Another experiment.

As promised, the green Sheila Hicks-inspired binding has been coiled into a bowl. I am ambivalent about it - I love the combination of colours (the contrast between the wool and the perlé cotton binding is not as pronounces as it looks in the photos), but I don't like the floppy, about-to-fall-apart feel. Previous experience suggests that embellishing it might firm it up, but I think that may destroy the variegated colours.

The underlying problem is that the cord itself is too soft. It is firmer where it is bound, but if I bound it completely I'd hide the variegation - and I might as well use washing line, as I did for the first one, which is still my favourite.

I think I prefer that technique to this one, but before I make up my mind completely, I'm going to try another experiment. 

I thought I'd get stuffing. 

You might think from this image that I have completely lost any taste I ever had - but this is, after all, an experiment. (If you like orange, yellow, blue and magenta together, I apologise to you. I don't.)

Heaven knows where I got the knitted ribbon from, but last night its time came. I spent an hour stuffing it with some orange threads I also didn't see myself using anywhere else - I know it was an hour because I was watching the Vuelta at the time, although the stuffing stopped when it got exciting.

The other ingredients include a spice jar top for the centre, inspired by Lois Walpole, orange perlé, and some beads - although I will admit I'm not sure about the beads...

Watch this space.

Tonight's app is Haiku - another Jixipix app, so you know it'll be good - and different. There are lots of options which can be adjusted in various ways, and a magic 'randomise' button.

I love both of these versions of the landscape

It wasn't so successful with the portrait and flower, but still interesting.

Despite the weather…

I’m feeling a bit more cheerful than I have for quite some time.

Partly because of this lot, made last week.They are more Unidentified Litterlike Objects – and a cat. [I didn’t kae the cat]. The ULOS are, clockwise from top right:

1. three bits of woven, ironed plastic bag;
2. Another bit of Japanese wrapping – rolled newspaper, twigs and plastic bag cord;
3. The leftovers from 2 of the woven pieces, used on my flower looms. [I don’t know why I have both a Clover and a Prymm one, but they do produce slightly different results.]

The odd photos were because I was experimenting with some of the different settings on the camera – this one is ‘pin-hole’.

The better reason for feeling cheerful was the lovely afternoon we had yesterday with Babybel, Babyboy, their mum and dad, Mrs and Mrs Cheddar and assorted dogs. [Quality Control decided not to attend.]

It had been a foul morning, but by the afternoon the sun had come out and we had a great time. We went along to cheer, baby mind, hold dogs, etc. etc. while Babybel and Babyboy’s mum and dad competed in a 4k race. Yes, I did say Babyboy’s mum. To save you backtracking through old posts and counting on your fingers, he was 2 weeks old on Saturday. And not only did she compete in the race, she won! [Well done. L!]

Needless to say, her role model is Paula Radcliffe.

Oh – their dad came fourth. Well done, R!

This afternoon, less excitingly, has been spent making several miles metres of wired plastic bag cord – and very slippery it is. This is for the purpose of experimentation in another Japanese Basketry technique.

I’m feeling a little more positive…

after a bit of playing around, starting with the thing top right in the photo. It is the plasticky cover from a used up WH Smith’s sketchbook – too good to throw away. I knew I'd think of something to do with it eventually.

I cut out the corners – and they looked useful so I rounded their corners, punched a hole in the corner and added a clip. But that wasn’t the main plan.

I sliced the sides up and punched holes in the ends of the slices – those piano-key-like things bottom right.

Can you tell what it is yet?

Then I found some goodies – sari silk goodies. I bought some more recently from Simply Sequins – so much temptation!

 

And in a departure from my usual round basket – I made a rectangular one.

OK – it’s not flat – but nobody’s perfect!

 

And I’ve got another two sketchbook covers and a whole heap of sari silk.

I also had fun with these. 

At Hobbycraft yesterday I bought a tiramisu kirigami calendar in the sale – as you finish with each page, you fold it, cut along the dotted lines and end up with a paper snowflake – or something. I thought it was a bit expensive even at sale price, but I like paper cuts, so I decided 5.99 wasn’t a lot to pay for 365 days of fun. [Turns out there are only 6 designs per week so it’s not quite such a good bargain…]

Of course it started on January 1st and today is February 23rd, so I’ve got a bit of catching up to do.

I had to decide what to do with the paper cuts after I’d cut them– so I stuck them on some paper – along with the negative spaces – which, as you may be able to tell, was a rather more challenging task. But I do like negative spaces.

And all that despite a bad night – which I turned to some purpose by playing with GIMP, and the graphics pad. I even braved the lasso tool, although I can’t work out why sometimes it did what I wanted it to do – i.e. lasso the internal shapes of my squiggle – and sometimes it just drew triangles.

 

 

Thanks to Karen for pointing me towards this article on Melody Johnson’s blog – I do dip into it regularly because I love her work, and her use of colour – but I hadn’t read that piece. I have printed it off and will refer to it often. I particularly liked this bit ‘Play with your fabric and make what the fabric motivates you to make.’ 

I’ve been feeling that I ought to be ‘doing designing’ before I start making – but I much prefer to play with my fabrics and threads and see what emerges. In theory I know my way is legitimate – but as I used to tell people when I was working, there is a big difference between knowing something with your head and knowing it with your heart. I don’t yet know it with my heart.

I shall continue to draw on the computer every day, even if what I’m drawing [especially if what I’m drawing?] has nothing to do with embroidery! Sumopaint has a fun feature which draws symmetrical patterns – so maybe tonight I'll find time to draw some kirigami …

You may have wondered…

what I was going to do with the hank of sari silk [although some of it feels like sari polyester] I bought earlier in the week.

You and me both.

However, today it told me it wanted to be a Lois Walpole bowl,  in these muted colours, so I had to go through the hank removing the brighter ones.

I have another piece of this corrugated card, so I hope there will be enough of the other colours to make a second bowl.

I also did a proper landscape drawing [sort of], on some paper which had been washed with inks. I picked out some of the foliagey shapes with Inktenses, and deepened some of the colours in the ‘water’ and ‘grass’. I’m quite pleased with it, and may have another go.

This was all this afternoon – in the morning we went to a small exhibition by students from Winchester School of Art, in the Theatre Royal. I was particularly impressed by Amy Madron’s projected images and Melanie Evans’ layered sheers with screen printing [?] and a tiny amount of stitch. Worth visiting if you are passing, although it finishes on Monday so you’ll have to hurry.

You will probably have guessed that I’m avoiding talking about the landscape I started on Wednesday. I spent an hour or so last night, while listening to a rerun Rebus [don’t get me started on what a waste of Ken Stott/Ian Rankin that series is] putting running stitches in the hills, and half an hour this afternoon taking them out again. Too heavy [I’ll have to go down to a single thread of floss or hand stitch with machine embroidery thread] and I need to think very carefully about stitch direction.

While I was unpicking I pondered on why I don’t want to machine embroider it, although everyone who's commented on it obviously thinks I’m mad not to. Partly it’s because I’m not a very competent or confident machine embroiderer – and yes, I know I'd get better if I practiced, but I don’t particularly want to. Embroidery for me is a slow, contemplative process - and machining isn’t. I also find machine stitch quite restrictive – basically all you can produce is a line. It may wiggle, it may have blobs, it may have loops of the bobbin thread showing – but it is still a line. And usually an unbroken line is not what I want – although in this case it might be...

I did take a good look at the piece and to try to decide how I might machine embroider it – and it didn’t actually solve the problem of the orientation of the stitching. It would just be quicker to sew and  slower to unpick.

So sorry machine embroiderers –  I admire what you do, but I don’t want to do it myself.

Just like half-marathon running – ‘Go Mrs Cheese Minor’ who will be hitting the streets of Gosport/Lee on the Solent tomorrow while the rest of the family cheer her on.