TAST revisited, week seven

Feather Stitch
Rayon Thread, mixed fibre background

Short and sweet this week as very busy.

Taster for Marie

We have a house guest so blogging has been temporarily suspended but here is a taster for Marie of zquilts.





Our Journey to Lindisfarne Priory

Yes, whilst the rest of the country had sun, we had cloud and mist.

(added later)
OK, I confess, that is sea water on the road!! we had to wait for the tide to go out before we could ride to the island!!

finally got my birthday prezzi

OK, so my birthday was in May but like a good little girl I saved my pennies and added a few more and treated myself yesterday to a new camera to replace my aging Fuji z something that has been dropped and generally abused over the years- it was only 3 meg pixel but served me exceptionally well. I use a small compact when on the bike but wanted something with a bit more oomph for bike racing and days out.

looking at my first attempt with my new Canon, I think I'm going to have some fun :-) ( no editing, cropping just compressed slightly to make it quicker to upload) click to see detail.

Stitch along

Over on Stitchin Fingers there is a group called hand embroidery who have a thing called stitch a long- no deadlines just chose your stitches from the list and do your own thing. You can attempt all of the stitches but no one will shout if you don't. Many are doing band samplers but I quite fancy doing small books of some kind ( I have an idea based on this post on Jacquelines blog but I'm not sure if it will work)
Anyway, I have started with an easy one - back stitch. Ohh I do intend doing more than one stitch in most of the samples.

design 3.5 inch across

Take it Further Challenge (July)

You may remember the sign post sketch from earlier this month, pointing to embroiderer in one direction and artist in the other with the idea that this was the halfway mark.




I had intended to use this with illustrations of traditional embroidery at one side and free embroidery/textile art at the other. However another idea emerged based on the fact that you need a balance of traditional knowledge and more modern approaches so I found myself mixing them up.
These are samples of traditional needlework from my studies and I transferred them to T-shirt transfer, I also added small samples of mixed fibre backgrounds.

The end result is here


it has proved to be very difficult to photograph!



Not sure whether it really worked but it was an interesting experiment ( please excuse the motorcycle in the background, it's not one of ours!)

Long Service Award

These were presented to me at work today (fortunately not in front of everyone) in recognition of having worked for the same company for 30 years.Scary!! when did I get to be this old?

Anyway, instead of a watch/clock type gift, I am getting an EMBELLISHER !! it is on order and I should be able to pick it up later next week. Watch this space....

award

Hey, look what I have. Many thanks to Embellisher of Million Little Stitches for passing this on to me.The rules for receiving this award are:1. The winner can put the logo on his/her blog. 2. Link to the person you received your award from.
3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs. 4. Put links of those blogs on yours. 5. Leave a message on the blogs of the people you’ve nominated.

This always gives me a problem so if you are listed on my sidebar, consider yourself nabbed! as you are all in my Google reader. If you are a visitor, please check out any that you may not have come across before.

fun question

I'm getting some interesting replies from my latest Stitchin fingers fun question so I thought I would throw it open on here as well.

Now, if you had the chance to visit any country of your choice to study/learn their embroidery/textile techniques, Where would you go and why? I suspect I know which country will come out top but I will try and put them in to some sort of league table.

If you have any suggestions, please add them.

Also if you are visiting my blog and fancy saying hello, please do so- always good to meet new people.

TAST revisited, week six

Week six- Algerian Eye Stitch

Embroidery stranded cotton, hessian, scrim. Size ATC

Sunday Shopping outing

On Sunday , Ian, Biker Ted and myself drove other to Wolverhampton to do some shopping and on the way back we called again at Amerton Farm and Craft Centre to Visit the British Wildlife Rescue Centre .

First we bought burgers from the farm shop to eat as we walked up to the Steam Railway

We then had icecream and wondered round the rescue centre

And this is what we were shopping for, 2 Suzuki GSX400 engines bought off e-bay as spares for Ians bike.

Nottingham Entertainment

Just a quick post, Nottingham celebrated One City, One World at the weekend and these are just two of the acts taking part on Saturday.

Whip the cat, traditional rapper sword dancing

Chinese Lion Dance

I was actually on my way down to the Lady Bay Arts and Community festival, walking the quiet streets, disturbed only by the sound of the occasional TukTuk.....wait a minute, TUKTUK?

Amongst the exhibitors was Gillian Lee Smith who make wonderful dolls-check out her blog here

Jeannine Roberts who works in felt-check out her site here

Liz Emery who works with wool and silk fibres- check out her site here

TAST revisited, week five

Week Five-Chevron Stitch

I can't remember the last time I stitched on even weave aida but I found some in my stash, painted it blue/purple and had a go. Here it is stitched with embroidery cotton, a bit different to my usual stitch interpretation but I had to try it. Size ATC

Take it Further Challenge (July)

This month, Sharon said "What is it to be at the half way mark" which set me to thinking about being halfway.
Halfway through the year (obvious)
Halfway through the challenge ( yes, possibilities)
Halfway through my life ( well, I had to stretch that one)
living in the Midlands we are halfway between north and south.


then we have half
Half finished embroidery (plenty of that)
Half woven fabric

Even being half biker and half artist.

Typical British Summer!!

Yes, we have a windmill in Nottingham, Green’s Windmill is a restored and working 19th century tower windmill. It was owned and operated in the 19th century by the mathematical physicist George Green. It is fully working and you can go inside to see the grinding process and buy the flour.
Today it was the focal point for picnic in the park and the start of the Sneinton Artists Art Trail which saw artist opening their doors to exhibit there work. I had a great time looking at artwork, photos, listening to sound installations in a garden shed and watching student videos along with work by textile artists and potters. Check out the Sneinton Artist site here.



This banner was made by the children of Iona School, with the help of textile artist Jane Marrows.

Unfortunately the live music in the courtyard at the windmill was interrupted by our very british weather.



Unique World prove that the only thing to do is enjoy it.

TAST revisited, week four

Here we go, week four ( well really week five as we had last week as a catch up week) is Cretan stitch ) as usual size is ATC, background is hand felted and stitched with wild silk thread.

Detail

Reasons to be cheerful

Thanks Melanie for this wonderful gift from your blog giveaway.

Felting Fun

This is scary, July already, where is the year goimg? This month I have TIF, TAST revisited and now Stitch a long
to work on. On the biker side of life, we have had to cancel our trip to the Snowman Rally next weekend due to ongoing electrical problems with the Guzzi but have a short trip to Northumberland planned for later this month. We also have a house guest for one week which means finding a home for the junk/stash in our spare bedroom.

So determined to make a head start and taking advantage of Ian being out,I took the opportunity of turning this

into this

and this

Felted silk and wool fibres with a bit of angelina thrown in, ready to be stitched as I owe a couple of ATCs this month as well.
I seem to had a large stash of little bags of colourful fibres picked up a shows without thinking what I would do with them. Does this mean I have some sort of addiction?