Busy, Busy again

We were preparing to go to an 18th birthday lunch. Firstly I made a batch of Irish Cream which the birthday girl loves, and can now drink legally (although it should be called Scottish cream as I put Scottish whiskey into it). Email if you would like the recipe! Claudia decided she’d like to make a postcard as a birthday card so she selected a piece of painted fabric and we stamped with pink and purple, cut out a fairy and FME with gold thread. While this was going on I was making a bracelet with some silver chain, a gorgeous bead and some charms to decorate the neck of the bottle (but didn’t have time to take photos as sons 1 & 2 woke up and decided they wanted to be dropped at friends). Party was at 12noon so it was all a little last minute. In the meantime daughter no. 1 made the salad. Made it to the party only 5 minutes late. Phew.

Last Sunday/Monday I attended the Embroiderer’s Guild conference, which is held every five years (not two as I previously thought). As well as embroiderers from all over Victoria, there were girls (and one boy) from Perth, Tasmania, and New South Wales. Most of the participants were living in for the whole four days, however as the conference was in Geelong, I was able to go home each night. My two day workshop was with Kirry Toose from Sydney who makes the most innovative wearable art and was such a fantastically friendly, enthusiastic tutor. Our workshop was making a Victorian capelet. Kirry brought some beautiful work to show us and allowed us to photograph also. However I didn’t think to ask if I could put it on my blog so I’ll just show one which we all admired very much.

This cape has the most amazing hand stitchery all over. Mine was nothing like this. I decided to go an Art Deco design based on the braid I had bought (see last post). Kirry had another piece of work in her portfolio based on circles as a focal point, which we used to create the design for my cape. After a quick dash to Spotlight and a visit to the thread shop in the bedroom (one of the Melbourne ladies had brought ‘a few’ items from her shop), this is what I managed to finish in the two days. Hopefully I will get this finished over the next few weeks.

This is the back

And the fronts

It is the dupion silk, backed with whisperweft, which we washed first in hot water to reduce shrinkage, and then the design is traced onto vliesofix. The design is cut out and then I ironed on the organza. Tear away is used while the applique edging is sewn and the FME. My machine and hand embroidery will be minimal in line with Art Deco design. I still have to finish the sleeves as for the fronts and back, do a little beading, attach the braid to the collar and FME and decide on and construct the fringe.
Cheers

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