West Country Embroiderers again . . .

Beppy Berlin, a very popular embroidery tutor locally, took the workshop, bringing designs we could work to make a square pincushion. We all worked with silk fabric and stranded threads in a variety of colour combinations. It was quite careful work, you needed to be as accurate as possible, difficult for me! The simplest pattern was probably this one, but Beppy gave us so many tips and ideas for extra bits of stitches and beads, and good threads to use that every one finished will be original!
This one is different, the hearts are the other way round.
Some nice centres.

Most people chose the heart-like design with the circle in the centre.
There is a good range of coloured silks and varied choices of thread colours

We were shown an alternative way of attaching a shisha mirror then beading around it to make a nice cluster.
Some interesting colour effects with variations in blue and green and some graded thread, and 2 further designs.
Watch this space for some finished ones, hopefully! See a pic of the finished item here.

Sometimes it looks as if you haven't done much in a whole day. A lot of chat goes on at these days, but people do work with quite a degree of application. This project needed quite painstaking effort and was not a fast project, except for the speedy, less careful stitchers like me, who is always having people saying to me, 'Haven't you done a lot!'

This is mine after continuing to work on it during the evening, and with the luxury of being able to line it up at home for a better shot.

Journal quilts again - April

This year's JQs are 12" x 12", bigger than last year's A4 size, and I'm finding it a nice shape to design for. I'm having to combine my jq's this year so far with work for other things, and this one serves 3 purposes. Another exhibition at our church is on currently, Stones and the Sea, and this fits the bill. The local Contemporary Quilt Group manifestation, Infinity, is doing a jq bimonthly, and this is Beachcombing. (I started thinking about hair combs and the lines in your hair as the comb passes through it!). And of course the national CQ challenge of one 12x12 jq a month, for which this is April's entry.The shells are attached by hand-stitching a small piece of net over them. Practically all the rest is machined, the 'combing' lines with twin needles.

... and more wildlife - the damselfly on the lower leaf with the limey green leaf behind it. It's easier to see bigger, sorry! There's a shadow of it on the darker leaf below it.

Can't resist the flowers . . . .

. . . and the wildlife.
Cplours, colours, colours. I've lways wanted one of these blue flower bushes in the garden and now we have one - ceanothus, I think it's called.
And a rhododendron - nice deep pink

and this one has a lovely scent - sorry blogs don't do smellies.
And these look promising . . . strawberries and gooseberries.

More houses . . .

Our cottage again ... that stepped gable edge is used a lot . . . Going down to the harbour at Crail . .

Some interesting houses, must get themselves into a quilt some time.

Our cottage. . . two made into one I think.
. . .and the lighthouse at Elie.

Art in the cottage . . .

The self-catering cottage we had in Earlsferry is an old fisherman's cottage, decorated and furnished in a lovely bright way. A large felt hanging . . . . . . paintings . . .

. . . embroidery . . .

. . . and a couple of bright IKEA rugs (the other was stripes).

Scotland - the southern coast of Fife

We've been on holiday in Scotland again, this time by the sea. Windswept beaches, tiny picturesque harbours from which the herring boats once set sail. St Monans has these waterfront houses, just begging the tourist, digital camera in hand, 'Please take my picture'.
Some locals were a bit suspicious.
There was no one about, it was cold and rain threatened. But the shapes and colours of the houses are lovely.

Funny how the tide is nearly always out when we go places. The fishing boats look like toys.
An ancient church in St Monans, looks like a pile of children's bricks.
It's all crab and lobster fishing here now.

Our last evening, had to catch the sunset.
Over the Forth road bridge . . . . . . with the rail bridge alongside.

Tulip time, hooray . . .

. . . . because I do love tulips! And irises and bluebells and quite a few other things! It's a wonderful journey of discovery finding out what is there in our garden as things begin to show themselves now. Our friend who lived here before us had some lovely ideas about planting. Having only been here since June we keep having nice surprises.

These pix will have to keep you going for the next 2 weeks as we are off to Scotland and the Lake District.

Loose ends . . .

Another sort of kantha stitching, each line of stitches shifted slightly to the side of the one above. And what to do with the loose ends, the bits of thread left over. It's getting a bit obsessional I fear, but I keep all these bits, (generally not shorter than 4" though) and do something with them. Here its running stitch lines. Its the sort of doodling I like.

What I've done with it . . .

Granddaughter number 3 painted herself a couple of bits of fabric - paw prints were what she wanted. She added some stripes with an oilbar, and I managed to get her to stitch a few lines with purple thread. Then it was left to me to turn it all into a bag. The shadow appliqué piece done at Beverley Wood's workshop with WCE has been turned into a bag too, for me this time, though it may get given away somewhen.

Close up of the centre - the appliquéd shape and some beads.

Happy Christmas, no, April

Yes, well, no wonder the English are always talking about the weather, there's always something to say! Last Sunday, just before 8am there was a bit of a blizzard.
Doesn't look quite right with the azalea and next door's mimosa tree in bloom.
Ah well, it looks quite pretty, for an hour or two.

Postcards, latest . . .

We did a mini workshop at Crooked Boro' Quilters last month, making fabric postcards. I focussed on 2 kinds, the strippy ones (see earlier posts for pix) and an appliqué one (see below). Both ideas were tried. The idea in this one is to use a print strip and pick up the colours in it for the other pieces - thus yellowy top strip, purples for flowers, green stems, couched thread and stitching. Its a way of linking it all together, promotes a pleasing feel.
I also did this one, another in the 'palm tree' series, as a demo, and some made this design. I finished it off yesterday. Hopefully there will be a nice show n' tell at a future meeting!
When Beverley Wood (see earlier post) came to WCE in Feb. we made a piece of crazy-like patchwork by piecing, cutting up and joining, stitching and embellishing, and eventually I turned my bit into 3 postcards.

Not sure what the excuse for this one was - it's not very inspiring. It was probably random leftovers. Well, sometimes they work, sometimes they don't.

Reviewing . . .

Linda at Occasional Jottings was reviewing the other day how she is getting on with her alternative to new year resolutions, it makes interesting reading - go and have a look at March 27th.
My own goal of blogging more regularly has not been met. Although starting well in January I have slipped back into leaving it for a week or more then putting lots of posts up at once. Must try harder.
It often is to do with pictures. Because this is a blog where I want the pictures to say as much as the words (probably more, most times!) I find I'm short of pix because I forget to keep up with taking them. Then I don't do much stitching for a bit so have no fresh work to show. Then the flowers and scenery pix outnumber the work pix . . . and so it goes on. Well, perhaps I should get out more, not take it all too seriously, this blog is not a masterpiece for all time after all! (Now there's a goal and a half!)

Last Month at West Country Embroiderers . . .

. . . some interesting free canvaswork embroidery, on single canvas that we painted first with fabric paints. Bit late showing it because Of the technology - I wanted to crop my pix to cut out expanses of unstitched (though nicely painted) canvas and just show the variety of stitches and the lovely colours. I also wanted to try making one of these collages that I admire on other blogs. Hurray, done it! Thank you Picasa!

Canvaswork . . .

I finished the canvaswork piece we started at West Country Embroiderers this month. Except that it needs some more beads and sequins. And I have to decide what to do with it! As usual. I really enjoyed doing it, and want to do some more.
This is my practice piece. Having only tried canvaswork once before, a small and unsuccesful attempt, I thought I'd try a few threads and see what worked best. I had bought single canvas with a larger mesh (eyesight) and wanted to see before the workshop day which ones would cover it enough. We did paint the canvas first, so bits showing were not a problem. I guess with white canvas you would want to cover it all up? I thought it needed the thicker threads - stranded cotton, soft cotton, some wools, thicker perlé, those knitted ribbon things or else finer ones used double. Our tutor used some torn chiffon strips but I didn't get round to trying that.

Easter celebrations . . .

A representation of the empty tomb we had in church at Easter. It started life as a pair of stocks (!) but some creative people with hammers, cardboard, paper and paint transformed that, others worked on the garden setting , and with the candles lit on Easter Sunday it made a great visual aid for the resurrection message. Interestingly, this cross is made from the tree we had in church at Christmas - an interesting symbolic link.

The flower fades . . .

My Mothers' Day tulips now. DGD asked, quite politely, 'Grandma, why have you got a vase of dead flowers on the table?' The answer could have been of course that I hadn't got around to clearing them up yet. But the real answer is that Ive been finding the drying, twisting petals so fascinating! 'I see,' grandaughter said, a bit hesitantly! The last 2 amaryllis when they were beginning to open. They are coming to an end now, more a soggy mess than interesting curls, so soon now the flower stalks will be cut off and when the leaves have died down they will be put away till next year.
This is the first one I bought, several years ago, buy one get one free in the Co op in Marple, and I gave the other one away as a Christmas present. I wonder if that one is still flowering?
How to keep amaryllis flowering year after year:
When the flowers are finished, cut off the flower stalk. Keep watering the leaves till they are dying down too. Put the bulbs away somewhere dry. After Christmas somewhen take the bulbs out, soak them in water for half an hour, pot them up and put them on a windowsill. Keep a little watering going. Eventually you will have the excitement of spotting the first shoot - is it a flower shoot or just a leaf? - then keep them well watered and they will flower for you.