Despite the weather...

(fortunately we were out of range of the Hampshire tornado) - and despite having a cold - I've had a busy and productive week. 

After Sandy's kind comments last week, I dipped the top of the wonky brown paper cylinder in some walnut ink, then tuned it right way up to drip.

I'm very pleased with the result, which looks distinctly landscapeish to me. It needs some stitch now, to make the most of those trees. 

I haven't got round to it because of exciting day out number 1.

Exciting day out number 1.

Recently I was invited to join a new textile/mixed media group, 'Visual Marks'. The first meeting was on Tuesday, in an area of deepest Southampton I've never been to before (wrong side of the river), so I fired up our new (and first) satnav, gritted my teeth and set off.

And got there and back safely and much quicker than expected - by me, the satnav was spot on. It was even better once I'd told it to avoid toll bridges...

The journey (and the parking) were the most traumatic bits, the session was fun. We did some mark making, as you might expect, given the group name. 

Group mark making, on quite a large scale - one piece in black and white, one in colour. Everyone got a bit of each to bring home and be inspired by.

These are my bits.

I scanned them, so they look a bit fragmented. 

Given the way my mind has been working recently, I rolled up my black and white chunk and thought 'vessel'.

So here's the beginnings, inspired by those chains of 'beads' on the original.

I got quite excited by the idea of beads, as that night we watched a good but too short programme about the Cheapside Hoard, from which I learned that Tudor  grandees were sewn into their jewellry - those long enamelled chains were sewn down to hold them in place. (That link will  take you to the exhibition website, but try Google images for pictures of the actual jewellry - it's stunning!

That led me on to blackwork, for the black and white piece, and Tudor embroidery for the coloured one. No idea if that's how they will end up, but it's how they are starting...

I took a little time out from thinking about - and researching - Tudor embroidery, and exploring ideas in my sketch book, to finish (?) the tesselation. 

Bird side up at the top, bunny side up at the bottom - I hope you can see them! 'Finish' gets a question mark because at the moment it's just a piece of quilting. I think it may become a bag for Babybel in due course.

Exciting day out number 2

The last event in a busy week was another 'neuf' meeting. Our multitalented member Nicky ran a session for us on working with glass. This was in the wilds of Hampshire rather than the depths of Southampton, so the satnav came into its own again. (It took me there one way and brought me back a different one - no idea if that is normal for satnavs but it made life interesting...)

In the session we all made a clock - Nicky even provided movements, and I can confirm that it keeps good time. Even if the placement of the blobs in mine is a lttle wonky. 

Then my colleagues made some exciting 'glass appliqué' images and I - didn't.

I was really taken with this glass, I just wish I had done it justice. I found the glass very hard to cut, hence the erratic edges. I don't see working with glass in my future, but despite that I enjoyed the session. And we needed a clock!

Next week should be a little quieter, except that our long anticipated, much needed new sofas should arrive on Wednesday, so I will no longer need to apologise to guests for the uncomfortable seating!

Endings and Beginnings

After spending a lot of time odd minutes here and there wondering what to do with these...

I poured the remains of a bottle of blue-black Quink into the smaller one. As you do.

As you can see, it spread up the sides in an interesting way. Osmosis - I think. No idea why it looks green on the bottom, though - and it's not just the camera, it really is greeny blue. 

It may not be completely finished - do I add stitch?  Wensleydale says not, as it looks like ceramic, but that makes me wonder whether I should be even making things that look like ceramic in fabric? Isn't a bit like making plastic things that look like wood? 

Long time readers of this blog may remember me wittering on about Tamsin van Essen who has certainly influenced me in making these, as, of course, has Edmund de Waal. Maybe I'm a potter in embroidere's clothing?

The wonky brown paper one definitely doesn't look like ceramic. I'm thinking of making it a sinamay jacket, except that my bit of sinamay isn't quite big enough...

This really is finished - inspiration on the right, completed embroidery on the left, with 5p to show how small it is. Got to use up some of that fine gauge canvas before my eyes get too bad to see what I'm doing with it! 

The beginning that has followed that ending is another piece inspired by the Contemporary Textile Workshop session last week. As I'm sure you can see, this is tesselated birds and rabbits - although I've just realised that if you turn the birds upside down they become rabbits.

I drew out the pattern, painted the birds with transfer paint, and ironed it on to some polyester satin - the duller back side, I resisted the tempation to go for the full bling. Now it's going to get some quilting, which hopefully will make it more obvious what it is.

And finally - a finished subtitle-reading blanket, and the makings of another one. I think this is the last of my oddments of machine knitting wool, so this should be the last blanket.

Does anyone else find that you tend to finish different things that you are working on around the same time, or is it just me?

Whoops, forgot these.  I found this bit of card, which I haved obviously used under some painting, when I was having a clearout. I was going to chuck it away, but it said 'sketch book covers' to me, so that's what it became. So that's a beginning and an ending in one -or three.

Things can only get better?

A slightly more cheerful week this week, although my insomnia has been particularly bad. But I slept well last night, the sun was shining when I woke up, and we had already planned a Sunday saunter. It was the last day of the Kathakali exhibition at the Discovery Centre, so, unusually for us, we ventured out at the weekend.

We thought the Discovery Centre opened at 10 at weekends, so we postponed our morning coffee till we got there. Bummer. It doesn't. And the Theatre Royal, which is our fallback coffee bar for such occasions, was closed too. As was the cafe across the road we've never been in.

But the new icecream parlour on the corner, which I have walked past and drooled at, was open. We resisted the icecream, but had lovely coffee (locally roasted), even nicer cheesecake, friendly and helpful service. And the reflections on the base of the table were fascinating.

I think the library cafe may have lost some customers. 

At 11, when the DC does open, we drifted along to find it was open but the Kathakali exhibition wasn't, yet. Bummer 2. So we went upstairs to watch 'Close Protection' by Graham Gussin again. 

We found it was well worth seeing twice - new ideas came out on a second viewing. (If you visit that link and read the description, although it seems like pure art speak, having seen the videos, it makes sense!)

When we went downstairs the Kathakali exhibition had opened, so we did manage to get a look at that. Wonderful vivid costumes with lots of bling, as well as more everyday dress. It made me want to visit Kerala, and see some Kathakali dance.

That was actually our second textiley trip of the week. Now the VHC is in nursery full-time, we have a little more time to ourselves in the middle of child minding days, and there is only so much shopping you can do. So we have been looking for places that are near enough for us to get there and back in time for the school/nursery pick up. This led to a second visit to the National Needlework Archive. (Only taken 4 years!) The main exhibition was of panels from the Quaker Tapestries. As I have made clear before, I'm not always a fan of representational embroidery, but this was different. Of course it's essential, given the nature of the subject matter, but the panels are beautifully designed and made, and the story they tell is fascinating. And there is an additional poignancy in seeing such a celebration of peace in the spiritual heart of the former Greenham Common Air Base. The women of peace got in in the end!

We also looked at the Country Wife, which who is under conservation there. When we went 4 years ago she was wrapped in bubblewrap and being saturated with nitrogen to debug her, but she is now lying down, being prepared for conservation. If you pay £2 extra admission, you get to see her and hear a talk about the conservation process - which is how I know why she was all wrapped up 4 years ago!

That was Thursday - Friday was the first session of this year's Contemporary Textiles Workshop, for which I have been repeating myself all summer. This session was about pattern - we had a Powerpoint talk (that's a first!) before trying a little pattern making - 

geometric collages

and geometrically based drawings.  In case you can't tell, this are my inept attempts at Escher-ish tesselations. (Actually I'm quite  pleased with them, and I'm thinking of trying one of them out with some transfer dye and a bit of poly satin...

I thought the collages looked like canvas work, so I set out to translate the green and purple one into stitch. I spent a lot of time faffing around with different threads and sizes, then got going with this.

Er - can you spot the deliberate mistake? Bummer 3.

I'm not going to unpick it now, I haven't got enough of that wool to start again, but I may try to do it properly at a later date. 

Living in interesting times.

It's been a bad news/good news couple of weeks. We had some worrying news at the start - the sort of sitation in which, because it involves other people, all we can do is offer support and hope for the best.

For some reason, my frustration led, not to embroidery, but to patchwork - just throwing together scraps of the colours which reflected how I felt. Then I found myself squaring off the resulting polygon - perhaps habit, perhaps my need to try to control what was happening. That was followed by scraped-on paint and some very undisciplined machine quilting. It is stalled now, partly because I need a break from it, but more because, unusually for me, I have plans for more machine work on it and I can't machine sew and watch cycling at the same time.

Fortunately, a few days later we got some excellent news. Let's just say that Babybel, to her delight, will be a bridesmaid some time next year. I'm not sure she knows what a bridesmaid is, but she knows there will be a pretty dress and an important role for her!

What with cycling and stress, not much embroidery has taken place, but there has been a lot of knitting. The second using-up-the-leftovers blanket has made quite a lot of progress. 

Before all the excitement, I decided I could improve this.

Definitely better - amazing what a little paint can do. The paint has also stiffened it up, so much that I don't think it would take stitch now.

These are my other papier mâché experiments. Abaca tissue and muslin on the left, brown paper and muslin on the right. And yes, it. is wonky!

I'm pleased with the contrast between these, but I'm not sure what stitch to try, so I'm putting papier mâché on the back burner for a while. (Sounds a bit inflammatory.)

Over the last couple of days, I have done something other than knit and worry.

A bit of hand quilting - transfer dyes on polyester satin, left over from my initial explorations of  repetition.

And some more experimental stitching on metal mesh - which is difficult to photograph with all the reflections.

Mmm - I seem to have developed a taste for bling!

Circuits and Bumps

All circuits now complete, I'm glad to say. I've had enough of circles.  These are all the circle pages.

They are even bound, and labelled. 

Although I've been thinking that it's time to stop repeating myself, it hasn't quite happened yet. I made these Kandinsky-inspired shrink plastic 'bumps' when I was doing City & Guilds, but never used them. I came across them when I was looking for something else (story of my life really) and decided their repetitious time had come.

This was inspired by some bedtime reading. In Moyra McNeill's book on drawn thread embroidery, she suggests màking slits in non-fraying fabrics like felt or Vilene, and working drawn thread stitches through the slits. It sounded repetitious to me, so here is an apped photo of the wrong side of a stained glass window at Salisbury Cathedral, printed on Tyvek. I cut it and worked twisted border stitch using lace instead of thread - photos before and after ironing. I've got some Evolon, felt and PVC lined up for similar treatment, though probably without the ironing.

However, I have moved on from repetitions. During another bit of bedtime reading, Fibrefusion's 'Beyond Boundaries', I came across a recipe for papier mâché you can stitch into, using muslin and abaca paper. Ah, paper tubes! (Maybe I am being repetitious?)

This is my first attempt. The odd colour is because I was using up some brown abaca. The bandaged appearance is because I got bored with wrestling with wallpaper paste and little scraps of musin and resorted to strips. I didn't take a 'before' picture but Wensleydale said it looked like a bleeding stump.

As you can see, you can stitch into it, although it helps if you make the cylinder big enough to get your hand into. The odd pattern is because I ran the couching along the edges of the bandage muslin.

Today I got a bit carried away. The one on the left is abaca and muslin, the one on the right is brown paper and muslin. Now I have to wait about 24 hours for them to be dry enough to bring into the house, and another 24 for them to dry out properly. Good job I've got some undrawn thread work to do.

Obviously I haven't given up repeating myself at all!

Four more pages finished.

Though not without some anxious moments. The top left page has drawing pin stitched circles - OK apart from the appliqued fabric not lying flat - and the smaller flower stitcher circles. First I had to remember how to use the flower stitcher, the instructions not being completely clear. And then I realised that the machine wasn't stitching out the patterns I had selected. They were interesting variations on zig zags, but bore even less resemblance to the diagram on the machine than they usually do.

Quiet panic set in - was I going to need a new motherboard? I have just had a welcome tax refund, but nowhere near enough to pay for a new Bernina motherboard!

Then it dawned on me that you drop the feeddogs to use the flower stitcher, so - I think - the machine was stitching out the sideways movement, the flower stitcher was doing the forwards movement, but any backwards stitches were not happening.

At least I think that's what it was - it stitched OK as soon as I tried it without the flower stitcher.

On the positive side, I had an idea what to do with the very boring bit of hand quilting below the flower stitched piece. It was coloured with Markals but it seems to get paler every time I look at it, so it definitely needed a lift.

The answer was elephants. 

I bought them ages ago and never found a use for them. I had to glue them down - no stitching holes - but they definitely improve the page.

The other two pages are pretty ordinary but, to tell the truth, I'm getting circled out.

Just two more to go. Some more boring quilting, machine this time, which is going to get some couching over the top. It was coloured with spray paints which are also doing a vanishing trick.

The other one is the sunprinting, which I didn't expect to work, but which was very successful. More couching for the larger circles - I'm pondering on what to with the smaller ones. Buttonhole rings come to mind...

Then a quick Japanese style binding and no more circles! Probably.

And finally - an apped-about photo from our Wednesday wander. We went to Salisbury to see the Rex Whistler exhibition at the Salisbury Museum, which is recommended, and I took a few photos of the cathedral, to play around with. I'm rather pleased with this one. Apps were XNSketch, Popsicle and iColorama, to blend the other two together.

Circuits and Bumps.

You may remember that at the conclusion of my last post I said I was going to play with Grilon, and similar threads, which shrink when exposed to heat.

Let's not talk about that, shall we? I spent the whole day trying to get one which worked. Three went in the bin, the fourth went in my sketchbook as an example of what not to to do. I'm sure it was me, not the threads, but I shall not be trying again.

Thursday was much better.

Wensleydale, Babybel and I (the VHC was in nursery) went to the North Pole. Must be true, here's a sign to prove it.

(Actually it is Mottisfont's 'Pooh trail', but don't tell Wensleydale.) 

So on Friday I turned my attention to a new challenge - trying out every method of adding colour to fabric I could think of. (Bar dyeing, I've done a lot of that.)

These are the results, apart from the transfer crayons which were too anaemic to be used and are hidden under the Bondaweb.

The Bondawebbed one - plus a bit of the Shisha one.

I challenged myself using this fabric - it's a shiny synthetic curtain fabric I bought when I thought my C&G 'goldwork' was going to be copper. 

It, and the accompanying resolved sample, turned out to be gold - and I still love them.

But I digress.

I started with the Gelli plate, freezer paper stencils and Colourcraft Aztec. 

Lesson 1

See that mottled effect? Aztec reacts to the Gelli like watercolour, it beads. Quite a nice effect but not what I was after. It also runs under the stencil, contributing to lesson 3.

Yes, those are holes.

Lesson 2

For machine cutwork, use two layers of tearaway stabilizer, one isn't enough. And choose a thread which   doesn't break every five minutes.

Lesson 3

Freezer paper stencils detach themselves from the fabric and cling to the Gelli plate with a vice-like grip, perhaps because I hadn't ironed them enough - this fabric does not like a hot iron. (See lesson 11.)

You don't need freezer paper stencils anyway, you can just use ordinary paper on the plate. Doh.

Lesson 4

Acrylic paint worked much better, but I overdid the textile medium. It does help to keep the paint from drying too quickly in a hot studio conservatory, but if it's too runny it runs under the stencils.

Lesson 5

Don't do monoprinting in 35 degrees C.

Lesson 6

The splodgy dots were done traditionally, with a stencil and brush at room temperature, but they still ran. I used Opalite which is lovely but I still haven't worked out the best way to use it. 

Lesson 7

Sometimes foil can be too bright. I added Hotspots and foil to the three circles next to the splodgy ones to try and make them more interesting, but now they are OTT. Not sure what I'm going to do with these. Emulsion paint?

Lessons 8, 9, 10 and 11

Markals (right hand end of the top row) and spray paints (underneath it), on this fabric, come out very pale but sunprinting with silk paints works well (left in the middle row). 

And Markal rubbed onto a nappy liner, ironed onto fabric, covered with another nappy liner rubbed with Chromacoal, stitched down and zapped is - er - interesting, but all that heat shrank the fabric

Lesson 12

Don't buy cheap Shisha rings.

All those lessons! No wonder I'm tired. Just hope I remember them.