Rhythmic Stitching.....

Debbie's Hexies

Debbie’s colour ‘Mustard/Ochre’. The meaning of the name Debbie is bee. For a few years I kept bees so the idea of hexagons was drawing me in to a design. I struggle with hand stitching as now I am losing the sensitivity in the tips of my fingers, I do so enjoy boro and sashiko stitching. Once the hexagons were stitched together I quilted inside each shape with a variegated ochre thread. I found this so soothing and rhythmic especially in our present strange times. Small silk flowers with beaded stamens were attached to the hexagons. There are 3 separate hexagons, each with a few hidden written words attached randomly. This would not be complete without a bee so one has buzzed his way in !!!!!

Rosemary's - 'By the light of the Silvery Moon'

Although gold wasn’t mentioned I wanted to include some bling even though it was to be only a gold thread. Red is such a warm colour and there were lots of reds in the ufo box. So to hand was hand painted silk velvet, silk, and random cottons of varying weights. Rosemary has two really lovely very fluffy cats so there definitely had to feature. I have a Tao cat book and so I printed off a piece relating to the passionate cat, and this was bonded onto the fabric and covered with layer of acrylic wax. I found a fringe on a scarf which reminded me of a curtain so here we - the finished square. I feel the cats are plotting mischief by the light of the silvery moon - but who knows, they might just be wondering what's for breakfast !!

Thanks for visiting our blog.

Jenni

Going with the flow...

Don't you just love a bit of free motion quilting, I do, but it's been a while since I've had a reason to rev up my machine, but this piece just called out for it.

I began by laying out a raw edge collage with luscious red fabrics, overlaid areas with organza and went with the flow. After quilting I cut back areas of the organza, added hand quilting, french knots and highlighted some of the quilting lines with paint.

 

Jane chose rust and gold. Once again I laid out a raw edge collage using my rusted fabrics. I overlaid African Bark cloth and gold painted Tyvek. After quilting Rosemary's red piece I wanted to free motion quilt this piece as well, but my machine just wasn't happy with the rusted areas, so I decided on seed stitches, french knots and beads.

Hope you've enjoyed joining us throughout this project, it's really helped us to stay connected.

Back soon

Sue

Liquid gold.....

My colour choice for our pages was ochre/mustard, which has proved tricky for people to work with. Whoops! But in this instance it reminded me of honey or liquid gold. My name is derived from a Hebrew word meaning bee, which I've know since being told as a child. I've always had a soft spot for bees, reinforced by my Granny relating how we should 'tell the bees' of major events in our lives, which is an old European tradition.

So when I saw this yummy fabric at a craft fair some years ago it just spoke to me, and then it seemed appropriate to use if for my ochre page. I know it’s not entirely ochre, but enough in the flowers to fit I thought. I kept it simple, stitching intuitively to echo the flow of the design, and adding some teeny tiny hexies and beads, and my go to Suffolk puffs and Dorset button for texture. I love mixing the traditional with the more contemporary, hence some vintage family lace, more old linen buttons from my Granny’s button tin, and those puffs are yet more remnants from sewing projects from my teenage years etc. This has been a real wander down memory lane!

Thanks for reading

Debbie

Red and Rust...

I started with hand dyed fabric, I painted some pelmet vylene, fibres and a map. Covered with red net, machine and hand stitching. I then added some organza and bead flowers, finishing with one of my wired embroidered butterflies. 

I had an enjoyable rusting session, this one was using an old circular saw blade and Egyptian cotton, I was delighted with the results. I then did some machine stitching. I cut the bird out of printed vylene and machine stitched some feathers.

Bye for now

Jane

Birds & Wheels.....

Jane's Birds - 

Where to start with a piece for Jane - her chosen colour ‘Rusty Gold’. My much preferred technique is free machine embroidery and I was trying to think of how I could tune into Jane's love of nature, particularly birds. 

I found a bag of old dried empty teabags and thought in some way they would make an interesting foundation. The tea bags were bonded onto painted calico, with added silk paper pieces. This was all over painted with Koh-in-noor. I painted some birds onto abaca tissue, these and also some silk velvet leaf shapes were then bonded onto the background. I added a random application of gold foil then gave the whole piece a couple of coats of acrylic wax, avoiding the velvet. Machine stitching emphasised the branch and other leaf shapes.

This was just great fun to do, so will explore this combination of techniques in the future. Why don’t you experiment ? -you’ll have a happy time and the end results can be quite unusual and perhaps not as you imagine.

Sue’s Wheels

I struggle with colours around ’brown’ so what what was I to do with ‘Rust' !!!!? 

I remembered some sample pieces I had done in the past, and found them tucked away in the ufo box - great I had an idea. Sue loves to recycle old pieces so with this in mind I set about cutting up and reassembling an old piece from the distant past - the original fabric - painted calico, stencilled, hand painted and highlighted with oil pastels. With further stitching and repainting in areas the piece came together quite well. Although the colour was difficult for me to get my head around, I admit to enjoying the journey. 

From time to time I recommend we all step out of our comfort zone and embrace the challenge - we can often be rewarded in ways we could never have imagined.

Thanks for reading 

Jenni