Jimmy Rocks Torquay

I had a fantastic time last night singing and dancing along to Jimmy Barnes. Jimmy  and his band, which included his two daughters on back up vocals and his son on drums, were singing at the Torquay pub beer garden and we were squashed in like sardines. I went along with some girlfriends and one of my D1’s friends and it was great to see all the older Cold Chisel fans had brought their kids (18-20 year olds as you have to be over 18 to get into the pub) along and they were rockin’ too.

I have managed to catch up on a few outstanding p/cards and ATC’s. These will be sent off tomorrow with New Year greetings.

And here is a close up of one

Although they started with the same base, each one is slightly different. I decided to try out a few different colours and threads for the finishing edges. To add an Australian flavour I FME’d gum leaves onto organza to attach and collected some seed pods and she-oak seed capsules on my morning walk.

While my SIL was visiting from US she bought some sock wool and was knitting socks for the return back to the snow and freezing weather. Claudia was fascinated with the sock wool and how the stripes appeared so of course she ended up with a pair as well.

To thank my generous SIL I made her a bracelet with some freshwater pearls and a beautiful stone someone had given me.

I had a lovely email today from Kim in the US who had seen my comment on Susan Lenz’s Cyberfyber site. Kim is visiting Australia and New Zealand in January and asked for some tips on places to see in Melbourne or Sydney. I put together an email with lots of links to places of interest in Melbourne, so if anyone else would like it just let me know. Also there is voting for the reader’s choice Postcard and ATC awards on CyberFyber so if you have time drop over, have a browse and leave some comments. There are some truly wonderful pieces of art on display, very inspiring.

Cheers, till next time.

Postcard in the post

Three posts in 5 days, wow, this is a record!!!
I had to post today because I received some exciting post (in the mailbox) this morning. An envelope from Susan Lenz with the Postcard I chose from her swap. This was the last one left of her Endless Possibilities Series, which has these digitized words and other machine stitched rows of patterns upon painted, heat distressed bondaweb(?) The scanner does not pick up the metallic thread, but they are in there. I thought this would be a nice addition to my daughter’s 18th birthday book. Susan’s other postcards in this series included vintage keys, but this one doesn’t. Luckily I have a few old interesting keys from our garage doors here and also some I picked up in my favourite second hand yard- Restorer’s Barn. I will add one of these (Hope you don’t mind Susan?).
Susan also sent in this parcel an extra ATC which will join the other one in it’s frame above my sewing nook. (Have to get rid of a couple of children before I can claim a room to be a ’studio’.). And here are some pics of the book. I was going to leave space inside for the postcard but thinking about it while taking these photos, I think I’ll dangle it with a key from a group of machined cords on the front cover. The dangle here on the front cover is actually a necklace I made that she can take out and wear. Some bits on these pages, such as the 18 wishes, were taken from an altered book on the web by Karen. She has some beautiful work on her site, so take a look.Here are a few more pages, just scan through if you’re getting bored with the family snapshots.This last pic is the back cover with a poem I found while teaching at a school. I printed it on some red plastic sheeting that was part of the Country Road catalogue!
I have started working on the return postcard for Susan Lenz. Following the endangered life theme of the ATC I sent, this will be the Orange Bellied Parrot, which migrates between Tasmania and the south of Australia. Rather than just do one postcard, I am doing a large picture which I will cut up for a series of postcards. This is the initial sketch of a parrot (you’ll have to click on this, it’s a bit pale):
Here is the background with some silk fibres/hankies being layed on:
Here I have added some turquoise organza ribbon to the wing feathers and overlayed with a pale mauve chiffon scarf (from the Op Shop). It is pinned ready for FME.
Just one final note, Dale mentioned at the Australasian Quilt fair that she will be running a Wild Women (and song?) challenge so watch out on the Thread Studio website for that. Perhaps Dale could post a You Tube of her singing a wild women song. I’d like to see that!!!!
Cheers

ATC off to US

After a busy week/weekend with Daughter No 1’s 18th birthday party(it was a joint party with her friend, also 18 and they invited 180!) I managed to finish the ATC for the Fyber Cyber swap this week. When I couldn’t find an appropriate bead I decided to stitch the butterfly. It is one of several rare butterflies from the Mt Piper region in Victoria, Australia. I am hoping to do a series on the butterflies from this area, which is now protected habitat. The Moonlight Jewel[Blue](Hypochrysops delicia delos) lays it’s eggs on lichen covered branches which is the background stitching on the ATC, quite appropriate that it includes cocoon strippings!
My representation of the butterfly is silk ribbon embroidery on felt with beading and the feelers are one of Sharon B’s woven stitches from the PLOS class at Joggles.

I also started on the background fabric for the postcard and had great fun mixing up a combination of paints. I layered a piece of Zap cloth(bulk nappy liner) from the Thread studio over some cotton material and painted both together, using lots of water.

Here are the pieces hung out to dry (saved the newspaper from underneath too).

With the leftover paint I also did litttle stamping on some white cotton.

I’m off to the Australasian Quilt Fair tomorrow in Melbourne, so probably won’t get to work on this again until next week. It will be chopped up and layered to get the effect I’m after. Off now to have tea out with the family visitors who arrived from London 4am this morning. They’ve been sleeping off their jetlag. Cheers.

Monet

I am inspired to write an extra post this week (I have set myself the attainable target of one post a week) by Fibre fan’s blog. She did a very interesting weaving inspired by the Monet waterlilies for the January TIF and then shelved it.
This piece reminded me of some items I have inspired by Monet, I love the colours he uses. The first was from my ceramics phase and is a vase I painted
The next is a lovely pastel drawn by an artist friend.(I had to photograph it somewhere there was no reflection)
I am SO-O-O-O excited, I have arranged an ATC swap with Susan Lenz for cyberfyber. Check out what is happening on her site, there is an international swap happening later in the year as well, and lots of great invited exhibitors.
I will blog the ATC I am sending shortly, I’m just having some beads made up for a special series of ATC’s, one of which I will send to Susan and the others for the international swap.
Before I went to Summer School for a workshop with Dale Rollerson I made up this cute little fabric box to carry some of my bits & pieces.
And the inside:It is a lovely aussie print featuring Flannel flowers, waratahs, grevilleas and bottlebrushes(callistemons). The beads are from my fantastic local bead man (who is custom making the beads for my ATC’s – he says he loves a challenge). The pattern for the box is in this book: which I borrowed from our local branch of the Victorian Embroiderer’s Guild. I also borrow copies of Stitch as it becomes expensive to buy overseas magazines here in Oz.
Just to finish here are the lovely eucalyptus (gum tree) flowers my 7 year old picked for me.
Cheers