when the postman arrived with my new business cards :-) In the middle of a Bank Holiday and needed for monday, perfect timing.

I of course, made the most of the day, getting through my worklist (in my head, not on paper, that would be too efficient) and coming up with some new spontanious work.

To add to the day, there was also some sunshine - I know! So a rushed to the Photo studio - ha - and took some pics too, busy lady.

To finish my perfect 'me time' day, I am now going out to a friends house for a girly curry evening. Lush. xxx

Quick trip to Olney

For me, a trip to Olney is a treat. A lovely market town about 20 mins drive from us, with a plethora of craft and gift shops, a traditional toy shop hidden away down a snicket. Shamefully, though I have never been to the local museum there! It is the world famous (?) Cowper and Newton Museum famous for lots of good things, too many to mention but you can check it out for yourself. There is also a great collection of local traditional bobbin lace there and as my daughter has been making lace at school for the last 3 years, I thought she might me interested but just never managed to steel her away - until this day!

The museum had asked me to take some of my work to potentially sell in their shop, I went on thursday and they duely loved my work and we negotiated a price for quite alot of stock - how exciting!!

I then decided to drag my lot over to see how things were going and have a look around the museum. The lovely ladies in the office were also interested in what my boys (6 and 8) would enjoy during the visit - so was I.

So here we are, famous for lace making and an annual Shrove Tuesday Pancake race!

Inside the museum garden, some boxing hares - the famous owner of the house kept three hares as pets, so there are alot of references around the museum. Lots of inspiration me thinks!

I didn't find out what or where this next piece had been, I saw a spinning wheel and some lace bobbins carved, but had no idea of the 'thing' in the middle, we hoped all would be revealed when we went inside. It was.

I was a bit blow away by the samples of lace, there were dozens and amazing to imagine that they were all made by hand. Evie did say that she thought that the swan she is making at school was tricky, but this!!
Hurray, there was some lovely applique. Cowper's bedspread - worked by Mrs King in 1781.

So there we have it, a quick guide to Cowper and Newton, the museum gardens were lovely and just about to burst into their spring blossoms. I will need another trip over to see for myself I think.

The boys? - well they were interested in fossils and rocks, the display of Slavery items (Newton was famous for working for the abolishment of Slavery in the late 1700's)

Surprisingly Noah, who is an adamant boy, enjoyed dressing up as a young lady complete with big pink dress and wig, I will find this photo and put it up soon!

So we had a great afternoon, the sun shone down and the children didn't scrap or sulk too much. I now have lots of inspiration for work and new projects.......

New felt - the update!

This actually didn't take that long to do, it's just taken me a while to photograph it - hey ho.

Working in all one colour and only in blanked stitch, you can soon crack out the patches.

I think each little patch took about 20 mins 20x9 = 180 mins/ 3 hours - is that all?? and then the other bits took a bit longer of course, but not an age.

I then carefully machined them flatly together on a piece of fabric hanging around needing a a new mission in life.

And then played around with feather stitch and different colours for each side of the squares.

Now, my only problem is what to do with it? mmmmm, it makes sense to keep it as a sample to carry about, but is really calling out to be finished into 'something', but what?

bag - funny size and would get spoilt

cushion cover - too bulky

just a flat thing to put on the wall - could be!

A lovely evening spent

One week ago I set off on a journey to 'the other end of the county, over the border and beyond'! I was on my way to meet a group of quilters/stitchers who meet once a month in a village hall. I have never spoken to such a group before, I think I told them this, but just incase I didn't - don't tell. Sshhh.

I told them of my background, thinking this would give me credentials (ha) and the work I do now in the Children's Centers. I mentioned the Textiles C&G course I am co-tutoring on, I think this went down well.

Handing out patterns, templates and samples of my work, the ladies were soon inspired with my new range of lovely felt and bought a few colours to play with.

We chatted about the samples and I went round a few times to make sure that everyone was happy with their work and new what they were doing. I had some lovely conversations with people and felt very welcome.

It had been a birthday for one of the stitchers the previous week, so tea and cakes were served. I was informed that this was not the norm, perhaps a biscuit was there to keep strength up most months.

There was a great 'show and tell' time, where the ladies held up their finished work and spoke about what they had made and any points of interest that came up.

These are the pics I took, I have now come to the conclusion that I have to take my tripod everywhere I go. To capture natural colours and lovely detailed work, my shaky hand and small 'satsuma' of a camera is not enough. You will now see me with cute little tripod on tow too.

The evening finishes with a traditional 'raffle' I donated a brooch from my box of tricks.

As you can see there were some lovely colour combinations and great variations on the basic design. I had some lovely feedback from the group and they will be happy to have me back in the future. I look forward to it! :-)

New felt, new projects

I have at last got my own supply of felt to sell to all my lovely stitchers, so armed with 35 lush colours in lovely rich felt I have started a new project to inspire :-)

I made a 'penny' quilt/pannel when I first stared the courses I do, but only made it in 4 colours. It looked great, but I was itching to make it in the full blown 9 square/9 colour version.

So here it is:

The recipe calls for 5 rich colours and four pale colours or visa versa of course.

You then cut one square and 3 circles of decreasing size from each of the 9 colours.

Then you arrange the colours, alternating bright with pale as much as you can, until you have a pleasing arrangement.

This is the range of my felt it all it's glory. Grouped into Yellows, Reds, Blues, Purples, Greens, Browns and Neutrals. I am really pleased with the set.

I have put an A5 set in my etsy shop, but have already started selling direct to the stitchers I work with. Thanks ladies!

The summer project is finnished!

Last summer (2009) I set myself a stitching project for high days and holidays, I NEEDED to be able to stitch all the time. I spend so much time sitting in the park on play schemes with the children and just general being outside, chatting and having the odd picnic. It just seemed logical to have a project to work on when I had a moment.

So:

I found some large pieces in my stash - this was not a difficult task I have the 2010 base fabrics there too. I then started to collect bits to add the patchwork hearts. Again, more scraps from my stash and then the odd gem from a charity shop.

I worked on each strip individually, so it was portable and less conspicuous.

Each heart was interfaced and then machined on, I now wish of course I had used bond-a-web, would have cut down the hastle no end, mmmm.

Once I had planned the fabrics, I then arranged the hearts, left to right:

A-B-C-A-B-C-A.

The space between each heart was the width of a heart, does that make sense?

Sitting in the park, or the tent or on the beech, I worked feather stitch over each heart. Then started machining the strips together and continued feather stitching over the seams.

The quilt then lay dormant for 3 months, school, work and christmas took over. :-(

Then as if my magic, the time came again when I needed to stitch and keep warm in a small cottage in Norfolk, so out came the fabric, a blanked I had been saving to line it with and some lovely navy hand quilting thread. Hey bingo, in one chilly day and night, I had quilted round each heart in the navy.

And then to bind, mm, never done that properly before. Had a surf and found this article really useful and the binding went on like a dream.

Hurray! Snugly warm and lovely in this grey, grey month of February.

In my head I am now planning this years summer project, Purple and Green will be the scheme - roll on the summer :-)