Just a quicky

I may have mistakenly given the impression

that I was going to start the first stitched piece of the FDA this week.

Turns out I was wrong.

We did have a session on Wednesday entitled ‘Everyday Cloths’. [The first stitched piece has the title ‘Everyday’. Cue Buddy Holly. But I digress.]

We did do some stitch.

But any connection between the session and the piece was strongly discouraged.

We started by looking at everyday ‘textiles’ [in my case a tea towel, a kitchen cloth and a pan scrub] through a magnifying glass and a microscope – and drawing them with graphite sticks and ink. Then we rubbed the graphite with linseed oil and splashed the ink with water. Hence the ‘stick’ through the pan scrub top right, which is a dribble.

Then we made ‘collages’ inspired by the drawings – followed by stitched pieces inspired by the collages. Design twice removed you might say – and a loooong way from the originals.

I am particularly fond of the ‘pan scrub’ which is a giant whipped spider’s web worked on a junk CD. The strange lumpy thing on the left is gathered calico with added bits. No, I don’t like the colour scheme either, but we were leant on [in this totally non-directive course] to use the colour scheme of the collage.

Next time I'll think about the newspaper I use. Oh, the dear dead days when newspaper was just black and white…

Mind you, I did get away with making 3D collages which were supposed to be 2D but ‘reflect the depth’ we saw in the microscope.

Actually it was a very enjoyable session! I need a microscope. And an OHP.

Today’s excitement was the arrival of this lot - the results of me going  a bit mad with the plastic a day or two ago. I decided we didn’t have enough books. [I can hear the laughter from those that know me from here…]

But it was here – so this lot didn’t break the bank. We get their paper catalogue, and Wensleydale fancied the book on North Yorks monasteries, and I fancied the one on Nano Nature.

But while I was on line I strayed into the textiles section and a few more books fell into my shopping basket.

Janice Gunner’s ‘Shibori’ book is one I have coveted for a long time, since I dribbled over A’s copy years ago. Full price - £18.99. Amazon's price - £11.99. Postscript’s price - £4.99.

I am not responsible for any damage you do to your credit card if you go over to Postscript …

Missing in [rather more] action – again.

I didn’t disappear off the face of the earth – I’ve just had rather a busy time.

It was Contemporary Textiles workshop again on Friday, during the course of which I produced this. 

It was temporarily stapled to the board, which is why it is curling – and it looked much better when A. added her bit of skyline next to it so the bridge had somewhere to go.

The idea was that we each made a cityscape to mount next to each other in the corridor. [I’m sure the imminent visit from HM Inspectors had nothing to do with this desire to fill the walls with work…]

In case you don’t recognise the scene, it is taken from an old newspaper photo of  this – but from a different angle.

When I got home from college, I had to brace myself for the arrival of this young lady, here setting out to climb a tree

 

 

 

 

in pursuit of this rather older lady. She didn’t quite make it.

 

 

 

I don’t understand how the date for Mother's Day is decided upon, but it must be a moveable feast because sometimes it falls very close to my birthday – and sometimes it doesn’t. This year  was one of the former, so we had a gathering of the clans over the weekend with celebrations for the two events. I ended up with a collection of very well chosen prezzies – this lot, plus an enormous bunch of roses and some Hobbycraft vouchers.  And a carrot cake and some angel cakes made by Babybel and her mummy. What more could a granny ask for?

Thanks to all those of my readers who made such a great weekend possible …

Missing in [in]action.

Sorry to disappear without trace, but it turned out that what I thought was post-portfolio-preparation lethargy was actually the precursor of a stomach bug. You don't want to know the details – let’s just say that over the last few days I've done a lot more sleeping than usual, and a lot less eating.

So all I've achieved creatively is this notebook – and most of it was done on Saturday.

 

 

 

 

I did drag myself into college today because I though it was hand-in day for the presentation write-up. Turns out it’s next week. Trust me to be over prepared.

We were given written details of Module 4 – but probably because I was feeling off colour I whinged because I think being given the written details isn’t enough, they need to be discussed. No-one else seemed to want to back me, although lots of people have said the same thing to me privately – but I always used to tell my students to speak up if they didn’t understand, because they would be speaking for lots of others, so loud mouth ploughed on – and won a promise to go through it in more detail later. I think the staff are so terrified of being directive they leave everything open – but as they do actually know what they want it would be better if they told us … [E.g, no pinked samples.]

Then we did the pre-portfolio-hand-in session – which was really helpful because it fleshed out the written instructions on  what should be included in the portfolio…

Don’t normally wash dirty linen in public. I am really enjoying the course  - we have a stitched piece to make now, entitled ‘The Everyday’, which is interesting – but it would be more enjoyable if had more idea of what I was supposed to be doing!

Perhaps the end of the beginning …

but definitely not the beginning of the end.

All of the first semester’s work,  which hasn’t gone already, is written/drawn/printed/stitched/mounted/bound and ready to go to college. The presentation write-up is due in on Wednesday, when we also have to take in the drawing studies work for advice on what to include and what not. Then we bring it home, weed it, and take it in again the following week…

And hints were dropped that we might start doing some stitching before long – can’t wait!

In the meantime, I've made two more of these.  I’m a bit brooched out, now – no more ideas for brooches but I have started thinking about book covers.

However I’ve started nothing, because I’ve felt quite inert today – probably because all that lot above is finished. So I spent the afternoon veged [vegged?] out on the sofa reading ‘The Suspicions of Mr Whicher’ – good, innit?

Nose to the grindstone,

shoulder to the wheel, slaving over a hot computer. Yesterday was group presentations day – which means today was spent writing a report on researching the topic and delivering the presentation. This is the penultimate deadline – due in next Wednesday – but I couldn’t start it until we’d delivered the presentation, which is why I've been working on the final deadline – until now.

Not an exciting way to spend an afternoon – apart from the thrill of battling with Office 2007, which seems to need at least two clicks – or ‘Help’ and several clicks – to do things you could do with one click in XP. And does any human being really need 40 alternative ways  to add a page number?

But – it is done – with nearly a week to spare - which may seem like overkill, but when we got a phone call on Monday afternoon asking us to look after a sick little girl, I didn’t have to worry about the preparation for the presentation which was finished, done and dusted.

The little patient is with her other grandparents now, and seems to be recovering nicely.

Tomorrow will be spent finishing off the portfolios for the final deadline – and we are promised that we might actually get round to doing some stitch soon.

In the interim I might make some more brooches …

It’s just like eating Pringles …

I can’t stop – making these, that is. [They are all the same size, the difference is down to Picasa getting artistic.]

It dawned on me last night that they didn’t have to be round – and I also found a tutorial on making these little 3D flowers, which remind me of gentians.

So I found myself working on the lower one in the middle of the night – yes, it was one of those nights again.

I’ve got another one cut out – rectangular this time. Two more and I will have run out of brooch pins – but I am thinking of notebook covers. Now there’s a surprise …

I have also finished pasting Raphaels into my sketchbook – but didn’t get round to the final evaluation. Once that’s done, that will be 3 pieces of work completed, only one more to go – till the end of the next semester - assuming I don’t get number 1 back on Wednesday with instructions to start again …