All about the waiting ....

For what? You ask.


For lemons to ripen, our desert grape vine to settle in after planting and the basil, well, I guess we are waiting to find it frost free zone so we can continue to reap the benefit of its wonderful flavour.

 

And I am waiting for one more day before unwrapping the fabric around a great selection of rusted bits and pieces .... watch this space for the colours and patterns that'll emerge!!!








I'm hoping for some fabric that will be suitable for book spines. So far I've printed a photo of the book spine onto fabric ... some are interesting,

others not so much. So maybe what I need is a mixture of photos and free motion quilting of the lettering onto a matching fabric. One more reason to watch this space....  I'll post more pics soon.



And I will leave you with beautiful morning sunshine now the mist has cleared ... looks like a day to be outside.

that last stitch feeling ....

... is such a good feeling. Just when I didn't want to look at the fish on the quilt I've been stitching for months anymore,  it is done!!

Really done, it even has a sleeve on the back to hang it up by and thanks to Paul it will hang with the fish swimming. Otherwise, he says, they look like dead fish on a fishmonger slab. A very good point.

I thought about adding fins, ones that would stand up a little. But, that would make it less than cosy as a lap quilt so these fish have hidden fins.

Its Saturday, the sun is making lots of shadows on the stone walls around me and the air is full of quiet. Have a good day all.  I'll be back here soon.


Oh, forgot to add ...

The fish quilt is mostly my dyed and painted fabrics, it was free motion quilted on a Bernina 750 by me and the edging is faced using a new technique which I will definitely do again.

More details of that can be found here https://weallsew.com/make-quilt-facing/. It is a very straightforward way of finishing a piece without interrupting the overall design.

Worms and experimental fish eyes

 Some days are memorable, on others I experiment with how best to sew fish eyes and fish (!) for worms in the richness of what they make from our kitchen waste.   Ordinary tasks ...

I love that this 'can of worms' is about 20 years old, is very well travelled and always, of course, stays out in the elements.

Yet, it is intact, does its magic work today as it always has done. Magic that means we fill it with kitchen waste and a few worms, and it gives us beautiful compost.


OK, the egg shells don't quite get fully broken down and I did find a piece of string, a plastic label from, probably, an apple. The only thing that stays the same as when it goes in is an avocado stone. What is it about these? Clearly, the worms cannot munch through that tough outer skin.

As for fish eyes, I've been playing with different ways to give my quilted fish a face. I have a large, well, very large, collection of buttons but I didn't like the way they looked. I also discarded painted eyes  ... not really my style.

 Had a go at a hand sewn eye ...  really hard to get a neat enough shape.

The winner so far is a programmed stitch on the Bernina machine ... looks good, will be the same for all 24 fish, and I can add a french knot in the centre. Now to find the right colour thread that will show on all the different colour fish ... back soon, Please leave a comment.

Briefly, a fig story

Yesterday was all about lots of beautiful and, somewhat overripe figs from our neighbours' tree becoming several pots of jam and a great accompaniment (glazed and roasted) to our supper.

Not forgetting that some have been frozen. On trays to begin with and then bagged for a real treat in the winter.

We're also eating them fresh, not quite as fast as we can but they are good to snack on when passing through the kitchen.

Paul says today is chutney day ... still a way to go before the tree is exhausted and we also have our own smaller figs ripening in this wonderful summer heat.


The end. Of the fig story. I'm sure you're pleased about that.

I'm off to quilt another fish ... only 7 more to do

and then I think I'll add some shadow lines and plants and leaves to the sashing. Photos later.


Enjoy your day. Let me know if you like fig jam. There's plenty here.

These are definitely not resolutions

Happy New Year ou Bonne Annee (sans accent!!). I'm in France enjoying unseasonably warm and often sunny weather.

Its that time of the year, people start something new, commit, make promise to themselves. I've done it, although not for many years and this is not what I am doing this year.

That said I've joined a group thats all about walking 1000 miles in 2018 - check it out on FB. And I've devised a way of keeping track of my miles via my Fitbit. Its a bit galling when you find out that what you think of as your long morning walk with the dog is only 1.7 miles so I'm tracking my weekly goal of 20 miles and I'm counting all the walking I do for the rest of my day. So far so good. As I walk I'm listening to Hilary Rodham Clinton reading her book What Happened via the Audible app.  I enjoy this sort of book as a listener much more than as a page reader. See more at www.audible.co.uk

Here's my page reading at the moment ...

Short stories -very readable with a focus on Vietnamese family life 

Just started this ... so far its all about the death of Chatterton & Dylan Thomas .. not as boring as i though it might be 

Edgy, unusal and brave poems in here by a wonderful poet 

What's not to like ... I can read about yoga and practice my french in one place 

A book to pick up and peruse  ... early days for me reading this   ... lots to inspire and help with so far

and now I'm saying this very very quietly but I've also joined a project called 10 minutes drawing ... its all the fault of the wonderful women who run the Design for Stitch course I'm on this year and two of the equally wonderful students I'm learning with. 

Enough said, here's my first two efforts, already on Instagram where we are all sharing our efforts at what I call mark making. Thus avoiding, whenever possible, the dreaded D word!!!

This morning's mark making was done with an iPencil ... so the project is a bonus as its encouraging me to learn how to use this and to mark make in Adobe Sketch. There may be a quilty thing from all this in a few years but maybe not. 

Finally, I've finished another almost lacey scarf in sock weight yarn and have started to add quilting to what I call my 'brick' quilt.   I love the effect of quilting with a double needle. Shame that I managed to break two of these just doing a few rows of stitching ... all down to some less than easy fabric and the rusty effect  -you live and you learn especially that the Bernina sewing 'computer' is a tad sensitive to stuff like that. 

Photos below and thank you for reading. 

In passing ...

.. breakfast coffee and a quiet moment to have a mini brag about progress with a couple of projects!

the shadow for the brick quilt is freezer paper ready .... just need to make decisions about the quilt backing fabric, and tack the sandwich and then quilt it ... and play with ways to include the shadows. Ideas welcome.





And below, presently decorating the floor, you can see some small progress on my 4th plinth project. Fabric pavements are printed, the donated old blanket is cut to size for the wadding.
Now what to do next?

Finally, on the wall, where lots of ideas begin, (where else), two pieces of fabric from my 2017 dyeing efforts. They seem to be saying 'put us together' .... but how and why and ????

Step by step ...

and slowly! At the moment my so called brick quilt, or maybe its the shadow quilt, is occupying some of my bedroom floor,

and the rest of the room is full of stuff usually in the linen cupboard. Hopefully the small changes to the laundry room will soon be complete -maybe some pics this week - and I'll be able to move more easily around the bedroom.

The quilt in progress might also be there for a few more days  ... I'm still undecided about the the size of the shadow that I'll add after the quilting, and even more undecided about the border. Still, its great to be working with my own dyed fabrics and a photo taken of Crumble and I out for a walk last winter .... maybe by next winter the finished quilt will be on my lap.

To close a couple of recommendations. If you're a stitcher then do take look at Michelle Carragher http://www.michelecarragherembroidery.com/Game-of-Thrones-Gallery(2829575).htm for some inspirational hand embroidery. I heard her speaking on Saturday ... such skill and dedication, and a great speaker.

If you like the movies then I and a few friends all really enjoyed Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool with Annette Bening and Jamie Bell. Here's one of the reviews https://www.theguardian.com/film/2017/nov/19/film-stars-dont-die-in-liverpool-review-annette-bening-jamie-bell.  Lots of very good performances by the major and minor actors and, for me, a clever and powerful accompanying score and authentic set.

Have a good week. I'm going back to the last few games of the tennis final.

Colouring in the garden

Its still sunny! Perfect weather for unwrapping and unstacking the paper I left overnight in dye and steam baths.

I found a great set of tutorials to help with eco dying, see https://wendyfe.wordpress.com/tutorial-leaf-monoprinting-by-cassandra-tondro/. I followed most of the instructions given, but also used the remainder of the Logwood and Persian Berry dyes as a bath for some of my stacked and wrapped papers.

The big hit was poppy heads, with bay leaves coming a close second in terms of subtle colours and interesting shapes. Most of what's shown in these photos is paper, pre-soacked in an alum bath ... next task is to try the poppy flowers - the bank behind the house is covered with them, and bay leaves from our very large tree, on some fabric.

Inside, my design wall has been moved to be flat against a solid wall so now I can audition fabrics, tea bags, whatever and they stay in place!!! 

the beginning of a quilt. 

this may become a curtain!!!!

Finally, a quick catch up ...

for my stitch a line a day project today's thread was red (left over from sewing  the binding on a quilt) and today's stitch was running stitch,

my yoga socks are finished ...

and I've been chain stitching ... the motif on the old piece of lace just seemed to call out for this stitch to be added, even though I've used it on this piece before ... some things are so good you do them more than once!!!

Good stuff on small journeys

I'm writing this with an eye on the flurry of long tailed tits feeding on suet balls in the garden and wondering if, at last, I'm comfortable with the flapping of birds' wings!!  The robin is also there, defending his or her winter territory and yesterday Mr Blackbird came along. What joy.

And I'm feeling very relieved to have rinsed, washed, ironed, and logged the 24 pieces of fabric that were put into dye baths three weeks ago.

 The record keeping was a bit tedious but now I have colour recipes when I want a particular colour and shade.


Not sure how i'll use them yet, somewhere that'll show the great patterns from the more or less fidgeting I did with the fabric while it was in the dye bath.












Maybe the fabric will come into its own for a piece based on some of the ways that lines have - I'm collecting lots of pics of lines, like these on a walk around Bloomsbury last week.

Lots of blue plaques en route (http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/blue-plaques)

and some inspiration for stitching patterns ....













Finally, a couple of pics from last weekend in Dorset: I slept under this ancient beam and the first snowdrops bloomed under my window.








Have a good weekend all. My to do list includes mushroom soup and drafting a poem for the first workshop of a Poetry School (https://poetryschool.com) online course called Re-writing the Map.
This fits wonderfully with the work I'm doing on journeys at Inspiration to Stitch  -almost too good to be true.

Putting the Pages Back In ...

So pleased to report that the fog has finally left us, its now very cold so I've spent the last few days close to the fire reassembling my Autumn sketchbook or with the extra layer of a quilt as I read my way through Kim Moore's poetry (see more about her work at  https://kimmoorepoet.wordpress.com), and the story of the Twin Towers tightrope walker https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Petit, plus very regular and very brisk walks with dogs, of course.

Here are most of the dissembled pages, awaiting the decision about what to include and what to maybe keep for something else ...

A few that might not make it into the Autumn Book

 

I quite like most of these 

Found one more use for the empty teabags ... just the right size to hold my sewn leaves 

Finally, some sort of order emerges ...

At last, a cover page

Definitely do not like these pages ... might make good collage paper another time 

I'll soon have to pack things together for my return to UK so the pages are now back in the sketchbook, in an OK order, although I've learnt to think about this more in advance. 

That's it for now by what of autumn as I've just had an email about what to prepare for the next day on the course, which is only six days aways and means a new sketchbook, new techniques and a new topic!

Leaves, and more leaves,



                                 and lots of loose ends