All heart

Now Christmas is over and all gifts unwrapped I can reveal my little hearts. Little trinkets given with love.













































HAPPY NEW YEAR to you all.



May the best thing that happened to you in 2010 be the worst thing to happen in 2011.

"Old Man Wind"

As an avid follower of Jude Hill, I am constantly amazed by her wonderful cloths. I have made my own little holiday cloth, "Old Man Wind".

It's funny how things evolve, this started off as an experiment following Jude's lead. I cut up various fabrics into tree and moon shapes then washed them. The frayed results were wonderful. Particularly the white silk moon, the fraying was quite extensive which lead me to the resulting picture. The green velvet frayed beautifully also.















After backing and edging it, I think next time I would prefer to leave the raw edges. Thanks Jude for your inspiration.

Christmas Banner

I was asked to make a sign to go over the noticeboard in the community hall for our local social club committee. I decided to go all out and make a banner that could be used each Christmas. It measures 1.7m long by 90cm deep. I have appliqued each letter on with blanket stitch and decorated with holly leaves and red berry puffs. I was fortunate to have a pile of xmas patchwork squares of various patterns that were the perfect size for the letters.

Making up for lost time

Sorry I've been away from my blog for so long, no excuses, just needed a break, I guess. My Fantasy Garden theme is slowly coming along. This is was my first piece finished. It measures approximately 54cm x 38cm.

The second piece measures 44cm x 41cm. The kantha background gives a lovely effect.


The third piece is only small, 24cm x 27cm. A mythical butterfly.... perhaps!


The fourth piece is just getting underway, pinned and ready for invisible tacking. It measures 53cm x 37cm.

Haven't fallen off the planet

Sorry I haven't posted in ages, I am away scuba diving in Bali at the moment. Will be back next week and promise to update with photos of my current work on the "Fantasy Garden" quilt. I have been doing lots of stitching while relaxing between dives. I have also picked up some wonderful pieces of batik and ikat material. Lots of pics soon!

Spring

Found these two blue tongues in my vege patch yesterday.



Spring has sprung!

Fantasy Garden

As usual I am slow to add more pictures of my work. I am enjoying the stitching. This section is almost complete, just have to finish kantha stitching the yellow sky and maybe some tweaking of the clouds.....

I have started planning the next section of the fantasy garden quilt, this is what I've come up with so far.

Eventually I plan to have 5 or 6 pieces of various sizes in this theme of colours, which will be randomly placed onto a background material and then quilted to a backing material.

Stitchers Block

That's what I've had for the past few weeks, hence zero posts on my blog. I've pulled out all my material so many times lately looking for inspiration that the house looked like it had been ransacked. Still nothing jumped out at me. I had so many ideas running around in my head but nothing would take form. It's a frustrating process for me, starting a new project. I eventually found inspiration at the local op shop when I spotted two large batik tablecloths. The pieces are very faded in the middle where they were covering a table that was exposed to sunlight, but the draping sides have kept their colour. For a dollar each they were the bargain of the century and more importantly an idea had formed!


This is the first of a series of blocks based on a "Fantasy Garden" theme. I have used Jude Hill's invisible basting technique to attach all the pieces. The bird and the yellow flowers have been cut from the batik cloth. The clouds are the batik off cuts that were surrounding the bird and flowers. I loved the unusual shapes that appeared after cutting out the pieces. The moon is cut from an old silk tie (another op shop purchase).

Life is good now I'm stitching again!

Nine Patch experiment

Thanks Deb for the fascinating tutorial "Fibre Fossils" found here. I gave it a try with some success. I was unable to get the Golden Heavy Gel Matte that you use but impatient as I am I purchased Atelier Impasto Gel instead.

I stitched a sampler nine patch with various materials and threads.

Then hemmed and glued it onto a small stretched canvas. Waited 24 hours for the glue to dry then gave it one coat of impasto gel. It did "fossilise" quite nicely although the maroon material went very dark. Again 24 hours later I gave it another coat of the gel to get a slightly harder effect. I probably wouldn't have needed to do this if I had purchased the Heavy Gel! Anyway it was a good experiment and I'm now working on some more small pieces.

It's fun to play!

The Sun bird has arrived

Apologies, a bout of flu and several overnight visitors have kept me from my blog. I have been getting a few moments of stitching here and there.

A Sun bird landed on my quilt and dropped a few feathers along the way.


I've also been playing with a small nine patch which will follow shortly.

Reef Cloth finished

It's finally done, well almost, still have to put a sleeve on the back for hanging.

I had a wonderful day at the Textile Art Festival in Brisbane yesterday and bought some lovely silk threads from Dale at "The Thread Studio" stand. Also picked up some dyed cotton fabric to use in future quilts.

A slow time

I have been remiss in not blogging for sometime. The house still feels very empty. I have been stitching to keep my mind of other things. The reef cloth has slowed for the moment but have some ideas for finishing it off very soon. I started on another cloth with no ideas of how it would turn out. Just started playing with some scap fabric and this is what has developed so far.



I might add a character (beast), maybe....

maybe a dog running across a patchwork field....

something will grow there.

Growing the reef

The reef cloth is slowly expanding and filling in. I've added another gorgonian fan (still not quite finished) and an orange starfish to balance the colour. I also kantha stitched the shell area at the bottom with a dark blue to take away some of the starkness in colour of the pale blue.

Sadly...

My baby "Twistie", died in my arms this morning, she was 15 1/2 years old and was suffering from Cancer. She must have known as we had her booked into the vet for later today to give her the needle.

I will miss her forever.

Something fishy

An update on my slow cloth. I have finished stitching the gorgonian fan coral which is a piece of orange silk organza. The centre veins are couched sari threads and the background is 100's of meandering stitches in varying shades of orange dmc threads. I got to this point and my mind went blank. Sat and stared at it for ages wondering what to do with the open space above the fan. Funny how things just come to you like someone eventually turns the light on! I was playing around with various fabrics when these fish jumped out at me.















I am now working on expanding the edges. Having fun experimenting with cloth weaving from Jude Hill's blog ( http://www.spiritcloth.typepad.com/ ). Will post some more pics shortly.

My very first journal page.....yeehah

After much procrastination I have finally started recording ideas in my journal. My Mum has been gently persuading me for many years to start a sketchbook and even bought a couple of blank books which have been sitting on the shelf for far too long. She also gave me the book "Creating Sketchbooks for Embroiderers and Textile Artists" by Kay Greenlees several years back. I am now re-reading the book through different eyes. Two things occurred that gave me the push. Firstly, I was always worried about starting on the first page and messing it up. Mum said " just open the book anywhere and start!" and secondly I read Karen Ruane's blog (http://karenruane.blogspot.com/) on how to embellish her little books which helped with the impetus to just start!

I found the picture (top left) on some junk mail and liked the colours so thought I'd have a go interpreting it in stitch. It was great to get the watercolours out as well. I thoroughly enjoyed working on this and am now hooked.

Another Reef Scene

This is an old peice I did a few years ago. It was my first attempt at machine embroidery, overlaid with hand stitching.

New Baby

There is a new baby in the family so of course something had to be made to welcome the arrival. The cot sheet/wrap is just over a metre square made with white cotton and reverse appliqued bunnies. It's winging its way to the new bub as I speak.

Kitchen Curtains at last ... or almost

I've finally started on my kitchen curtains. The two side panels are done and hung! Not sure what to do in the middle window, think I'll just put three short panels across the top. The flowers are reverse appliqued using some of the green batik I used on my pincushion. Strange how the mind works, pincushion to kitchen curtains.




I love the way the sunlight streams through the flowers.

Puffy Pin Cushion

I've been inspired by Karen Ruane's blogsite http://www.karenruane.blogspot.com/ and all her exquisite embroideries. Thought I'd give reverse applique a go and made this pin cushion. I added a couple of puffs to give a dimensional look. Thanks Karen for the wonderful inspiration. I cut up an old chambray shirt and used a bit of green batik that I've been hoarding for eons. The colours worked well together.

From the Heart

My mother has been embroidering all her life and has taught me almost everything I know about textiles, embroidery, colour.... the list is endless and is still continues.

Happy Mothers Day, Mum, hope you like the book mat.

The story continues...

It's time for a splash of colour! The more I work on this peice the more excited I become with the possibilities of molding cloth to cloth. I decided to expand my "Moonlight on the Reef'" to meld into the base fabric. (Close up below).

Can't wait to get stitching the gorgonian fan. I was inspired by my partner's underwater photos he took on one of our many diving trips on the Great Barrier Reef. That's me in the background!