Wednesday 26 August 2009

WORK IN PROGRESS


DEEP SEA MICRO-ORGANISMS
Needle felting on embellisher made felt. One part of a mobile I'm making for my garden, that is when I get it finished.


ARTS AND CRAFTS FOREST
Embellisher felt onto linen fabric with hand embroidery. I think I'll add some machine embroidery to this one at a later stage.




LINCOLNSHIRE ANTIQUES AND HOME SHOW ( nee SWINDERBY)
For years we have been exhibiting at the Arthur Swallow Fairs at Swinderby showground. The owners of the ground have decided to remove the underlying gravel on the site very shortly. For this reason the Swinderby Home and Antique show is moving to the Lincoln showground just up the road.
The IACF owners have decided to jump in and hold a fair on the old Swinderby site at the same time as the Arthur Swallow Lincoln fair.....!!!
Please do not be confused by this and think that it is the same organisation running it.

PLEASE SUPPORT THE LINCOLNSHIRE ANTIQUES AND HOME SHOW

RAG RESCUE WILL BE THERE

Tuesday 25 August 2009

Trying out machine embroidery


I managed to be firm with myself today. I switched off the computer at 9.30 am and spent a day teaching myself machine embroidery. The book I have ordered on the basics hasn't arrived yet so I thought I'd just have a go. I already had some felt made and my intention was to use vintage silks but the machine needles I had didn't have a large enough eye for this so I used ordinary sewing cottons. After a few doodles on a spare piece of felt I felt confident enough to attack the larger piece. I must say I quite like the effect I've created.
Getting no know mum's old machine is rather difficult. It goes much faster than any machine I've worked on and I couldn't get larger stitches because of th, unless I wound the wheel around by hand. I wonder whether the foot pedal has something wrong with it as I'm normally very good with my foot controls.
I think my eaten leaf project will have to go on the back burner for a while until I become more experienced and have read my new book. I can't wait for it to arrive.

Friday 21 August 2009

Somthing good always comes out of something bad.



At the beginning of August I went away for a week. On my return my new plant in the garden, that I had lovingly nurtured for a couple of months had been attacked. The flowers and seed heads were still perfect but all of the leaves had been eaten. When I had got over my disappointment I decided to get out the camera and play with the images on photoshop. This got me thinking about my next felting project. I love challenges and this certainly was one. Wet felting was out of the question as my frozen shoulder just is too painful for such energetic movements so I set about making the background on the embellisher. After yet another sleepless night of pain I had come up with a method of creating the leaf and the blue seed pods behind it. The first picture is the result of my multi-layered creation. Now all I have to do it start on the machine embroidery. This is something I haven't done before mainly because my old Bernina machine died on me about 2 years ago and the new cheap sewing machine I bought at the same time as my embellisher doesn't have the the drop feed option. However two weeks ago my mother gave me her Bernina machine so now I am able to try this new technique. I've just ordered Pamela Watts book - 'Beginners guide to machine embroidery'. I can't wait for its arrival so that I can move on to the next stage.
Unlike most experienced felters I haven't got any qualifications in this area. I've been on a one day course on wet felting which was superb and many years ago I spent happy evenings on creative embroidery courses at night school. I teach myself as I go along, making manymistakes along the way but I guess that is how you learn.
Any hints would be gratefully received.