Nostalgic tales, the Canada Connection.

Had a look round the garden today, found some weeds, as you do. Also found some special flowers blooming.

My grandparents both emigrated to Canada at the beginning of the last century, and were married at Niagara Falls, and then lived at Simcoe, Canada to start their married life. My grandfather was a furniature maker, and his brother and his family still lives in Canada now. Although I have never had the good fortune to meet them

However when Grandmother became pregnant with her first child, she became very homesick for her family , and they returned to England, Oxford to be precise. They lived in the same house all their married life, then my Aunt continued to live in the same house until recently, so for approx 75 years the same family lived in the house.

The front garden of the house in Oxford was planted with flowers by my grandmother, and my father was given a plant from grandmas garden to put into his garden as did his 3 sisters. This flowering plant had apparently come from Canada, and all the family have a cutting of this plant in their gardens, including my children. Its a strange link to the past.

Why am I telling you this story? I noticed this morning it was flowering in my garden. I do not know what it is called, I do not have "green fingers", so am always pleased to see it again.

The snails have walked over them, but I have let them be.

By strange co-incidence I have also had some flowers delivered, quite unexpectantly, by Interflora. They were sent by my colleagues at the school I have just left. So kind.

I took my camera with me yesterday into the depths of Wiltshire ( as promised)... amazingly I saw another field of poppies, knowing I had my camera with me, I wanted to take a photo for you, but there was nowhere safe to stop the car. Most frustrating. So sorry will have to make do with this boring and bland photo of Wiltshire yesterday.

Brilliant sunshine we had, but today they are forecasting thunderstorms and torrential rain..... hasn't arrived yet!

Can you believe it?

Went on a car trip to the depths of Hampshire today, and forgot to take my camera!!! Can you believe it? At first I was not too stressed about it, the weather was misty and murky, not good conditions for taking photos.

On the way home I noticed that the rapeseed oil I had been moaning about in previous post had been harvested, and it was wonderful to see green fields again. Then I saw a wonderful sight, and had not got my camera, it was a field full of poppies, the sun was shining and the whole field was glowing red. With the green fields surrounding it , a truly wonderful sight. Very impressive, but I cannot share the vision with you. Sorry.



Tomorrow I am travelling down south, to deepest Wiltshire, I will wish for good weather and will take my camera.




This is a picture of sheep I took recently (in Hampshire), better weather than today. (click on the picture to see the sheep under the trees).

Gallery Fun - for free.

Are you impressed? Good fun playing with these illusions. Thanks for the link Helen S.



Click on the picture to take you to the link.

Straight stitch (Satin) TAST 22

I really enjoyed this challenge... so much so I have overrun the time. In the photo above, I have created a Bargello ( Florentine stitch), and also in my hand dyed even weave linen I have withdrawn the thread, then stitched it back in with straight stitches to make the colour sequences change. Rather like Ikat weaving.

Hey ho.... trouble is I got a bit too enthusiastic and started slanting the straight..... thinking on the terms of What if......? So please forgive me for getting carried away. So here are some more photos of this challenge.

I started with some of my own dyed canvas and silk and threads, I had some bought threads in the right colours too, and had some paper drinking straws. For a little variety - I also had some wire used for keeping the flies out of greenhouses. I did find this too hard on the fingers and threads though.

I was so pleased that I have mounted the pieces onto an A3 sheet of paper ( I coloured it) then I can use it for reference.

Then I did some wild experiements- using a transparent nylon fabric as a ground, I used velvet ribbon, glitzy thread, shiny rayon thread and the red..... is a plastic net used by the supermarkets to wrap oranges. Great fun!

Day trip to Cirencester

Had some exam business to attend to today in a neighbouring county, so on the way home, decided to call into this town.



Gill of elegent sufficiency blog should be able to recognise where this is! Some really nice chocolate in this shop. If not recognised yet..... ...here is another clue!

However one of the reasons to visit, was to go to the art shop ( the green fronted one in the photo) to get some more inktense pencils. I am really enjoying using these, so decided to invest in a couple more colours. Another reason to go was to pick up dearly beloveds Fathers day gift from the Jewellers . So quick reminder for all interested ..... its June 17th............how do I know? My children told me!

Green Fields.....

England is renowned for its green fields, and one thing that strikes you as you step off a ferry, or plane on returning to the UK, is how green everything is. Much to do with the amount of rain this little island gets.

I was procrastinating a short while ago about the yellow invasion of our fields. This is the subject of a small journal quilt. I have called it "Yellow Invasion - Raping the green fields of England." In case you are not sure, this relates to the Rape seed oil.

I feell better now!

Crossed buttonhole- TAST 21

Cannot say I enjoyed this stitch very much, I made a background of hand -dyed silk on organza, in pale greys and pink. I chose a fine grey pearl thread.

Try as I may I could not keep the stitching even.

Great book

Today in the post I recieved a book on the embellisher from Australia. Dale has created some wonderful work to illustrate her techniques and to encourage you to experiment. Just my sort of book. Have a look here.

I have been playing with my ideas of cubism with a photo of an iris I took at the weekend in the garden of Urchfont Manor. I am just Thinking about whether I can use some of Dale's inspiration AND use the embellisher. It is quite a complex compostiton. what do you think?

Wot no broadband?

Have not had our broadband connection for 36 hours.... a real nuisance. So it is good to be back, talking to everyone again.




It will not be long before these will be back as well. June is the normal time for the English strawberry harvest. Yummy.





(click on photo to enlarge)
Saw this wonderful poster recently, and I am really trying to do my bit..... tea bags, eggshells, as well as grass cuttings and potato peelings. I have bought one of those green plastic composters, and have hidden it, out of sight, behind the shed. Hope it works. Right better go and do some stitching................

Weekend away

Have been away at Urchfont Manor with my mentor, Julia Capara and a group of fellow artists, this weekend. The weather yesterday was truly English, warm and sunny, it certainly bought the croquet enthusiasts out to play.

.

The borders in the garden were lovely to see, and the flowers were truly fragrant.

However that was not the purpose of the weekend. We go to work and we do that with enthusiasm and dedication to our art. The format of the weekend is structured. We have tutorials during the weekend and talk about our own work, and as all of the attendees exhibit in Galleries regularly, it is so encouraging to be able to dicuss our artwork at this level.

We also partake in a number of drawing activities through the course of the weekend as well as continue with our own work. This weekend we looked at cubism as a movement and its influences on textile art.

On this piece of work I was inspired to transpose the visual language of Picasso, by concentrating on the planes, composition and tones he used. This is A2 in size and the media used is graphite. It is not finished yet, and I will continue working on it over the next few weeks.

This is one of my compositions I shall call it "Bottle on a table" . Is that a good title do you think?

It was drawn from observation, then cut up and significant lines redrawn, and then tone and blended pattern added.

Many people do not understand Modern Art and in particular Cubism. I am always willing to learn about new ways of seeing if that may help me with my self expression. How do you feel about Modern Art.. Love it ---- ot hate it??

Stitches Book

As promised in yesterdays post, here is the stich book I made. The outer cover is "J" cloths.

This is the front cover. The thread is a variegated, and hand dyed. It is a finer quality cotton thread. Great to work with. The stitches are straight stitches.

The back of the book uses the same thread and straight stitches too. The beads are all hand made too, from Fimo and others from glazed clay. The cord is made on the sewing machine and the book is quite soft as the backing to the embroidery is felt.

Inside the pages are brown wrapping paper, torn to size. Each embroidery stitch is completed in Anchor soft embroidery thread on a fine evenweave linen. It was fun to make.

Butterfly chain Stitch - TAST -week 20

What a lot of headaches to get on the internet and into blogger this weekend....... I gave up in the end. So at last ...... here is my effort at this weeks challenge.

I decided to continue the idea of using primary and secondary colours for the thread. Whilst looking through my stash for the right colours. I came across something I had prepared for a class a number of years ago. Thought it was a good way of using up the stash.

I had taught a class on cross stitch and I used to design for a number of UK magazines. This was one of my teaching aids on colour. In the stash I found the threads I had used as well.

The threads felt as if they were inviting me to use them.

The background " fabric" was some dyed and marbelled "J" Cloths - I also found in the stash. They used to only be available in light blue, and they dye beautifully. I had dyed a batch dark blue and marbeled some of them. I think they are available in a range of colours. The advantage to the "J" cloths were they had perforations, unlike the cheaper all purpose cloths you buy from the supermarkets now. As this stitch would be easier to do on evenweave fabrics, I made my choice.

What I hadn't remembered was, the fabric is not as even after dying! My stitches came out a bit crooked. I enjoyed the exercise though and found it very satisfying to " chain" the groups of upright stitches together. As you can see I chose to use complementary colours of threads together.

I decided to back the J cloth with some yellow cotton. It does give a warm glow to the fabric, the subtlety may be lost in the camera image, but it is there in reality.

I also found a stitch book I had made out of a J cloth, but I will blog that another time ........I need to get some work done.

Another Exhibition

One thing I love about the summer in England is............there are always lots of art exhibitions to enjoy. Went to see one locally, paintings and drawings by people who live in my area. It made a pleasant contrast to the Stroud exhibition which was featuring national and international artists. Have a look at the Gallery via this link............here.



The group meet twice a week and are obviously very enthusiatstic about their art. Wonderful. The exhibition finishes on Saturday, if you want to go and look. Now to find the next exhibition.

Textile Festival - Stroud

It was something of a last minute decision to visit Stroud today.

The Stroudwater Textile Festival is taking place until 21st May, and if you have the opportunity go along, you will not regret it. admittance is free. The map on the website is most helpful for finding your way around Stroud,

The first exhibition I went to see was at the Museum in the Park , Stratford Park. The work on show was by Sue Lawty, Dail Behennah and Maggie Shaw.



Stratford Park was beautiful in the sunshine, full of wonderful trees, and there is a bandstand as well as tennis courts and a bowling green!

I had seen Sue Lawty at the Vitoria and Albert Musuem last year (and you can follow her V & A blog,)so it was interesting to see some more of her work. I had been fascinated by her attention to detail and this exhibition certainly illustrated this perfectly.

Sue's work was complemented beautifully by Dail and Maggie's work. I had seen Dail's work in Crafts Magazine, and it was good to see how she built up the layers of wood, creating wonderful shadows in the process. I had not seen Maggie's work before.



I seemed to pick up lots of leaflets, one in particular interested me..... in June ....the Stroud valleys are having Open Studios.

We drove back into the Town Centre, parked the car and then found our way to the Subscription rooms. Laura Thomas was exhibiting some wonderful colourful pieces, many of which were embedded in Acyrilic. Fiona Rutherford was exhibiting some beautiful tapestries, I do not recall having seen her work before.

I could not help myself, and bought some wonderful hand spun wool dyed with natural dyes. They were quite expensive, but aren't they lovely. I am thinking embellisher machine....... suspect most of you are perhaps thinking...... knitting.

After a quick lunch we wandered through the town and found " The Space". I was looking forward to seeing Yvonne Mortons work, unfortunately, no work at all. I was a little disappointed, as I had enjoyed working with her last year.

However the exhibition of Kuba cloth from Africa was a delight in line and pattern, and Gaynors limewood carvings were very textural.

We walked back to the car in pouring rain. Quite a sight with the mist of the rain.

We were pleased to get back to the car and out of the rain. Ten minutes down the road on the outskirts of Cirencester, it was dry and sunny. Look at this turbulent sky, John Constable would have really loved painting this.

We arrived home to sun and blue skies, this image is a mile from home!

Do not be deceived though.... we have just had what the weatherman has called a "beefy storm". We have just had black skies, thunder, lightening, hail, and flash floods. How the weather can change within a few miles and a short space of time.

Basque Stitch

Gosh .... I managed to get the TAST challenge stitched since I last posted. Have also cooked dinner, cooked home made apple crumble and home made rock cakes......... quite a productive evening. Fed the animals too.

I made the decision to use only fabric and threads I had previosly space dyed myself. The threads were varigated as the procian dyes were lemon yellow and violet . I used the same dye batch for the linen evenweave fabric. One thread was quite thick, a shiny rayon, and I found this quite difficult to stitch through the linen fabric with it. The other two threads were cotton, medium weight and fine. These were really easy to stitch with.

Can you see the letter M...hope so. The photo is not brilliant , as I had to take it with flash switched on.......it is 11pm at night here after all.

Monday morning post note ( addition).

Have taken a photo this morning in daylight..... is it any better than the one I took last night with flash?

I will let you decide which photo you prefer.

These were the threads and the fabric I used. ( hand dyed with yellow and violet procian dyes)

Close up of the different weights of thread.

A lazy sunday afternoon

After a strenous walk around the garden in the pouring rain.... its time to get in a comfortable chair for a Sunday afternoon nap, and to dry off..

In the meantime I decide to sort out my blog a bit more. Really needed to put more links on the blog as I get so frustrated looking for the blogs I like to read. So pleased I have made a good start to this... still lots more I need to put in -but that will be another day.

Snoring is starting to come from the other chair, as well as the smell of wet dog hitting my nostrils.

Whilst surfing the blogs I have noticed many of you getting involved with Tuesday stitching.Have often wondered what it was about. Great excitement today........ I found out...It is Sharon B. blog. I have also put a link in my link bar on the blog.

The excited howl from me woke someone up!

So I thought I might give TAST a go tooo........ so dug around in the studio and found an old box full of left over bits from C & G days. Seemed appropriate as I have been posting about the colour yellow recently and also complementary colours. Also be able to use up some of the UFO stash.

So have printed off the instructions for Basque stitch..... here goes...............did I read somewhere it needs to be posted on your blog on a Sunday? Better get going then................... what ??? I am 5 months behind the rest of you? Better late than never I suppose!

Someone else has gone back to his slumbers....... it's a dogs life!

Rain is still pouring outside....... miserable weather!

Missing in Portugal

Rosalind from Down by the River blog has asked us all to publish this poster on our blogs. Bloggers are worldwide, and you never know, it might just mean she is found. Regular updates are on the BBC website.





Please feel free to copy this poster to your blog.

Shopping.

Perhaps I should have titled this post differently. Seduced by textile goods ?

Went shopping in Cirencester. yesterday afternoon. In the pouring rain of course, so the shops were fairlly quiet for a Friday afternoon. Drove through rural Wiltshire and Gloucestershire to get there. The wild flora is certainly enjoying this wet spell of weather.

Popped into the craft shop of Brewery Arts, its is still housed in the theatre, I suspect the renovation work will be finished by the end of the year, the builders seem to be making good progress. Did not buy anything there though.

Then popped along to the sewing supplies shop and really had to buy some stuff there, as you can see! Then along to the Art shop at the back of the church. Just had to buy some "Inktense " pencils to try out.

I merely purchased the basic colours of the pencils, as I wish to experiment. I know that some of my internet chums love them. So thought I ought to give them a go. Think I am also being badly led astray by Gill . (of An Elegant Sufficiency - who knows this area well!)

The gold thread is needed for a project I hope to be working on soon. That is if I ever find the other reels after all the help I received from four-legged friend with the unpacking of my treasures!

I tried to buy a 5 reels of the same gold thread on e-bay. The bidding became silly - The thread sold for £18. Think some people have more money than sense when they are on e-bay! The postage was a pound and 5 reels X £2.45 = £12.25 total £13.45.......the buyer paid well over the odds!

Now why did I purchase the fat quarters of cotton...... you may well ask............I could dye my own. -Yes I know.- but when the local hobbycraft opened I bought a bundle of bright primary colours, and last week I did buy some more dyes. So I can dye some of my own..... when I get some time.

Meanwhile some more colour inspiration for you............

Yellow - of course.

Just for a change, some blue and white. These pansies were on special offer when they were babies. Well.....have to save some money somewhere.

Well Papoosue, lets see if these pictures will enlarge. Cross your fingers. Have followed your directions...... here's hoping.