COMING OUT OF HIBERNATION

Happy New Year!  It's been a long winter and not much blogging, so here are some recent works:

Birmingham Embroiderers' Guild monthly raffle has a colour theme.  For each monthly meeting two members decorate one large and one small shopping bag and members bring items of that colour.  This was my recent orange effort, using Seminole patchwork, appliqué and some hand-stitching.

Our branch is hosting the West Midlands regional day in June and we have been busy making labels (not sure why):

As usual, Eclectica had a stand at the NEC's 'Sewing for Pleasure' last month and will be taking our work to the 'British Quilt and Stitch Village' at Uttoxeter Racecourse later this month (April 22nd to 24th).  For details, see the website (http://www.quiltandstitchvillage.com).

We had lots of interest and lovely comments at the NEC so come and see us at Uttoxeter.  Here are two of my pieces:

They are called 'Maze' and 'Labyrinth' - batik surrounded by hand-stitching.  

Living in a small flat, I don't have facilities for batik but know a talented local artist (and musician) - Layla Tutt - and used her facilities.

Pat Trott came to talk our guild a few months ago and ran a workshop on Mountmellick Embroidery last month.  I finished this piece last night using one of Pat's designs.  It is handworked in various white threads and interesting stitches on a cream(ish) background.  It was really satisfying to work on and I'm now planning to work another piece with my own design. 

CUSHIONS

Hand-stitched hexagons

Machine-stitched 'pointless' patchwork

I made this cushions for a fund-raising sale and they were quickly sold.  The large multi-coloured quilt (see August post) fetched £200 in a sealed bid auction.  

INSPIRED BY BUILDINGS

Three pieces of work using some or all of appliqué, painted and dyed fabric, printing, metal (including aluminium drinks cans), hand and machine stitching.

'Window at Missenden Abbey' 

I did a course at Missenden some years ago and took a photo through an open window.

'Park Hill flats, Sheffield' 

One of my sons lives in Sheffield and this is now hanging on his wall.

'The Roofs of Llandrindod Wells' 

Inspired by a postcard bought in the Metropole Hotel, 

Llandrindod Wells.

CATCHING UP WITH PATCHWORK

In an effort to make more storage space I have spent the last few weeks finishing three projects.  About seven years ago, I did a 'Come and Cut Again' workshop with Edwina Mackinnon at the Bramble Patch in Weedon Bec and, finally, here is the finished work which will be (yet another) cushion:

The next piece was started four or five years ago when I was shown how to make a very easy patchwork block - pointless patchwork - and I've just completed a huge quilt using odd bits of fabric.  There is almost no hand-stitching and a minimal amount of quilting.  It's now residing on my bed but is going to be sold/auctioned to raise money for  charity.

  

Finally I've made a quilted table cover in traditional hexagons.  It was originally supposed to be a bed quilt but I lost heart.  I was given the patterned fabric and some made-up motifs by a friend who had started sewing it some years ago.  Everything is hand-stitched except the bound edges.

LAND AND SEA

Some recent and not so recent work, mainly machine-stitched:

A VIEW FROM THE BALCONY

The view from a previous home overlooking a small river.  The bridge joined the car park to a small wooded area which eventually was left to become very overgrown.  

NIGHTSCAPE  

Hand-dyed and black fabric, couched threads.
Based on a photo taken of the sunset in Scandinavia.

I SAW THREE SHIPS

Strips from bundles of sari silk, with appliquéd ships.

Based on a painting bought by a friend.

MAKING WAVES I AND II

with seagulls over the sea    

                                                                                                                                                                                       with flocks of birds in the sunset
           
              

CROCHETING ADVENTURES

I learned to crochet many years after starting to knit.  Another aunt - sister of the two knitters - lived some way away so I didn't see her very often.  I inherited two of her fantastic tablecloths.  This is a corner of one of them:

My crocheting started with baby clothes and blankets and progressed to adult garments.  I saved up all sorts of leftovers of yarn, bought some in charity shops and even used some new stuff to make these two jackets.  

The pattern came from 'The Crochet Sweater Book' by Sylvia Cosh published in 1987.  I bought the book some years later, but it took several more years to collect all the yarn and I finished the first one in about 2003.  When I came to do the blue one, I realised that I had misread the pattern first time around, so the colours of the diamonds are in a different format.  I still wear them and have been stopped in the street by admirers.

I'm still crocheting things like small brooches and these two mathematical objects:

A stellated dodecahedron (diameter of ahout 13cm)

An attempt at a symmetric hyperbolic plane - about 15cm in diameter - see a fascinating book by Daina Taimina - 'Crocheting Adventures with Hyperbolic Planes'  The book won a prize in 2010 - the oddest book title of the year (it beat Collectible Spoons of the Third Reich). 

JEWELLERY

Over the last few years I've had various attempts at making jewellery.  In his forties, my father gave up the family business (a fruit stall in Petticoat Lane) and made his living by making cheap costume jewellery.  I eventually overcame my dislike of jewellery although have never had my ears pierced and, many years later, I'm surprised to find myself dabbling in jewellery-making.

SILVER BROOCHES & PENDANTS

I made these two brooches and two pendants at a class at the Midland Arts Centre (MAC).  The pendant in the bottom right is made from twisted wire (my father did a lot of that when he made wires for pierced ears) and offcuts from the circular pendant.  The 'chain' of the circular pendant is crocheted silver embroidery thread.   

KNITTED WIRE & BEADS

EMBROIDERED & BEADED BROOCHES

I like to use loads of bead with fabrics, including handmade felt.  The top left brooch was made at an Embroiderers' Guild away weekend at Westhope College in Shropshire and the bottom right one at Jacqui Lawrence's class at MAC.

WOVEN BEADING

Two woven bead 'purse necklaces' and a beaded necklace using handmade

silver beads and bought seed and larger beads,

 METALWORK

Two pendants made of annealed aluminium from drinks cans, patterned by denting with a pencil and machined-stitched onto black felt.  I made these at another Birmingham Embroiderers' Guild weekend at Westhope College.  In the top right-hand corner is an enamelled metal brooch made at a workshop at the RBSA in Birmingham