The Lilac Project

Another set of Helen's Towers of Flowers from Stitch Magazine.  These are for a friend .............. I hope she likes them .............. they're a bit purple though aren't they?   Not quite the perfect back drop but the lighting was better outside

 

The eyes - well according to opticians it's an age thing but from near perfect eyesight to reading strength about 4 and distance glasses in 6/7 years is a bit of a concern especially as my old reading glasses were ideal for the computer until a couple of weeks ago.  If I need my reading glasses for that then they soon won't be strong enough for stitching ............ I'm finding hand stitching with the precision that I like difficult anyway ................ not to mention threading needles!  The free machined flowers above were a bit "hit and miss" stitching a foundation grid to incorporate the outlines ............ I seem to lose focus frequently.  Opticians just don't understand unlike the lovely ladies who read my blog ........... thankyou for your good wishes everyone!

Snow, Felting & Giveaway Winner

With some snow on Wednesday & more forecast, I had decided to set Thursday aside for some felting but was distracted ................. the hills from our back garden ..............

Along the top of these hills runs a lane ................... Four 4x4 vehicles & eight young men got stuck there late Wednesday night when they met an abandoned vehicle and, after several hours attempting to free themselves huddled together in two vehicles for the night.  From being able to see the road when they came to a halt, daylight came .......................

Thankfully, one of our sons and his 7 mates managed to get out of this and another vehicle and get home safely.


I have finally got round to doing some felting today.  I have used resists and felted over objects before but this is my first attempt at using a balloon ............... not sure that it's quite the sea urchin shape I was aspiring to but it's a vessel nonetheless.  My special Valentines gift was being allowed to play all day so this is for my husband ............ when it's finished ............

Thankyou for all the comments on my giveaway post ........... I really was surprised to see so many.  Each comment was assigned a number (by myself) in order of posting, written on a piece of paper, folded and placed in a bowl.  Independantly witnessed by aforementioned no. 2 son, my husband picked out no. 2 .................. Sue from "The Magic Armchair Traveller in Stitches" whom I will be contacting shortly.  I must mention that said son was really quite perplexed that people had actually said that they would like one of the bowls and wonders why on earth somebody would want one ................... same reason as I would I suppose.  There's nothing like family to give you an inferiority complex eh?
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100th Blog Post Giveaway

The draw for the giveaway has now closed ............. the winner to be drawn shortly

To mark the occasion of this, my 100 blog post, and as a special thanks to everybody who reads my blog, I am giving something away.  Remember the small bowls that I made last year .................... if you would like a chance to win one (either the darker blue or the purple as I use the other one) then just leave a comment at the end of this post.

Names will be put into the hat next Sunday, Valentines Day .............. be sure to let me know who you are and a way of contacting you if you aren't linked to a blog.
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Tea for a Prince?

The first cup & saucer ................ I think I've acheived what I set out to do

Whilst in progress, comments from 3 different family members ...............

"Will you be able to drink out of it?"

"It must be alright, even I can see it's a cup & saucer!"

"What are you making?" "Cups & saucers" "What for (with a tone that meant what on earth for)?"  "Just to see if I can" .............. silence ..............

I cut 6 sets in total but perhaps we could do with an orderly kitchen for a day or two before I continue ..........
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Cups & Saucers .........

I have a problem and that problem is "If I use it then I'll have no more". Playing, sampling, trialling, designing even is using stuff up - stuff that I might need for "that" future project BUT if I don't play around and use things then that special piece or project is never going to materialise!

Quite a few of my fabric paints (they are mostly about 10 years old now) are drying up especially where the lids have cracked or split ................... so I need to use them!  I have been very brave and used a whole metre of pelmet vilene and a whole metre of painted bondaweb on these.  I had planned to use another metre (the last one) of bondaweb and said to my husband earlier that they may be better with doubling up the vilene too ........... "and" he said.  "well, I won't have any of that left either" .................. "and" he said .................. hmmmm, we'll see ................... .

I'm happy with the "deco" shapes, looking forward to embellishing and, hopefully, catching up with some more blog reading! 

edit - looking at the above photograph, I've just realised that I commented on some blue & white spotty cups of Jackie's this afternoon ................. the "holes" in my blue cup weren't really planned around anything - I just had the soldering iron out for another holey (obscured by the pic) cup still flat to which I intend to add swirls.  Another one of those strange coincidences!
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Enough Birds I Think ........

These bits only really came about this week due to me looking through my bags of scraps to see how I could minimalise it a bit and found two partially cut out birds (again from Nellie's pattern ) .....


and enough strips left over from bowls to make some mini ones (handy to keep by the sewing machine) ,,,,,,,

My husband seems to think that it would be a good idea to make more of these to keep handy around the house for dropping threads into rather than them falling to the floor - good idea in theory maybe but in practise ................... !

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Thankyou for your lovely comments about the bag in the last post - am really pleased with it.

"Anemone"

It's finished and I love it!

This is me or at least I think it is - texture, dimension, a favourite colour combination and the sea. Now to try get on with some of the more mundane things in life, time management is not my forte, drizzle stitch is much more exciting!

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I've been using a laptop of late so find it difficult to see if the colours are accurate but I think this one is ok.

Clingfilm

Thankyou for all your lovely comments everyone - they are very encouraging. I have curtains to alter, a garden to weed and numerous other jobs around the house but sometimes it's good to do something fun.

Snippets of lightweight fabrics on a cotton background with the outside ring of a hoop beneath .......



Clingfilm carefully laid over and the inside of the hoop fitted all ready for some machine embroidery to hold the snippets in place ...............



Machine embroidered, ironed beneath baking parchment and fitted into a small hoop ready for some embellishment ................

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to fit inside this hand dyed silk "cup"

Accessorising

The dust and paint fumes got to my respiratory system and caused havoc for the best part of a month. However, this past week I have started to feel better so it's time to get on with some accessories for the living room. Here is the first cushion .............


I love the texture and shabby chic essence of faux chenille quilting even if cutting the channels through all those layers is rather hard going on the fingers.

Another coiled fabric bowl - this one's for keeps!

Back to Bowls & Pots

I hadn't planned to do another post about the coiled vessels right now but on catching up with all the blog reading have just noticed a comment from Bethel of Bethnia posted back in November! It has also come to light that I am not getting all the email notifications for comments so can only guess that our provider is filtering them out as spam.

Here's another one made before Christmas which I still have (there were some that I forgot to photograph before they were given as gifts) ..........



In reply to your comment Bethel .............


Yes, mum did like! She said that my brother had admired it too so asked me to make him one for Christmas which I did - not purple with "flowers" though!
I haven't had any problem with the tension at all. Here is the type of polyester washing line that I use together with a picture of the first bowl that I did. I try to keep the coils snugly fitting as I stitch and try to hold the bowl at the same angle for each complete turn (I just use a pin on the inside to mark the start point). I realise that's it's some time since you commented on these but if you have any further questions then do please ask - only to happy to help!

Some Presents .............

It's ages since I blogged ................. not much to tell really. I haven't been doing much stitching but I don't seem to be have been doing much else either - the garden is crying out for attention but the weather being so warm for this time of year means the mining beas that have taken up residence in the flower bed are still a nuisance. I did add a little decoration to one of the bowls for mum's birthday .................



And I've been doing some folded patchwork which is quite fun but I won't show all of it as it's for Christmas and the intended recipient just might see it ............

Picking Oakum?

I tried making a coiled handbag (somewhat similar to this in shape) but it didn't work out. I forgot to take a photo but it started to get a hood at one end (something like this)! One can't do much else but think whilst spending 5 hours undoing 6 hours of machine zig zag so was it therapeutic or more akin to picking oakum albeit I was in my own home and had the luxury of cottom materials? Anyway, I now have a lovely purple bowl and pot ..........





Many thanks for all your comments, encouragement & suggestions. In a way, I think you are all right. Yes, a clay type fastening would be more in keeping - I had thought of other materials but (if I'm honest) was being too lazy to go searching out other things and trying to use what was right next to me (slapped wrists!). Yes, simple might be best and, yes, I probably am being too hard on myself but then I suppose I wouldn't be me if I weren't would I? I'm trying to forget it for a bit as the more I look at it, the more I see that the binding around the top is very uneven on the inside ?????

One Finished ............

I'm very pleased with the bowl ............




but I'm not sure that I'm happy with the pot as a "finished" item ..............


All/any criticism welcome please. This is the second attempt at adornment - the first was button beads all around the top which didn't work out either. I quite liked the idea of machined cords but needed something to "tie" them together and now I'm not sure about it at all - I was really hoping to put these two "to bed" before starting on another. Not being in a class situation or in touch with like minded artists does have it's disadvantages at times.

On a different, more positive note, I am delighted to see that I've got a mention on Sharonb's "In a Minute ago" - that is exciting!

A Couple More Bowls

Continuing to play around with shapes, quite a large bowl which I am really quite pleased with. My husband has tried claiming it as a fruit bowl this morning but it's not really my colours so we shall see!



I tried experimenting with a different sized stitch for the smaller pink/purple batik one but it's a mess and wish I hadn't used that fabric up now - still you don't know until you try do you?


Aside from these two bowls I don't really know what I've been doing since my last post. I did spend nearly a day wrestling with the sewing machine and cheap thread before finally admitting defeat and a day helping my mum with housework since she is recovering from a major operation but apart from that ............. time management springs to mind!


That chicken fabric that I bought the other week had a little too much print to wrap easily - still it's a bit too pretty to cut into strips really!


Thanks for taking the trouble in look in the chandlers for me Chris, I shall keep a lookout for other suitable materials whilst out and about and perhaps do a bit more experimenting!

A Pot!

Working inside the vessel to try and achieve the kind of shape I wanted was quite hard but (one very sore finger and a blunt rotary cutter later) worth it ...................

Embellishment was the plan although I quite like it how it is (apart from the scruffy stitching due to the awkwardness of the positioning).

Shopping

The finished bowl ........




I'm impressed too (it is actually more circular than the angle of the photograph shows) considering that I never removed it from the machine from start to finish - so much so that I've been and got some more "line" (+ a small wallpaper seam roller that will be handy for working sprinkles of dye into fibres for microwave dyeing) .............



I've invested some of the Christmas present fund in some fabrics so I will now have to justify my purchase of them!

Coiled Fabric Vessels

In a round about way, I came up with the idea to make some coiled vessels as Christmas presents. Being unable to source the cotton clothesline recommended in the book locally, I thought about experimenting with some cheap poly. stuff .........



Even though I haven't used anything else to compare it with I think it works really well - the bowl is well formed and not at all floppy (only problem being I broke one of the little pegs which attaches the extension table by leaning on it - still it's not the first time and they don't cost much thank goodness) ..........


As this one is something of a trial piece to see how things work and to estimate the lengths of cord and fabric required etc., I may just do a row or two more to finish it off - it would be a handy little bowl to keep by the side of the machine to house threads/feet etc. to save them falling to the floor during projects.

A Giant Tower

I don't usually work to a larger scale but having enjoyed making Helen's towers so much, thought I'd have a go at a giant one.

It looks quite at home in the flower bed but I don't think the elements would be too kind to it!

Rock garden

The "shell" for this vessel was another discarded sample using wireform - transfer painted organza laid over a fine cotton with rows of straight stitching was too rigid for what I wanted at the time.


Venetian & woven picots, cup stitch, bullion knots and a few beads provide lots of texture.

Rock Pool Treasures

Not exactly recycling but putting to use some samples and other bits and pieces that have no real use in their present state and don't very often see the light of day. The hand dyed velvet "cup" was a discarded prototype for part of a larger piece. With a wireform insert, it holds it's shape nicely so I thought it might make an interesting little "bowl".



Probably one of my most treasured experimental samples! A machine embroidered sandwich - fragments of glitzy fabrics and threads trapped between clingfilm and water soluble - provided just the fabric for the insert. It was hard to part with but it's done now!

Llots of crunchy beading to depict the treasures of the rock pool - a very tactile piece!