Competition Entry

Snowflake Wallhanging

(double click on image to enlarge)

I have entered Quilting Bloggers, Weekly Themed Quilt Contest, for the first week in Feb.

The theme is Snow,Ice and Cold(Brr!).

The Snowflake wallhanging was a challenge to use intricate piecing with unusual fabrics, my own dyed ones and Stewart's Grandmother's lace crochet snowflakes.

I wanted it to make you sense the cold when you looked at it.

Take a look at the Quilt Bloggers site by clicking on the badge on the right of my blog. Have fun browsing.

China Inspiration

Last night Judith Symonds came to our local branch of The Embroidery Guild and showed us her collection of textiles and clothing from Southern China. Wow! is all I could think of. The workmanship, stitches and abundance of colour on mainly black was breath taking. We had to 'multi- task' while Judith was giving us all the history and interest of a piece she would then send it round the room.
So picture this 10 minutes in, there were at least 20 or more textiles being past round with the chatter and gasps as someone laid eyes on the stitches and beauty. These pieces are made by young and old women alike and are equiste often recyled through the generations and remodelled into another sections of a garment making that one even more intricate.By the end of the evening there were so many pieces to re-look at you didn't know which one to choose.
I took pages of notes because I forgot! my camera, which I could really have kicked myself for.

I do have the tinge that these textiles are now in England and not in China but Judith is inspiring hundreds possible thousands with her talks, each time so, stitch heritage and the appreciation of culture will continue. I have more of a warm appreciation for my fellow ladies in a far away land, stitching in their different world.
Thank you Judith for showing and inspiring us.
I just wanted to go home and start again!

Linear Buisness Card Inspiration

The large printer at ProntoPrint decided to have gremlins and printed out an image it wanted, of Blue Moon first. I really like it, so it will hang on my inspiratonal board in the studio.

Buisness card Inspiration

Went to proof read my buisness cards and postcads today. Had to show you one of the sheets. The Blue Moon ones are just yummy!
See the tips on what to be aware of when ordering your buisness cards from a printers on my website
http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

By the way there are no more Blue Moon ATC's for swapping now.The response and what inspires you have been wonderful. Thank you.

Embellishment

The inspiration from these leaves will be with me for a little while I think!

See more embellishing on my website http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Embellishment with Jewels

When there were gaps in visitors yesterday at the Gallery I was working on the green sheer embellishments, inspired by the lacy leaves of the flower I found at the weekend. I was asked how I do the embroidered rings with the jewels in them so have put theinstructions on my main website under STITCH heading down the right hand side, if you would like to know how.
http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Gallery Day Jan 26th

Had a wonderful day in the Gallery today. It was really busy this morning with me demonstrating to several ladies, the embellisher. They all had a go and made a small postcard sized piece of felt embellishment using the blue and green scraps from my Blue Moon work.The ladies had a cuppa, while chatting and embellishing! They loved the pieces of work I had on show and all left with the embellished postcard and one of my Red Atc's (can't promise to give a freebie every week).
They are coming back next week!
I ill be publishing listof te mixed media techniques for February.

See http://www.thegallerydereham.co.uk/ for updates and to book in.

Sheer Fabric Inspiration

Had to go into Kings Lynn this morning, Jenn came too!
New heels for my boots,ordered some buisness cards, ooh normally make my own but I need some photo ones for

The Gallery!
But our best shop was the fabric shop! I needed some sheers. So armed with a small leaf from the flower dec, Jenn and I had great fun feeling and pulling out all the sheer fabrics! Then onto the bead and braid sections and of course paint and glitter!
We don't get out much together to play as you can tell so we had lunch too! Pizza!
I will look to my figure, another day!

Flower Sections

Just had to take it to bits and disect it!

New Inspiration, Flower

It's the 25th today a month after Christmas and its also Burn's Night today, the celebration for those of Scottish descent. Have a good celebration!
It's gone so quickly already!
New Inspiration
I found this flower decoration on the second hand stall on Swaffham market on Saturday,for 20p. It just yelled at me to be used. I think it's the green lacy metallic leaves that drew me in.

Cards for ATC's

Here is one of the cards to go with the Blue Moon ATC's.

I used the trimmings of the ATC's to make the strips and applied them to the card with machine zig zag stitch.

Now they can be on there way!

See my website for ATC inspiration and more news! http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Chain Braid Stitch Page

At the moment I am participating in a crazywork round robin, so I was revisiting different embroidery stitches. This has inspired me to form a book of stitches. Making the pages interesting to look at in the future. This page was inspired by Beryl Taylors Book, Mixed Media Exploratons.
Beryl Taylors website is http://www.beryltaylor.com/

Chain Braid Stitch Sample

Chain Braid Stitch 2

Now you can see that the thread is twisted around the bottom of the needle and it has already in the chain loop.

Chain Braid Stitch 1

It is always good to learn new things and come out of your comfort zone!
So today I leant a new stitch.Ooh you might say but I enjoyed the researching and threads!
I belong to http://www.stitchinfingers.ning.com/ which is a wonderful site for sharing and being inspired.

On this site there are different groups one being "Take a Stitch on Tuesday", I know it's Friday but I've had a busy week.
Sharon Bloggon organises the stitch and kindly demonstrates it on her website
http://www.pintangle.com/

This weeks stitch is 'Chain Braid Stitch' not as easy as it looks and you can end up with knots!

I found that making the loop before I got the needle involved! far easier. The thread as you can see is twisted in a loop behind. Important otherwise you just get a knot after knot!(I speak from experience).

Inspirational Mixed Media Book

This book is so wonderful for surface pattern and beautiful ways of combining media.

Well done Beryl Taylor.

Purple Embellishment Day

Some of the purple embellishment items made this afternoon at The Gallery Dereham.

Visit my webpage for more on embellishments and "how to"

http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

I will be demonstrating different mixed media techniques every Tuesday 10 until 2.30pm and in March Workshops will be available to book in.

Visit http://www.thegallerydereham.co.uk/ for more information.

Purple Embellishment

The start of purple embellishment under the machine.
see my website for more embellishment ideas

http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Purple Beads

Another taster of my beads before they are used for creativeness!

Gallery Camel

Paper machie morning at The Gallery Dereham. Putting a coat! on a camel.

Gallery Paper Machie

The SPLAT artclub at The Gallery Dereham had been making paper machie sculptures last Saturday and they had a Camel that needed a wooly fur coat so I applied a mixture of paper and glue mush to add the texture and give it time to dry ready for painting. Judy had a great laugh as the Camel became rather heavy for her legs so ended up sitting down. I'm sure it was because she was tired! baby camel got his fur coat too but was still standing!

The Splat Childrens Art Club is on Saturdays. see http://www.thegallerydereham.com/

8 Blue Moon ATC'S Finished

They are finished and ready to swap.
One for me as a keepsake.
One to Sheila in Australia and
One to Judy in America.

So that leaves 5 to swap with the best comments on what they are inspired by.

Finished Blue Moon ATC'S

I have really enjoyed making these.
See other collections of ATC's on my website www.art2inspire.co.uk

Scrumble Detail

These are added flowers and scrumble pots which are then added with extra crochet to form a textured edge.

Scrumbles!

I took a crochet hook and some different wools and threads and enjoyed, Scrumbling and adding on crochet flowers. Really free and enjoyable. I was ispired by Anneliese from Stichin Fingers network site.

Crazywork Detail

I've enjoyed working in these colours, Yvonne's going to have to close her eyes if she visits this post!

Crazywork Square

Went to Brightlingsea in Essex yesterday for a wonderful brunch with Mum and Dad in law and their friends. It was lovely meeting and catching up. In the evening I finished sewing on the lace motif and embellishing it with beads.
At Alveva's a quilt group which I belong to, eight of us are sharing in a round robin, crazywork challenge. We each made up a box of fabrics, trimmings,threads and beads which we make a block in our chosen idea and then pass it on to the other members each month. We don't see our box until the end so it will be a really exciting reveal at our garden party in the summer.

Shian's Fabric Scout Hut

You can see our pile of fabrics on the bolts ready to be cut on the right and Shian busy cutting wadding. The fabric is for a suprise quilt the group is making.
There were specials on jelly rolls and Moda packs aswell as Christmas fabrics. We liked the fat Quarter tub because they were all £1.
All in all a good retail experience beause we followed this with a spot of lunch in a Tea Shop!

Me Choosing Fabric

As you can see I was so cold!

Choosing Fabric

Jill Choosing!

Lola

Since Tuesday at the gallery I have tidied up in my studio because I kept taking things in the door and putting them on the table and eventually had no table left. My table is 6ft by 8ft so you can tell there was a 'little bit' to sort out!

See my table space under the studio heading on my website http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Thursday I picked up my friend Jill, the treasurer of Alveva Quilt group and we went off to the coast to buy fabric!

Cold, Cold and very very wet! better than snow though!

When we got to Shian's at The Scout Hut, Hunstanton Lola was hugging the fire as you can see. She didn't even move to say hello. I don't blame her.

Working at The Gallery

I love Tuesdays at The Gallery Dereham, surrounded by art and creative people. The comings and goings are interspersed with me demonstrating mixed media techniques. I was embellishing today. Several people had a try and loved it and want a workshop. Marion came to play too!
Her piece of new work can be seen in the foreground on the table.
Visit The Gallery Dereham
http://www.thegallerydereham.com/

Marion Playing Too!

Marion came to play at the gallery too!

She brought in work that she had been developing on the new printer, Big Beautiful Bertha!

Here she is preparing the Lutradur before it goes through the printer.

Visit her website for a real feast for the eyes.

http://www.artmixter.blogspot.com/

I Want One!

Judy really loves embellishing. After a quilck how to and tips on how to use and how some fabrics react to felting she was hooked! her words were"I want one!"

Tuesday at The Gallery 12th Jan 2010

Tuesday morning at the gallery Dereham was interesting today with all the comings and goings.The spaces have been moved round now so there is a gallery and shop area (Hadyn in his Framing workshop and Photography spaces and a workshop and display area for art!

I took the Embellisher and as you can see Judy one of the gallery owners had a go . She had never done embellishing before so tried all the different scraps of fabrics and wools on her sample.

Blue Moon ATC detail

This is the detail of the beading on the ATC. Remember an ATC is only 2.5x3.5 inches, so I have managed to get alot of beads in the corner.
Can you see the Blue Moon bead?

See http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/ for other ATC's I have swapped and watch out for the ones I would like to swap in the future! coming soon!

Beaded Blue Moon ATC

This ATC has been beaded and embroidered. I just need to put the backing on and stamp it ready to send. This one is going to Sheila in Austrailia with Best wishes.

Blue ATC'S

I got inspired last week by The Blue Moon at the start of the New Year and as blue is my favourite colour and I had some ATC'S to make for swaps. I just had to make them in the blues,small versions of the Blue Moon Embellish Page. Here is one of the ATC'S before it has got any beading on it. I embellished fabric scraps onto a piece of felted jumper. The blue circle is a Dorset ring, the start of a Dorset Button. This will then have a bead put inside and beading all round along with french knots.

Blue Beads

Just had to show you a picure of these blue beads before I started using them. Don't they look yummy,ooh!

Embellished Purse

I have posted the embellished purse because I have been asked alot of questions since I originally posted it on a Fibre Arts Network. I made it last year at a workshop given by Sandra Beech. We had to thread wool into a dyed thread tube. Then stitch these threads into two circles with a handle.I then linned my purse. We were then able to embellish it with dyed thread and embellished with beads and embroidery.

See all my work and how to at
http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Another Snowman!

Jenn built another snowman today. I think he must have said something suprising.

He had already borrowed her scarf!

blue moon

Just love this!

Blue Moon Embellishment

I thought I would continue embellishing a blue feltwork and embellished piece. I used the Blue Moon we had last Monday as inspiration. This has sparked off lots of other ideas too!

Beading

I decided to do some more beading on the scrim and velvet I started before Christmas.Jenn had caused way to much fun this morning with her new friend! I thought I had better bring some creative normality around here!
Visit Jenn's blog for more revelations! http://www.jenniferroseclark.blogspot.com/

Visit my website for the new additions. http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

I managed to put a counter on my site today with some help!

Families and Snow!

Jenn had a great day today as we couldn't go anywhere due to the snow. She decided to have some fun with her new friend!
See my website for more of my sculptures http://www.art2inspire.co.uk/

Zero smitten with Jenn and she steals a cool kiss.

Sunbathing!

Zero plays it cool!

Still Snowing

Jenn trying to make cute conversation with her new friend.

Background Before and After

Thought you would like to see the before and after pictures. It is now ready for embellishment with embroidery and bead work. I will post the finished piece when I've finished.

Background Machine Stitch Detail

This is a small section of the Background so far and as you can see I have machined gold circles around the purple swirls and added gold metallic stitching in other areas to give interest.