NEC

is over, much to my relief. What with the weather and other things, it was pretty stressful. And I didn't even have the energy for much in the way of retail therapy. :<(

Take my tip, and never stay in a hotel at the NEC when a boy band is playing there. All their fans' parents will decide to sit out the concert in the nearest hotel bar and they will test the food service to breaking point. And the parents' cars will cause far more traffic chaos than the snow.

Still, here is Moving On in wall hanging mode, and some people seem to have bought some of my postcards.

Now I'm moving on to Hanger Farm. The embroideries are finished and tomorrow I shall photograph and frame them. Then I shall have to think of something else to do!

Over there!

A description of how I learned to love designing on Paddy on my long-neglected college blog, Paper, Plastic, String.

And an exploration of some of the things my second favourite app, iColorama, can do, on my photo blog, Cheese Snaps.

Thanks to my colleagues from neuf, 'Moving On' is now on display at the NEC. Please have a look at the Eastleigh College Stand if you are there. I shall be around on Saturday and Sunday mornings. 

One down, three to go.

One is the book, off on the first stage of a rather roundabout journey to Birmingham. 

Two is this, the first of three (I hope) for Hanger Farm. Of course its only an eighth of the size of the book, but then I've only got a fortnight to make the three in!

It's one of my apped photos, printed on one of Crafty Computer Papers fabric sheets, and about to get a little light embroidery. (And I did press it before I started...)

I ddn't make it to the Contemporary Textile Workshop today, but tonight I'm feeling much better,  after a good night's sleep and one of those events which gets your adrenaline going. Odd that I feel much better when I'm cross... 

I'm still alive

but only just. I think it's only flu but it has laid both of us low. We only managed  to watch a bit of the cycling world championships, that's how ill we've been.

Not much creative has been happening but I have finished this little sample, inspired by a 19th century cotton print.

Sorry for the dodgy photo but I was too knackered to find the camera so took it with the iPad. Not a good idea really.

Before the lurgi struck I was hoping to spend the weekend assembling 'Moving On', but that hasn't happened, so there will be some frantic work next week. 

Not a good week!

When life gives you snow...

do some snow dyeing. It was all a bit ramshackle, because it must be at least 2 years since I last did any, and I couldn't find the instructions I used then. This is the drawback to throwing out lots of printouts on the grounds that you can always find them on line...

I think last time I used a grid to hold the snow over the fabric, but which grid I have no idea. And as always, I forgot about threads till the last minute, so they got too short a soak in soda before going into the cat litter trays vat with everything else.

I found one set of instructions which involved stirring the dye into the snow and tipping it over the fabric, but I bottled out of that when I realised how much snow I needed. (A third of a table top, 10 cm deep, for each.) So I put the snow on top of the fabric and poured the dyes over the snow. 

I'll bag it up for batching later on. Nothing else is going to happen to it till Tuesday afternoon, and possibly not till Wednesday, depending on whether we are needed on Tuesday to look after a poorly, poxy VHC. (We knew something was up when he went off his food. The VHC never goes off his food.)

When not spreading blue dye over the house and garden, I've been working on some designs for yet another Karen Ruane class, called 'Alchemy'.

Yes, I know I still haven't finished the work for her last class, and I've got a book to make for the NEC in March, but I find her ideas so inspirational that when she offered another class I couldn't help but sign up. This one explores the design process from first idea to product (notice I didn't say 'finished product').

My theme might be described as Lancashire mill girl meets Japanese Boro cloth. I've researched my family history, and unsurprisingly, given where I come from, most of my ancestors came from Lancashire - apart from the Yorkshire ones. And all of them were working class. And where did working class Lancastrians work in the 19th century? In the cotton mills, of course. About a fifth of those I've traced so far worked in the mills, and others were dressmakers or hatters. Textiles run in my blood. 

Given their low incomes and large families, I think my foremothers probably spent more time mending than doing embroidery - which led to ideas about patched and darned cloth, and these stamped, drawn and collaged ideas. Apparently mill girls wore long aprons called 'brats', so I have a vague idea of making a Boro-ish apron. Or perhaps a book. Or just a cloth. 

But as soon as I've finished adding stitch to the left hand collage, I'll be back to 'Moving On'. Honest!

Something old, something new.

Starting with the new, something which always cheers me up in the middle of winter.

While I was out in the garden I took the opportunity to photograph some old friends. Some have survived better than others: 'Mirror' is looking very good, but 'Storm Cones' has become 'Storm Cone' and there was no trace of the other half. 

'Moving On' is not moving on much. The second attempt at page 3 is not much better than the first. W. reckons it needs more arrows, but that would mean some unpicking. I know he's right, but... 

I can't make up my mind whether to get started on page 5, which is sort of designed but needs some preparation, or bite the bullet and tackle page 3. I'll see what I feel like in the morning.

And finally - some exciting news <g>. The FDA graduates have been selected as the student team of the year, so we are invited to the Eastleigh College Awards Evening, where we will receive the applause of the assembled multitude, a pen set each, and presumably a bit of paper as well. 

In my former life I attended a number of college awards evenings, on occasions making witty boring speeches about awardees, so it will make a change to be on the receiving end. Bet it's no more exciting than the graduation ceremony, though, but hopefully with fewer speeches...

A bit of this and a bit of that.

The great sort out of magazines etc. has, I'm glad to say, been finished. I have a mountain of empty ring  binders, an avalanche of paper for recycling, a cascade of empty plastic pockets, and space  on my book shelves. All I need to do now is to get my act together about trying to sell my redundant books, and then there'll be room for some new ones!

I've also finished my subtitle-reading knitting. Take 2 different balls of wool and knit two stripes of each colour, increasing at the ends and twice in the middle on every other row till you run out of wool.  It has come out a little small, but I've been wearing it cowboy fashion in the neck of my coat, and it's very warm. That meant I had to find some more simple knitting, so there is another scarf on the needles. Of course I have lots of scarves already, but I'm on a mission to use up my stash and what's left is mostly odd balls, and sock yarn.

Speaking of subtitles, if you missed 'Borgen' last night, I strongly recommend you try to catch up with it, especially the first episode. As a summary of the pros and cons of sending soldiers to Afghanistan it beat any news programme I've ever seen - and it was much more interesting and moving than that description makes it sound. It was a bit confusing to see 4 actors from various seasons of 'The Killing' reincarnated into very different roles in life, especially when one of them was the Prime Minister before Christmas and is now a car salesman. But I digress.

I plucked up the courage to restart page 3 (or possibly page 4) of the book. Arrows going in all directions, symbolic of my general confusion and lack of decisiveness. 

Tomorrow we are being grandparental again, with not one but two spotty small people. Yes, the VHC copied his big sister and got chickenpox as well. A poorly big sister was easy to occupy, but a spotty 17 month old may be a little harder to entertain all day, but I'm sure we will rise to the challenge!

Good things and bad things.

Thing 1

I don't know what the weather was like in your neck of the woods yesterday, but in the neighbourhood of Cheese Acres the sky was blue and a golden glowing ball appeared in it, which the weather expert around here assured me was the sun.

So we decided to go to Hillier Gardens.

When we got to Hillier Gardens we drove round the car park and decided to go to Mottisfont.

Good decision. Their car park was also pretty full, but there were lots of Blue Badge spaces. 

We had an enjoyable stroll round the gardens, spotting a few more stars on the way. Then mince pie and coffee in the stables cafe, and a visit to the excellent craft exhibition in the house, where there were more stars.

Thing 2a & 2b

I've finished both my massive clear out of old magazine articles, computer printouts etc. I have also finished page 4 (or 3) of The Book. It looks more 3D in reality, although of course it isn't. I'm pleased with it.

After a visit to Hobbycraft on New Year's Eve, I am equipped with thread for page 3 (or 4) and I had hoped to have a replacement piece of fabric prepared and to get started tonight, but it hasn't happened. It won't happen tomorrow either as it is back to grandparental duties.

Thing 3

Babybel isn't back to school yet, so our intention had been to have a dog walk in the morning, then drop the VHC at nursery before taking Babybel to Mottisfont again, as she enjoyed the Star Trail and fish feeding so much. However (here's where the Bad Thing comes in) her daddy has phoned to say he strongly suspects she has chicken pox. I foresee lots of dabbing on of calamine, cuddling, and story reading in our future, plus a bit of playing on the iPad... Interesting that the only medical aspect of allthat doesn't seem to have changed in 60 years!

Serendipity.

As so often happens at the end of the year, it has turned into clear out time - old clothes, old magazines, and a few apps, because I decided I had far too many. Of course before I decided whether to delete them, I had to find out remind myself what they did. Which is where serendipity came in.

I started with this - Saga tubes - and bunged it into 'Glaze' which has so many options I find it a bit overwhelming. I made several versions, and I can't remember which one I chose for the next step...

which was 'Type Drawing', using 'Bradley Hand' font (hereinafter known as 'Sir Bradley') (sorry, couldn't resist). 

Yes, the so called original is square and the other is rectangular. Don't ask me why.

Then I used step 2 in 'Kyoobic' (ouch), 'Percolator' and my favourite, ’Decim8’. The 'randomise' button in the latter is responsible for the excess of images. 

But serendipitously, in one of them I spotted the motif I am currently besotted with. 

This one has the chevron motif lurking at the left side. So now it's gained a backing of wadding and the makings of some raw edge appliqué, and tomorrow it will get quilted and become page 4.

Unfortunately what was going to be page 3 has assumed the status of 'a sample to go in the work book to show what not to do'. I still think I have the basis of an interesting design, but it needs some tweaks, and the embroiderer needs to improve the standard of her stitching more than somewhat. 

However I haven't got enough of the right colours of thread to start again just yet, so it will have to wait till I can get to a thread shop.

On a more cheerful note, the third Karen Ruane block is finished - not a very good photograph, I'm afraid, there is so little daylight at the moment to try to get decent images. The snowflakes are actually lavender in colour, not this strange grey.

The initials are mine and my mother's - and that is a pocket in the middle. I think I shall put photos in it when the thing is finished.

In case I don't post gain before Tuesday, I wish you a happy new year, and a somewhat drier one for everyone in the UK, or anywhere else affected by the deluge  we have been treated to!

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!

The shortest day?

This is not an obscure reference to the end of the world, which had better get a move on if it is going to happen, except that, if it's based on Mayan time, we have to make allowances for their day ending several hours after midnight GMT.

It is an even more obscure reference to the fact that 35 some years ago I was experiencing one of the longest days of my life, which started in the small hours and ended a long time later, after a lot of swearing and yelling, with a bouncing baby boy. Of course he isn't really 35, it just isn't possible....

Happy Birthday, Cheese Major, so glad that after a few rough years things seem to be looking up for you.

Things are looking fairly good at Cheese Acres too. 

Page 1 is finished, apart from having some stiffening and a backing added, which won't happen until the very end.

A considerable amount of unpicking went into this, so even though it doesn't quite lie flat, it's staying that way. I have been called many things in my life, but 'perfectionist' is not one of them. (I actually typed 'peefectionist' which I rather like, but I'm not one of those either...)

And I've made a good start on page 2. In the chilly fastnesses of Wednesday night - or perhaps Thursday morning - I came up with the idea of making a stamp with Softsculpt from page I. 

So I did. 

Well, several stamps, because when I was searching for the Softsculpt, I found some Magicstamp shapes as well. Anyone else have stuff they don't remember buying?)

The result of the printing was rather paler I'd hoped, perhaps because the fabric paint is several years old, but paler was better  than too strong.  

Then, as I was reading old embroidery magazines in bed, I came across an article about Italian quilting - so the phantom tubes have been Italian quilted. (I hope you are impressed by the months of forethought and planning which go into my design process.)

As this is the only time I've ever done any IQ apart from C&G , when I used a sewing machine and a twin needle, and the result was very tight, I'm not quite sure to do with the ends. The book I consulted suggested quilting wool or piping cord, and as I had lots of the latter and none of the former, piping cord it was. The drawback to this is that piping cord is very prone to unravelling. I've left the ends quite long for now, but when I've had enough wine to stiffen my sinews, I think I will probably tack the ends to the backing fabric before I trim them a bit shorter. Then some random arrow stitches in the background and page 2 will be done. However, if I don't get it done tonight it will have to wait till next week, as we are having two small guests for a couple of days and I suspect there will be other things on my mind.

The small hours search for Softsculpt was productive in other ways. Not only did I throw away some things I won't ever use (feathers and tomato paste tubes, mostly) but I also found several packets of skeleton leaves left over from C&G, which will be useful for the next session of the Contemporary Textile Workshop. For once we've been told more or less what we'll be doing, so with any luck I will not be taking masses of stuff I decide isn't right when I get there. (As it isn't until the middle of January, perhaps I have been guilty of forethought and planning after all?)

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.

Playing around...

with my Karen Ruane piece.

Look at this piece and admire the dedication that made me tackle two of my least favourite stitches - cross stitch and bullion knots.

I must admit that I love the look of the cross stitch hearts on silk, so much that I bought some more waste canvas.

And my bullion knots are better now that I know the right way to do them (milliner's needle, wrap clockwise). Not good, you understand, just better.

The more I do on this piece, the more I like it. I can see so many things that I could have done better, but I still like it. As there is a lot of stuff in it which I inherited from mum, I find myself thinking about my somewhat ambivalent relationship with her as I work on it, which is quite bittersweet, and adds to the process.

Working on it has reminded me how much I enjoy flitting from one process/stitch/patch to another - low boredom threshold! Only having a little bit of cross stitch or a few bullion knots makes them tolerable and doable. And, as Karen points out in her videos for the course, you can always add more. I like to kid myself that I have a 'less is more' aesthetic, but  sometimes nothing succeeds like excess. 

I think it may become a work in intermittent but continuous progress, as I make more blocks to add to this one. 

I have also been playing with my tiny Sandra Meech sketchbook. I have a collection of printouts from the Internet for ideas for sketchbooks, and I decided to work my way through them with no very clear idea of where I was going. It ended up being a very productive process, giving me lots of ideas for my piece for the NEC in March. 

Hence the scribble on the yellow spread. 

It is definitely going to be called 'Moving On' (maybe).

It is definitely going to be a small concertina book (maybe).

It is definitely going to have eight pages (maybe).

It is definitely going to include those arrows (maybe).

It is definitely going to involve patching and layering fabric (maybe).

It is definitely going to use the indigo fabrics I dyed with Tiggy Rawlings last year (maybe).

It is definitely going to be hand stitched (maybe).

That led to some explorations of ways to join fabric together - only with paper. They are mostly stitch, although I have to admit that a little glue was involved, purely as a temporary measure, you understand.

The second image is the reverse of one side of the first one, and I included it because I like the way the backs of the stitches seem to develop from the black marks on the left - a B&W print of the over-enlarged detail of foliage on the right of the top image. The foliage is in the apped photo of a truck at the top, except I ripped that bit off.

I trust I make myself clear?

More joinings. I vaguely remember doing something similar for City and Guilds, except that variations of faggotting were involved in that one, and mine, which was black and magenta, ended up looking like a section from a tart's corset. Which in turn reminds me of the Rocky Horror Picture Show, although I don't remember any magenta corsets in that, even on Magenta... 

And as I correct yet another nonsensical autocorrection, I must point out that any post which is even more gibberish-ish (yes, autocorrect, that is what I meant) than usual is all the fault of Paddy the iPad (maybe).

Things are looking better.

Thing 1

is definitely better for a touch of emulsion paint. It is whiter in real life, photographing it in artificial light turns it yellow. I've added some beads and some more tiny French knots.

Thing 2

went black overnight, with a touch of red rub-on.  Also an improvement, I think.

I worked on a few more of the sketchbook pages, using the arrow motif which emerged from Kare Ruane's Ledger class. I'm not sure if I've mentioned that the Eastleigh graduates have been invited to take a stand here, which is very scary. Our theme is - guess what? - 'Moving On', and although that isn't why I started taking photos of traffic, they seem relevant. Of course the arrows are a long way from the photos, but the motif did emerge out of the picture bottom right, so there is a connection. I see possibilities in a couple of these.

I'm beginning to think that I prefer working with linear/geometric shapes - hence all those tubes. Have I discovered my 'preferred way of working' at last? Who knows - I could decide something completely different tomorrow...