My bag is finished.

My bag based on stone work at Teotihuacan is now finished.
I have to say I am rather pleased with it.

You can see more pics at Textiles for Two.

My head is in Mesoamerica!

I have been very busy working on a bag for our Mesoamerican project.
It has taken a lot of my time this week ~ well all of it really but I am enjoying it.
Here is a little peep and you can see a little more at Textiles for Two.

I'm hoping to be able to show you more of it later this weekend.

Flutterby butterfly!

The project at Patchwork class this time is "Appliqué".

We meet once a month and this project is to take 3 classes. Normally I would find out all I can on our subject and do several pieces. This, however has resulted in quite a few UFO's (really must do something with them).
I decided I would change tack and work on one item and give it my full attention.


I thought I would make a butterfly. I wasn't sure what it would be but I thought I could used some of my favourite scraps for it.

Maggie, our teacher reminded me that I do quite a lot of appliqué when doing art quilts, something I hadn't really realised, so what about doing reverse appliqué?
So the first class was all about making patterns for my shapes, cutting them from the background fabric and placing the scraps in place, securing them with Bondaweb.
After that I satin stitched all the motifs.


This time I outlined the butterfly and free quilted the background. I did shadow quilting on the inside of the butterfly to create a contrast.
I have beaded the butterfly's antennae and round the body.
I can't decide if I should bead around the wings, maybe I will.
What do you think?

Next time I will finish my piece.
I have decided to make a soft wall hanging. This panel is approx 12inches square so will be a good size hanging when finished.

Wall Flowers Panel

As well as working on the big Mesoamerican project with Jan for Textiles for Two, I am working on my own project on Nature from the inspiration around me in the North Devon countryside and coast.

This is my latest piece based on flowers growing against and old wall.
The base fabric is a piece of handmade felt I did last year. I trapped all sorts of bits and pieces with wool tops between soluble film and machined a close grid pattern over it all. I gave it a vigorous wash in hot water to felt the wools and dissolve the film. And that is how it stayed for a long while!

I recently found some gorgeous organzas in a fabric shop in Barnstaple. This one was a very pale lavender with embroidered flowers and leaves.
I used it as an overlay for my felt and machined a rambling stitch between the flowers. That looked OK but was missing texture. I love texture.
So out came my heat gun an the surface got a good blasting ;0)

I expected to get a lovely crusty surface that would feel like a stone wall but I didn't expect the flowers and leaves to pop out quite as well as they did.
I burnt all the organza away from the edge to leave it quite rough. I added beads to the centre of the flowers and some little beads and sequins around the background.

I'm not sure how I will finish it yet, maybe I will apply it to some velvet, I think the contrast in textures would be good but whether it will be a wall hanging or a framed piece, I just don't know.

Unfinished Symphony

The first swap of the year at Unlimited Textiles was an "Unfinished Symphony" swap.

The idea was to send an unfinished piece of work to your partner for them to do with what they wanted to make a finished piece of art.

I received a piece of experimental knitting and crochet from June.

Of course I pounced on the lovely flower motif at the top and with some hand painted cotton, some extra fancy wools and some needle felting I made this postcard. There are little beads at the centre of the flower and scattered on the "hillside" with a little silver ladybird peeping out from behind that flower.

Another shape jumped out at me - literally - and this little fishy art doll was born.
I did quite a bit of needle felting to make the lacy knitting a little firmer and make that lovely little tail.
The fishy is embellished with another little flower and beads and charms. There is a hidden fishy too for June to find.
I think this little doll is lots of fun and I hope June will agree.

Just in time for Valentines Day

The swap at Textile Challenges this month is for a padded heart to be made in time for Valentines Day.

Well, unusually for me, I am on time and here is my heart.

The heart panel is made from layers of singed organzas and lots of free machine embroidery. I don't think they show but there are little hearts embroidered with the gold thread.

I have stitched little pink roses to the panel and added some little beads round them. I didn't think this needed a lot of beads or the gold hearts would disappear altogether.

The heart itself is made of patterned velvet and the whole thing is lightly stuffed.

It measures 6ins long.

It will be on it's way to Pam very soon.

Dezdamona

Meet Dezdamona.
Let me tell you about her.

My hairdresser, Dez, loves Girls Aloud and in particular their song "The Promise"
He entertained the salon over Christmas with his own rendition of this song complete with all the right dance moves. I think he really should have been on the stage.

So the idea of Dezdamona was born.
I thought, at first, I would make a doll but changed my mind and decided to just make the front of a small doll and appliqué it to fabric.

The background is hand painted cotton. The base of the doll is calico, tinted with fabric pastels. Her dress is made from layers of silk and organza with free machine embroidery.

Dezdamona herself is padded and quilted to give her her lovely curves.
Her hair is made from fancy threads and yarns. She is in need of a hairdresser I think although, she has some little beads in there to give it sparkle.
Her jewellery is made from seed beads.

I have added the words "The Promise", "Starting to fade", and "Dezdamona" using transfer paper printed on the computer. A sprinkling of crystal stones adds to the glitz.

I mounted the piece onto board so it can be framed or hidden in a drawer ;0)
It measures approx 9 x 6 inches.

Oh by the way. Dez loved Dezdamona and she made lots of friends being passed around the salon.

A Little Quiltie

There isn't any theme for our swap on Unlimited Textiles this month so I rummaged though my stash to see what would inspire me.

I found a piece of dress velvet. It has a gorgeous feel with little sequins on it. The print is in shades of pinks. From the lightest shell pink to deepest maroon. A very rich fabric indeed.

There in my images was this lovely lady with flowers the same colour as my fabric! I found some lace in the same colour ways and this little quilt was started.

I had some pink metal roses that seemed perfect and added some beading down the side of the image.

"Smell the Roses" journeyed off to Jill who liked her.
I have been doing a lot of abstract things just recently so it was a good exercise to go back to using images again.

Slash and Burn

For July (yes I was late - again!) on Unlimited Textiles our swap theme was Slash and Burn.
So OK, not a lot of slashing here but plenty of burn to make up for it.

The background of the first two pieces was made by free machining painted nappy liners to organza. This was zapped with my heat gun - I love my heat gun ;0)
Then placed it on wool felt and covered with a chiffon scarf. I free machined all over the fabric doing freehand flowers and swirls.

The finished background fabric was cut into the pieces I needed and I beaded the centre of the flowers and dotted sequins and beads here and there. I put a tiny silver dragonfly onto the Quiltie.


The third piece is based on stone walls again.
First, painted Bondaweb was ironed onto cotton velvet.
Next, I stitched painted Bondaweb to organza and played with my heat gun again ;0)
Pieces of this burnt fabric was stitched to the velvet. All of this was covered with dark red organza and stitched with a straight stitch.
I burnt away most of the organza. Little seed beads were added to look like raindrops.

A lot of the walls here are painted with Oxblood
Red paint. I love it when this starts to peel.
This is the look I have tried to get here.

Pat got the first ATC and Patsy gets the other and the quiltie.
I know Pat liked hers, I am keeping my fingers crossed about Patsy.



On a side note:
Unlimited Textiles is open again for sign ups. This is only for a short time so if you are into textiles, love to swap would like to join this talented group, go along and sign up, let me know where I can see your work (I'm just nosey) and I will approve you asap.

Stone Wall Inspiration

This arch is for Hannah.
One of the themes she chose is Nature and she likes blues, green, golds, and purples.

Well this isn't strictly nature but is inspired by the walls in Devon.

We have lots of lovely dry stone walls and cob and stone walls.
Cob is a mixture of earth and clay.
I love the texture of these walls and the way moss clings to them. I have enjoyed seeing the rain sparkling on them this year too.

I think of these walls as part man made and part nature and a what a wonderful combination they make.


I started out making this arch by painting bondaweb and bonding it to organza. I blasted the fabric with the heat gun and allowed it to bubble and go quite hard in places.
I cut up this fabric into pieces I thought could represent stone slabs and stitched it down onto cotton velvet. I also put some strips of gold organza on and stitched them down and zapped with the heat gun again.
I added little beads to represent the raindrops, we have had a lot of them this year.

What you don't get here is the texture. It has a rough feel and I think feels a little like the stone wall it is made to represent. I hope Hannah thinks so too.

Flower Power

We have been away for the Bank Holiday weekend. We went to see Laura and Toby in Southampton. It was lovely to see them they are so happy together.
I have photos and will share later.


I wanted to show you my latest organza flowers.

I just love to make these flowers and I love to wear brooches so I decided to combine the two.
Here are the results.
These are big showy brooches, almost 4 inches across.

They have the same heavily beaded centres as the flowers on my quilts and of course the little dragonfly but, now I can wear my art!

I'm really thrilled with them. I wore one on our little walk around Ilfracombe yesterday and had some lovely comments about it.
Big head now ;0)


You can see other pics of them on Flickr and my Etsy Shop.

Kilt Pins

I joined the "Kilt Pin Swap" on ANUK.
What a great idea of Kari's.

I thoroughly enjoyed making these. As they were for Valentines Day I felt they needed a heart on them hence the fabric hearts.
The hearts were pieces of textile that I had over from another project I just cut them to shape and zig zagged the edges. A bit fiddly but well worth it I think.
I now have a little box of hearts!

The first pin went to Jill and the other I have been using myself but maybe it will go to Laura (my daughter) as she comes home for a few days this weekend.