I'm glad I had those socks to work on because...

1. in my flurry of finishing I'd left myself without any sitting-on-the-sofa-listening-to-the-TV/Radio 3 embroidery (and in case, last night's TV was Alistair Sooke on Egyptian Art, which required watching as well as listening, for at least two reasons). (Andrew Graham-Dixon tonight, for those who prefer their art historians a little more mature.) And because...

2.  Good job I finished some the new ones last night.

I've started another pair, as although I have accomplished several things today, starting any sitting-on-the-sofa-listening-to-the-TV/Radio 3 embroidery was not amongst them. 

I did pin the Traveller's Blanket together, which should provide several weeks of sitting-on-the-sofa-listening-to-the-TV/Radio 3 embroidery, but before I can start work on it I have to do a bit of design exploration - like working out how many little patches I can get out the fabric. And before I could do some design exploration I had, of course, to make a sketch book.

I've fallen in love with the single section case binding in Heather Weston's 'Handmade Books', so that is what this is. The images come from scans of my fabrics, but the printer was running out of ink, so the colours are a little bit duller than in real life.

After my pinning and book making, W. dragged me out for some fresh air at Hillier Gardens, where I took some photos in the winter garden. When I got home I played around with my new favourite app, 'Waterlogue'. Before-and-after images above.

Let's hope that tomorrow I manage to start some sitting-on-the-sofa-listening-to-the-TV/Radio 3 embroidery - except that it's subtitle reading night, so I shall be knitting whether I have embroidery or not...

Spontaneity is the spice of life?

We had to go out yesterday morning, but it was such a lovely day that on the way home we played hooky from the boring things we had planned for the afternoon and went to the Hillier Gardens.

As you can see, the gardens were looking wonderful. I have no idea if it is normal to have primroses, daffodils, camellias, magnolias and rhodedendrons all in flower at the same time, but they were. That bed of ferns on the bottom row positively glowed in the sunlight, and I think that a few exhibits for Art in the Garden, which starts later this month, may have already taken root. 

What's the point of being retired if you can't skive off and enjoy the sunshine?

Work in progress.

Two down, two more to go.

Or that may be three, depending on whether I decide (or have time) to redo page 4. Looking at it here, though, I think it serves to balance the light colours of page 3, so it may survive. Plus I need to get it all finished by the end of the month.

I've just started page 8 -  out of sequence, because how it looks when it's finished will influence how I do page 7, for which I have a design, but feel vague about the execution.

I had a dreadful dream last night in which neuf  (our post degree exhibiting group), were putting up an exhibition, and everyone had produced stunning new work, except me, who was stuck with my old stuff. I think this may be my subconscious putting the boot in. 

Despite the ticking of the clock, I managed to get to three exhibitions this week, albeit one by accident, and one that had nothing to do with textiles.

As the library Discovery Centre was closed, I went into the theatre for my morning coffee, and caught the exhibition by Eve Dawson in the coffee bar. Lots of of small abstracts, in various media, which I found a bit overwhelming because there were so many of them. I would have found it easier to look at them properly if there had been fewer, bigger ones. However, they did trigger ideas for textiles, especially the wire ones.

In the afternoon, as the sun was shining and the exhibition was about to close, we headed to the Hillier Gardens for their display of snowdrops. There are, of course, snowdrops in the gardens, but they had collected lots of different varieties, plus some cyclamen, in an indoor exhibition. Very pretty, very suggestive of spring. We were given mirrors to look at the underside of the flowered, which highlighted some of the differences between the varieties, plus some of the self seeded variations they have in the gardens.

After our usual coffee and cake, we looked at the photography exhibition, which was also on at Hillier. Some very atmospheric images, which made me wish I'd got a bit more out of my photography class - although I suspect they all have much more complicated cameras than mine!

Finally to top off a good week, my washing machine has been repaired at last. Athough I've managed to keep on top of things because Babybel and the VHC's mum and dad kindly let us use theirs, it's great to have my own back in operation.

We survived...

a sleepover by one granddaughter, one grandson and one granddog. And a good time was had by all - apart from the grandparents being so worried about the children sleeping well that, even though the children did, the grandparents didn't. (The dog was pretty restless too. He can't get his head round the fact that no cat is going to come in and attack him - or that there is no cat food to steal, now.)

We went to Hillier Gardens on Saturday, despite the rain. The tree house was inspected and deemed too wet to use. But it was decided that we should return another day to explore it further.

The mermaid in our party hugged a few trees. The non-mermaids didn't.   

The whole party enjoyed tea in the cafe. Babybel sat quietly and ate her crisps. The VHC didn't. The feminist in me says that boys and girls are pretty similar. The grandmother in me thinks boys are louder and bolshier! 

On Sunday we went to Mottisfont. As non-dog owners we hadn't realised that you can take well behaved dogs into the gardens, which allowed us to exercise the mermaid, the dog and ourselves all at the same time. (The other member of the party came along for the ride.)

Babybel enjoyed finding the stars on the Star Trail, and granny and granddad did too. This is only a sample - the photographer was in charge of buggy pushing and refused to tackle more muddy wet grass than she had to. 

It was not too cold to have coffee in the stable yard, where Babybel could pet the chicken wire horse, suitably dressed for Christmas.

The VHC could explore the effects of running away from granny and through puddles, falling over (fortunately not in a puddle), and pretending you can't get up again, pretending you don't like the gravel on your hands and then adding more after granny has wiped them, (see what I mean about  bolshier?) and fearlessly approaching and petting a dog who is bigger than you are (a beautiful English pointer). He was more wary of the horse, however.

Granny and granddad could sit down, at least for part of the time, and the dog could field the crumbs from the rich humans' table.

Then we all went to Babybel and the VHC's house and very gratefully returned our visitors to their mum and dad.

I am sure seasoned grandparents wonder why I'm making such a fuss, but this is the first time we've had both of hem overnight, and previous visits from Babybel on her own have been rather tearful affairs.

Before all this I did manage to finish Page 2. Neatened Italian quilting and arrow stitches. It's not clear from the photo but the stitch on this is silver, not white, apart from the red thread end which seems to have crept in from somewhere. I'm pleased with the way this looks, it feels like it follows on well from Page 1.

Now to Page 3 (!) - or maybe a later page, as I have clearer ideas about those. Not that I don't have ideas for Page 3, if anything I have too many, which is a big part of the problem!

Slow progress...

on my Karen Ruane piece.

This is the third block, and definitely not finished yet. For a start I don't like that running stitch, so it will either come out or have something added.

The initials are mine and mum's, the hanky is one of mum's. 

Slow progress too with the cover for 'Moving On', because I keep changing my mind. (Autocorrect changed that to 'much mind' - I wish!)

First I tried couching in a sort of brick stitch effect in a thicker silver thread. Then I decided the stitches needed to be closer together, in a chevron pattern. But when it was nearly finished I realised it looked boring, and the silver was overwhelming the blue. 

Fortunately it was easy to cut out.

Then I tried small, closely-spaced patches, arranged at random by rolling a die. Still overwhelming.

So now I'm using a much finer thread, which looks better. Unfortunately it is really meant for couching, and doesn't take kindly to being pulled through the fabric, so I'm having to use a big needle and very short lengths. I just hope it works, I can't face starting for a fourth time.

And this afternoon we made a slow and stately progress round the Winter Garden at Hillier Gardens (this cold weather and my arthritis do not agree).

The sun was setting, and the light was beautiful.

The tea and cake were pretty good too.

I’ve come to the conclusion…

that scanning is boring. [Like this post, which goes on a bit.]

Scanning is especially dull if, like me, you have to scan everything 4 times.

I was feeling idle last night  so I played with PostworkShop – quite the easiest way I know  to produce interesting manipulated photos – on these two images.

 

Yes, litter photos again. I bet readers who’ve been with me a while are missing the flowers.

 

I applied ‘white sketch’ to the images,

 

 

 

 

 

then printed them on calico, previously painted with Inkaid, and collaged with the backs of envelopes. As you do.

Today I scanned them

Once as a colour image.

 

 

 

Once in grey scale.

 

 

 

 

 

Once in black and white.

 

 

 

 

 

And once in inverted colours. 

Boring process, interesting results.

 

 

 

 

Then I did the same for the other four pairs of images I printed off last night.

Don’t worry, I'm not going to show you all of them. Just the first scans – to prove that I do eventually  use the fabrics and papers I prepare for printing.

‘Sketchy marker’ on emulsion painted junk mail – for the flower lovers out there, the left image is of daffodils. The right one isn’t.

 

 

 

My own combination of filters [known as ‘plasmaxor’] on a bit of old curtain painted with clear Inkaid. The daffodils are a bit more obvious here.

 

 

 

‘Abstract 1’ on the left, and ‘antique drawing’ on the right, on calico painted with Printability and collaged with brown paper.

 

 

And my favourites – the ‘kitchen garden’ filter [I kid you not] on heavy but not pelmet weight Vilene, painted with moulding paste and Inkaid, a recipe from ‘Digital Art Studio’. It has a wonderful crunchy texture, which the scan doesn’t show, but which works really well with the images.

And if you decide to try it and put the result though your printer – on your own head be it.

The I did some more scanning.

When my mum died, I inherited a lot of transfers. Anyone with an ounce of sense would have binned the lot – but when did I have an ounce of sense? I am not really a transfer person – all the designs seem to involve satin stitch, probably my least favourite stitch after cross stitch [one because it’s boring, the other because I’m useless at it]. In any case, the transfers don’t work very well, probably because many of them are even older than I am.

But I have a vague idea of adding floral transfer images to some of the litter photos – and perhaps even embroidering them – so I decided to scan them.

I’d only need to scan each one once, wouldn’t I?

Wrong. I couldn’t decide whether I liked the colour image or the black and white image best.

I managed a few before terminal boredom got to me.

This post is going on a bit , so I won’t write about our afternoon out at the Hillier Gardens.

I’ll just show you.

It has been a beautiful day.

 

So beautiful that I was inspired to paint some papers.  The colours are a bit odd because I was experimenting with using watercolour to make paste paint, and  used up some left-overs. [Those dark marks are shadows, because the sun was shining!]

 

 

So beautiful that we had lunch in the conservatory for the first time this year – and I took my sweater off!

So beautiful that we tore up the ‘to do’ list and went to the Hillier Gardens, where there were spring flowers, 

 

 

 

camellias,

 

 

 

 

 

 

an amazing rhododendron, 

 

 

 

 

and beautiful trees.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The tea and cake were pretty good too.

But best of all – my beloved flowering cherry at home thinks it might almost be spring – there are little tiny red buds on there.

 

 

 

According to Google weather, there was a ‘chance of snow’ today -suppose it still might…

Bunking off college …

but with ‘per’ – as Wensleydale is prone to say, having read far too many ‘Jennings’ books as a child.

We were asked to do emergency Babybel sitting, so I arranged to go into college in the morning, and bunk off in the afternoon. It was a seminar and tutorial session so I grabbed the first tutorial and then W., B. and I all went to the Hillier Gardens for lunch and a play in their tree house. A good time was had by all despite B. and I being under the weather – turns out she has a virus in addition to the conjunctivitis we knew about.

The seminar/tutorial were very helpful and I have spent today sampling, in between the coughing and sneezing. 'Everyday’ has morphed into ‘family’ after the suggestion that we thought about what was most important to us. [Everyday > familiar > family had come out of my mind maps.]

This is more or less the idea  - you might think that you have seen something like it before! – but this will be at least a metre long and 2D. Oh, and made out of an old, faded, frayed curtain, with bleached out lines. And recycled textiles. And string. It’s a bit conceptual, this piece.

Why do I associate my family with tatty textiles, do you think?

I did draw the line at ripping up my GG grandfather's dictionary for it, as suggested by one tutor.

Another suggestion was that the circles [‘family circles’ – geddit?] should be made from textiles obtained from  – and possibly stitched by – family members.  So now I am cadging old clothes from my kids and their families … [I haven’t mentioned the stitching yet …]

I played around with a bit of curtain and the embellisher – adding holes and patches. The white was a scrap of silk noil I fished out of the bin, embellished from the front or back, which I really like.

 

 

I think the bleached circles will be stamped with a set of pastry cutters made by my grandfather. We are fairly sure they were joined with lead solder so I don’t use them for food! This is the effect on ink – the fabric samples are drying as I type. [I have four of these curtains, all about 3 metres by 1.5 metres, so I’m not skimping on the sampling …]

 

I also tried drawn thread work and other stitches using self threads from the curtain – the warp and weft are different, which gives some interesting alternatives – as does the fading. Loose ends are deliberate!

 

 

 

Can you tell I’m quite enthused by this?

We have a busy few days coming up so I probably won’t get much done before next week. The next step is – probably - a full sized mock-up, and experimenting with scanning and printing out bits from GG Granddad's dictionary – I thought I'd try tissue paper glued to the curtaining and see how that looked.

Sorry to go AWOL …

but things have been a bit busy around here, so not much creative has been happening, apart from a commission.

I don’t usually take commissions – I haven’t got the bottle to charge a realistic price, and I don’t like the pressure of working in a less slapdash manner than I usually do, to a deadline – but this was different. The commission is for a shopping bag for Babybel, so when she helps her mummy and daddy with the shopping she has a Babybel sized bag instead of a mummy and daddy sized one. [Sounds like a new version of ‘The Three Bears’.]

So I started a doggy bag- it’s not quite finished and it’s really a doggy and teddy bag, because I didn’t have enough dog fabric.

It is based on this pattern, except that it is smaller, I didn’t have the same fabric, and it will be an across-the-body bag. I have included the crayon pocket, as I thought that would make it dual purpose as Babybel loves to draw.

Not sure what to charge, but I think some kisses and cuddles might be about right …

We did manage a Tuesday trip today, to the Hillier Gardens again. I like the gardens in the winter, because you can see the underlying shapes of the plants so well at this time of year.  Very inspirational.

 

I also took charge of this – a kind gift from an internet acquaintance. In case you haven’t an inkling, it’s an Inkle loom [sorry] – so now I have another learning opportunity coming up. No, I don’t need another textile activity – but I thought I could use some of my redundant knitting yarns on it. Of course I don’t know what I’ll do with the bits of weaving when they are woven – that’s Plan B.

Last time I posted I asked if anyone could guess what I had printed this with. No-ne risked a guess – which means either that I stumped you – or that there is no-one out there …

 

 

The answer is - half a small onion.

 

 

 

 

 

We’re off on a college trip tomorrow – if it doesn’t snow. [It has snowed every Tuesday night this year.] We are going to this – so if you are in Southampton Art Gallery tomorrow and see a bunch of noisy students – that’ll be us. Hodgkin is one of my favourite artists, so I'm looking forward to it.

For the first time for months …

we had a Monday Meander.  Wensleydale is still finding walking quite difficult but he is fed up of being indoors, or only going where he can lean on a shopping trolley, so we took ourselves off to the Hillier Gardens.

It has been one of those lovely winter days which, as W.said, ‘we used to have’ – still, sunny, and very very cold. We had a look at the current textile exhibition, ‘Material World’, had a short walk in our favourite part of the gardens, the  winter garden, and then sought refuge in the cafe to warm up.

The exhibition seemed less interesting than it did last year – perhaps because many of the same people are exhibiting, or I’m getting pickier. Terrie the teacher has pieces in it, which are worth a look, and it is great if you want to buy interesting knitting wool – but as I am trying to reduce my wool stash, I passed by the alpaca, mohair, and locally grown and processed wool. [I coveted some bright pink mohair socks but I wasn't convinced they would survive my rather heavy handed washing.]

All this gadding about meant that I didn’t do very much else. I did finish this last night.  I realise it is a bit like a spot the difference competition – the only change from yesterday is the addition of some gold beads. The paler blurry bits in the background are not due to an inadequate scan but the colouring of the Colour Catcher.

Not sure why I’m so besotted with working with Colour Catchers – possibly because there are usually several lying around my workroom - which of course is because I don’t throw them away like a normal human being, I take them in there and iron them onto interfacing …

I did start a drawing this morning. It isn’t finished, because I want to colour the garnets red, with Inktense. The gold has been coloured with a metallic water colour pencil but you can be forgiven for not realising. It isn’t a ring, apparently, but some form of shield decoration. I love the wiggly shapes of the gold round the garnets, which were great fun to draw.

More wiggly shapes – repeating patterns made from the section of ‘tree’ on the left. The watercoloured ones fold up – and the explanatory label was added at the tutor's request. Good thing really or I wouldn’t have been able to remember what I’d done …

Unexpectedly available

but exhausted. The small tornado is in bed and [fingers crossed] asleep.

We had a good day but she has worn out her gran and granddad [known jointly as ‘nanny’] and QC [known as ‘meow’].

The biggest hit was her dad’s 30th birthday balloons which he nobly sacrificed for her pleasure.

She also enjoyed the slide in the tree house at the Hillier Gardens – and all the flowers – another of her new words.

I’m getting close to the last of the planks, but I like this Paint Shop Pro version which I can see in seeding or French knots, although I might crop it first!

A Wednesday wander

to the Hillier Gardens again, this time with Mr and Mrs Cheddar, although Ronaldo the wonder dog had to stay in the car. [She had a walk and a game of football later.]

We managed to get round most of the Art in the Garden we hadn’t seen last time. Lots of animals this year, although we didn’t spot any dogs. The pink pig apparently has a hornets’ nest in his nose, which is perhaps why he’s got it in the air …

 

 

There were also several flower-like forms. I love the rusty ball full of nails.

 

 

 

 

 

And lots of real flowers.

 

 

 

 

Today’s texture photo is also a plant – the stem of one of the enormous Gunnera plants near the pond. Amazing to think that last autumn they were cut down to stumps and now they are back to 6 foot +.

I’m not sure how you could work those little projections in stitch – perhaps picots?