Passing the Time....

There's nothing better than spending these long cold

winters evenings in front of the fire with a little

project in hand.

Did I say 'little' project....

That might have been a slight under-exaggeration!!!

These little hexi blocks are destined to become

a King sized quilt for our bed.

My scrap box is once again overflowing

so in the true tradition of quilting I am 

turning them into something warm 

and homely.

That's 6 down.....How many to go?

.....maybe it will be finished in about 2 years

if i'm lucky!!

What could be better, on a long winter evening

snuggling up under a home made quilt, where every little bit of 

fabric used has a story to tell.

How I Love....

Those cold cold crisp Winters mornings.

We woke up this morning to find our

world had turned white with

a thick hoar frost.

Beautiful.......

The frost faeries had been hard at work

on the lilac tree!

Even the spiders webs looked amazing!

A very Christmassy looking ivy leaf.

One down.........

So that's one down, 5 to go!

Work is underway to complete the next 6 pieces of 

work for the exhibition in May 2013!

I have finally finished the first piece and the next 3 are

well under way. 

So, here is a little sneaky peek at a bit of the 

first piece!

All the pieces are based on the 'Goddess'

form and all will contain text that I 

find inspirational, both of my own 

making and reproduced with  

kind permission of the authors.

Working in Abstract

I have been aiming to work more toward the abstract .  To help me along

the way I have joined an Abstract Challenge group

and this months challenge following the 

storms in the U.S.A  is 'Sandy'.

This is an exercise in Sketch book design so I don't have 

to complete a textile mixed media piece.

So this is the start of my first piece.  Dark stormy skies in soft pastels with 

isobars based on a manipulated copy of my thumb print.  I have also decided to

include text within each piece.  Thinking about the devastation that 

a storm such a Sandy would bring made me think about all the people 

that are important in my life.  So the text is a stamp of 

'How do I love thee, let me count the ways'

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Things To Come

Posting here has been a bit haphazard lately due to computer problems.

I have been working on the next body of work for the exhibition next May

so here is a sneaky peek of things to come!

Lots more work to be done on these before they are finished

 but they are coming along nicely.

Collaboration....

A very mixed ability group I am part of decided to make a 

small wall hanging, with each person making one strip 4" x 18"

Round Robin style.  So we all chose our fabrics and made the 

first strip before sending our fabrics on to the next person.

So here is my finished pieces.  All the girls did a lovely job on their strips

despite a few having some collywobbles to start with.  

Olympic Panel

As part of the Cultural Olympic celebrations 

a group of 77 artists from the Open Studios 

scheme, myself included collaborated in making a panel

celebrating the Olympics and Paralympics.

All the artworks measure 20 cm square and 

are created using various mediums. 

 Paint, ceramic, glass, textiles, metal,perspex and wood

all feature withing the panel.

 The panel will be on show in the Balcony Bar

of the Corn Exchange in Newbury until the 15th Sept.

It's well worth a look.

A Little Bit Of Crochet

During the day I have been very busy working on

 my next body of work to be exhibited next year.

Come the evening time I've been creating this piece of loveliness,

a blanket make out of crocheted hexagons...very easy to do .

There's a long way to go yet to make it into a usable blanket but I'm

looking forward to working on it through the winter when it will keep my 

knees warm as I'm working on it!

Off The Beaten Track

As we are hosting the Olympic Games this year

there have  been a number of Cultural Olympiad Events 

occurring up and down the country.

For us, the big one is was the Fire Garden at one of our most

important heritage sights, Stonehenge.

We were greeted by the sight of huge spheres lit up, massive fire candles 

and chaps manipulating fire, all amongst the massive stones which are normally 

roped off and can only be viewed from a distance.  

The atmosphere was amazing!

 One of the many fire candles, each one had a different

design on it along with writing in 

different languages.

 Fire balls, these could be clearly seen from the road

and were an impressive sight for those driving past!

The automatons made amazing shadows on the stones.

 

Below, some of the lanterns that were hanging amongst the stones.

These had all been made out of t-shirts!!

 

 One of the chaps 'playing with fire'

This had to be one of the best ways to spend a cold damp English Summer Evening,

with all that fire around we we're never going to be cold!!!

A Bouquet of Loveliness

I have spent a lovely day crafting with paper, not something 

I tend to do very often.....

The result of my efforts is a beautiful bouquet of loveliness...

Each one will be given as a gift at some point over the next few months...

Picnic Lunch....

Whilst my laptop has been out of action & refusing to work I've been in my

 workroom crafting and have made this little gem.

I've decided that if the summer ever comes to the UK I will take my picnic blanket & sketch 

book over the common and spend some time sitting in  the sun.  

So I needed something suitable to take my lunch in and this little bag is perfect.
It  has a wipe clean interior with plenty of room inside for my fruit and veg!

New Arrivals

In a few short weeks there will be a new arrival within the family.

As we already know baby will be a boy I've been making

a few little goodies for when he arrives.

A couple of little bibs........

 

A couple of burpie pads to go over mums shoulder......

   

And a little birdie basket to keep it all in.......

A sneaky Peek

So with 8 days to go before Open Studios starts I thought

I'd give you a little sneaky peek of some of the pieces

that will be in this years exhibition.......

A little detail from one of the boats.....

Moving onto the garden.....

 A little bit of Cow parsley and 

Sea Holly.......

 so there you go.......

If you're in my neck of the woods then please

do pop in .....

www.open-studios.org.uk

entry # 10 in the brochure and on the website.

A Little Tweet

Don't you just love Spring ....

Whilst working in the garden at the weekend

we could hear a little chirping noise coming from

the ivy hedge......

Carefully peering in between the leaves we found a

perfect little nest with three beautiful

chicks in it.  

Quickly, before mum came back we

took a couple of quick snaps then left them in peace.

Can you guess what type of bird they are??

We spent a good long while watching 

Mrs Blackbird flitting in and out of the nest with

food for her chicks......

Did you guess right??........

Exhibition Time Once Again

How quickly the last year has gone.  It's once again time for 

Open Studios

http://www.open-studios.org.uk

 I will be opening my doors and welcoming

visitors who come to see my work.

If you're in the area why not pop in for a look round 

and a cup of tea!

A little Treat......

A few weeks ago I decided to give myself a little treat.  I have been waiting with great

excitement for my parcel to arrive and today it did!

So here they are........

My beautiful handmade, hand painted boots made by Tracey at 

Pandora Picture Boots in Glastonbury.

I am a very happy bunny!!!!

I'm Lichen this!!

I have had a bit of a break this last couple of weeks, a week in beautiful Devon

 then a week with my family in Northern Ireland.

Whilst taking a walk around the country lanes in Devon I 

came across some beautiful lichen growing on a wooden fence.

It is very reminiscent of Barnacles growing on a boat hull or rocks on the shore!

 

I also came across this very dessicated Hydrangea head.

 

It was great to find that this head had been missed when deadheading and had 

been left to decay,  allowing nature through death to create a beautiful delicate 

ethereal flower head.

Final Doodle....

So, the final Doodle lesson with Traci at 

Strathmore Workshops was all about painting

whimsical faces.  Not something I am very confident

about doing!!

So having taken a deep breath I took the plunge and here is

my piece..... her eye is very large and not at all how

I meant it to turn out!!

I'm really pleased with the overall look of the piece and the colour

scheme and the fact that her face shape is pretty good and her

hair &lips worked out quite well too.  

I've really enjoyed having a go at the workshop and will continue to

use the techniques Traci has shared with us.

A Weekend Away

A bright and sunny Saturday morning saw us heading up to Hereford for 

a much needed weekend away with a small detour to a log cabin showroom!!

We stayed Leominster ( pronounced Lemster!) and, having feasted on

one of the biggest breakfasts we have ever had we

had a wander round the town looking

at all the beautiful black and white Tudor buildings.

I loved this sign on the pub opposite the hotel we stayed in!!

Sadly this poor woman in the sign was probably Sarah Leeke  of Leominster being 

ducked in one of the last recorded instances of this practise around 1817.

 Once we had finished in Leominster we headed down to Hereford,

to have a wander round the town and the Cathedral grounds.  

The beautiful Cathedral door with all it's iron scroll work.

Statue of Edward Elgar in the Cathedral grounds.

We found this beautiful piece of wall in the courtyard along with lots of old

gravestones which made up the pathways.

Lots of inspiration found to draw on over the weekend.

Carrying On.......

Carrying on with the watercolour paint and marker doodles.......  

For this piece I taped four sheets of A3 watercolour paper together to 

give me a much bigger working area.

As I find it quite hard to just doodle freely I thought it would

be a good idea to put a favourite piece of music on, close my eyes and 

do the initial watercolour doodle marks without

looking at my work too often to see what results

I would get.

So not only do I have one big piece of work, but when 

broken up I also have four smaller pieces of work

to take inspiration from as well.

This time I tried to write using an ink pen, unfortunately the ink

 bled when it was used on the watercolour paint.

So note to self.....use marker pens on these areas!!

These doodles are going to be the starting point for a series of works

on Goddesses, weather they become part of the background

or part of the Goddess bodies themselves has yet to be explored

in more depth.

In each piece you can once again see the leaf/flower form which

is the enduring theme through out all these doodles.

I love the soft green colour within all these pieces and 

leaf shape that I have chosen to use this time.