Stash busting -almost

I have begun the stitch along for Stitchin Fingers’ hand stitching group and also incorporated a little stash busting. I have a large collection of fleecy offcuts from making trackies and pJs for my four children. I have been wanting to utilize them as the base for textile-ish experiments, but had a sudden brainwave while lying down having a back operation from 8 year old daughter (we were playing doctors) to use some bits for the stitch along which began on July 1st. This will become the centre ‘A’ square for a blanket which I’m sure said daughter will love, as I plan to use quirky colours and shapes.

These are the ‘a’ stitches, algerian eye stitch and arrow stitch. I began drawing the squares for the algerian eyes and then decided to go for the free style approach. Claudia is busy working on her ATC’s and postcards for gifts (to family) and swaps and I’m hoping she’ll be able to incorporate these stitches also as I work through the list.

At our last textile group get-together we spent an hour or two chatting while winding up some bead in various materials. I used painted tyvek and various papers, some not so successfully. The thinner papers probably need to stay adhered to a straw (they are the mangled ones on the right!)

One of our members was very lateral thinking and made beads from all sorts of things, including bark from the paperbark tree. They were extremely effective. I also added to my stash as Pam brought along some vintage fabrics and embroidered collars to share, and Pauline gave us a goody bag of bits and pieces (she had Claudia in mind with some flower sequins).

The last photo is some more stash ‘adding’ kind of! I’m getting ready for the Embroiderer’s Guild of Victoria bi-annual conference starting this weekend. I’ll be having some fun at Kirry Toose’s Victorian Capelet workshop. Although I enjoy hand stitching and find it very therapeutic I also love machine work so it’ll be a great two days of playing on the machine. I chose my colours from some cushions in a Vogue Living magazine, teal dupion silk as the base colour and the aubergine for the lining. I anticipate we will be doing quite a bit of layering and embellishment, so I’ll be taking lots of beads, threads and fabric scraps. (quick visit to the bead shop in the morning methinks!).

Cheers

39 Steps

No ‘new’ artwork this week, but I did have a ‘jolly’ time at the theatre on Saturday night. MTC’s production of 39 steps was very clever and extremely funny. The actors: Helen Christinson, Marcus Graham, Grant Piro, Tony Taylor were all brilliant and it was a very enjoyable night out with the girls.

I spent some of my free time this week joining and browsing Sharon B’s new site stitchin fingers. It’s a great forum for discussion and viewing some great stitching and textile art. There are also a few interest groups being set up so head over and take a look.

Joggles newsletter featured a very interesting book this week: The Art of the Family Tree by Jenn Mason. The preview showed quite a few interesting possibilities. I have a photo of my grandmother from when she was a cute little button of about 3 or 4 years, that I would like to present in some way, so I may have to check out the local booksellers for this one for some ideas. My grandmother was/is one of my main inspirations, she was a great embroiderer and taught me to crochet. I have many of her pieces of crochet and embroidery, as well as her lace wedding dress from 1930. I have been looking for an antique mannequin to display the dress so I may make a fabric memory book to accompany it. (There is a fabric memory book group happening at stitchin fingers)

The photo below is of my Mother’s grandparents. When I received this photo it was damaged and the easy access to facilities to touch up and repair was not then available. I decided to embroider and decorate to enhance the photo. My great grandmother RoseAnn was known to be a great seamstress, hence the inclusion of the singer sewing machine.

I’m hoping to do some creating this afternoon. I’m working on my journal for uni. 5,500 words done in five entries. I aim to finish one entry now and then have only one to do to be up to date. (We have 3 uni sessions left this semester).

Cheers