Category Archives: Uncategorized

TRAVELLING BOOKS

Nothing for months and then the posts come along like buses! 🙂

Some branches of the Embroiderers’ Guild have started travelling books and my branch (Lutterworth) is taking part. Basically what happens is that participating members are divided into groups of six and each member buys a small  (5 x 5″) spiral bound sketch book. The book one starts with ultimately becomes yours at the end of the process.

I worked page one in my own book and then at the next meeting passed it on to the next member in my group of six……. and so on. We have just come to the end of the first round and below are the pages I made. For some reason one is missing, but you will get the idea.

This week we will hand these six books over to a new team and receive theirs in return. Then begin the rounds again, until the books are full. At the end the first one becomes mine to keep.

I am finding it is fun and not too onerous as the pieces are small and one has a month to finish it.

Page one in what will become my book at the ed of the process

Page one in what will become my book at the ed of the process

Detail of page one

Detail of page one

It just happend to be Christmas when I did this one!

It just happend to be Christmas when I did this one

Daisies, stamped and embroidered

Daisies, stamped and embroidered

Abstract flower on my own dyed fabric

Abstract flower on my own dyed fabric

I called this Perfect Day . It is painted Pelmet Vilene and hand stich

I called this Perfect Day . It is painted Pelmet Vilene and hand stich

GARDEN WALK ON 1st AUGUST

After spotting a butterfly I hadn’t seen in the garden before, I went out to see what it was up to !

Brimstone Butterfly

It was a brimstone and was investigating mainly the marigolds, which although colourful are the bane of my life as they have spread all over everywhere.

While I was out there I did my usual walk around the garden to see what else was out. There isn’t much there now as most of my flowers have gone over. I really need to do something about the gap in the seasons here.  I NEED autumn colour.

Cosmos

The Cosmos are still gorgeous. And of course the gardians of the garden are always there looking very affable… but cross them at your peril!

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MIXED MEDIA WORKSHOP Day One

I have just enjoyed two very hot but very enjoyable days at the Bramble Patch with Hilary Beattie. This post is going to show some random images I took of what was happening around the room.

(As usual you can click on the images to enlarge them)

This week we were working with re-cycled papers, fabrics etc. in order to make more images from which we can choose when we come to the design workshops later.

The following two collages are a selection of what I saw other people doing.

Edits 1           Edits 2

Next we have our fearless leader dispensing pearls of wisdom to some of the students. Hilary went round the class doing this for us all so that we had a good idea of what we still need to do before we get to the design stages of our final pieces , which will be started in September.

Edits 3

 

WORKSHOP WITH ANGIE HUGHES

Today, I have been at The Bramble Patch taking a workshop with Angie Hughes. Her workshops are always very informative and fun so it was a great day. Thanks Angie.

Today we were making front and back covers for a house shaped book.  The images which folllow are works in progress.

First is Karen’s… sorry about the backgrounds but as I said they are still being worked on.

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Next is Anne’s

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Angie was workimg along with us and this is hers. She had also brought along her button making press and you can see some of the demo buttons here too.

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Here is Joan’s

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Next is Dorothy’s

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Last but not Least we have Mary’s

First her box front

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Secondly, here is one of her pages.

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Now all we have to do is finish them! Oh… and make the pages! 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

RAIN RAIN RAIN

How different the roses look today!

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When I was little my mum used to say, “come and look, the rain’s making the fairies dance”

Well mine were dancing in it today! Can you see them? They are having a high old time!

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Mum used to love the rain and she would sometimes dress us all up in wellies etc. and take us out in it!

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EXHIBITION IN LONDON

I promised to show the pictures I took at the Prism group’s exhibition, CODED:DECODED, unravelling the message,at The Mall Galleries last week. I took far too many of course, so here is a selection of the work that really appealed to me personally.

I thought the whole exhibition was very well curated and although, of course, not everything was to my personal taste (what would the world be like if we all liked the same things?)  I didn’t see a single piece of poorly executed work. Very well done to all concerned.

The first three are some of those by Jackie Langfeld and are called Dis-Functional

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Next we have a piece by Consuelo Simpson called Hidden History : hedgerows

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The next two are by Ali Brown the first called Cod-ed and Deco-ded, the second was called Iwashi and concerns sardine fishing.

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The next set were hilarious, by Charlotte Sewell …..a line of elderly women waiting at a bus stop. Called ‘More to me than meets the eye’ lift up the curtain and see the inner self. 🙂

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Next the work of Alice Fox based on fallen leaves, which she thought had letter like qualities that couldn’t be deciphered.

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Next, Julia van den Bosch, Hedge Parsley on Ham Lands.

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Gina Ferrari’s work. Mixed Emotions, concerning the difficulty of deciphering the expressions of an autistic person.

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Anita Bruce’s work called Hymn To The Dawn was a series of 4ft panels, (of which these examples are close ups) was accompanied by bird song which was really beautful.

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The Book below is by Lisa Earley, called the Escape Artist and is a companion piece to a large double layered wall hanging called A Life Worth Living. It concerns the artist Paul Nash who faught during WW1 and was invalided home. While recovering, he painted scenes from the war from his sketchbook, which he exhibited This led to him being sent back as a war artist.

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As I said, this is a small fraction of the exhibition. There were some I wanted to include but were difficult to photograph for various reasons so I had to abandon those. Amongst them I loved Pauline Cattle’s needle felted piece but couldn’t get a good image of it.

Anyway… Well done everyone.