WIPW

This week is just a mess.   Home schooling takes up most of each day and having a child in the house means that it is never clean.  Monique has ADHD, so she is constantly on the move and constantly touching things. Nothing is where it should be and there is sand through out the house.  She bought me this card for my birthday and it about says it all.

My daughters wedding is on Saturday and I have all the catering to arrange and to travel down to Canungra for the service.  The mind boggles.

But in amongst all this , mainly when supervising lessons, I have managed to nearly finish another portrait.  This is Daphne.

I have taken a different approach to this class lately.  I know that I can stitch portraits so I am just progressing with my own thing, working without really thinking.  For the class I am working through the exercises with the aim of learning new techniques.  Thinking about each technique and then adding what I have learnt to my own toolbox.  Hopefully this will improve my work.  Only 14 portraits to go in this series but I have so many others I would like to stitch.

WIPW

I am in the middle auditioning the embroidery against the hexies.  I always knew I would need a border around the embroidery and this has given me the opportunity to make a decision.

The plain pastel coloured fabrics will look the best and will frame the embroidery.  The next decision is just how to do this?

I could just put the border around the embroidery and slip stitch everything together.  But, I have been following the work of Katja Marek.  She has taken hexies into new territory.  I bought her book "the new Hexagon" and I think there are other things I could use here.

This is a great article about her work.

WIPW

The last embroidery for the quilt is ready to go.

The combi block is going into a mug bag, and

 

the Medici embroidery is driving me mad.  So much so that I have decided to stitch the one I found in the old magazine first to get he hang of it.

WIPW

It is working again.  That was really a nervous breakdown event.  I had to pack up the computer, get it on a trolley, walk the km to the barge, get it from the barge to the car and then drive for an hour to get to the Apple store.  When I got to the head of the cue, and I had an appointment, the assistant tells me they can deal with the remotely.  I had to pack it up again, get to the car and by this point there was no way I could have pulled it all the way to the ferry and then home so I put the car on the barge and drove home.  Hang the expense.  Then I got thinking about what was wrong with the computer and came to the conclusion that someone had put on a security program I knew nothing about.  Turns out my husbands computer guy had put it on when he has looking at his computers.  When they rang today I had sorted everything out myself.  Good thing is I don't need a new computer.

So as you can imagine not a lot of work has been done but I have managed to lose a friendship block I made for a patchwork friend.  I will have to do that one again.  I have finished 3 more pin cushions.  That is the end of them.  I see that all the others I have made have sold so that is pleasing.

It was easier to stitch the latin for Cease the Day.

And I have finished the stitching but have to put the hexi's around this design for my simple stitching.

One more to go after this and I am ready to start making the quilt.

 

WIPW

Small steps this week.

A pin cushion.

And another.

And there is another somewhere.  This home schooling is taking over most of my time.  I can see I am going to have to re-organise how I stitch. 

WIPW

There are only 2 more blocks that I am going to stitch for this project, the other 2 just don't suit my final design.  Added to this there are another 2 blocks that I have finished that I have decided to exclude.  Reason? I only need 12 blocks for my design and the ones I have decided against are just too different from the rest.  One is the applique block.  This is the only applique, it will stand out.  The VW's are also being excluded and I have just finished them.  They also don't match the theme.

Because of this I decided to play with them a bit.  The applique will go into a mug bag, and I think the same will happen with the VW's.  This last block was very lack lustre so I thought I would play with my ink intense pencils.  I have had these for 5 or 6 years and done nothing with them.  In this case I did some colouring in and them applied water.  Not a bad result.  (But it won't suit my quilt.)  I will have to explore their use some more.

I am also working on a friendship block for my patchwork group and looking at how to stitch my Medici piece.  (Those on-line classes I am designing are also being worked on but as they are for a client I can't post any images.)

My classes with Textile Designer have come to a halt.  Firstly I became ill and couldn't stitch and then I just wasn't interested in the techniques they were using.  I think I will give this another month and if I find the next 3 classes uninteresting, cancel the classes.  I have a ton of things of my own I want to stitch.  The only other class I would like to do is Sue Stones stitching faces.  I really enjoyed that class and would like to explore this further.

WIPW

I'm not doing anything out of the ordinary at the moment.  I need to get new glasses to use to do my stitching.  The appointment is next week and then I will have to wait for the glasses to be made.  So I am just doing ordinary stuff.

Like, I finished another pin cushion.

And I am working, (a bit), on my simple stitching.

And I'm crumpling papers to use for the Cas Holms Momigami piece.

We are not using the traditional technique, rather her version of it.  I had no idea of what this was until this workshop.

 

You live and learn.

WIPW

I thought I needed to clean my sewing room, it was such a mess!  But now I can even invite a visitor or 2.

It is even clean from the other direction.

It never stays that way so I needed to make documentary evidence.

I am also continuing, slowly, with my simple stitching.

When I downloaded the pattern it said this was "Kenny the Kitten"  but I am going to give him flowers behind his ears so I think I will change the gender to female and call her "Kathy the Kitten".  (Hope this works.)

The new issue of Inspirations magazine had this lovely piece of Medici work on the cover.

I don't usually buy this magazine, just read it at the Guild.  But this is something I have always wanted to stitch.  Getting the right materials has always been the problem.  The magazine has this available as a kit.

Now, I'm not sure it this was good or bad.  There is a two month waiting time for the kit.  I think it is good, because I have so much on the go already.  But I am certainly going to have a go at making those tassels.

WIPW

I have the next simple stitching piece all framed up ready to go.

But I am behind on my 'Stitch Club' lessons.  The death of my dog and my problem tooth has upset my whole world.  So, I decided that I wouldn't follow all the instructions that Mandy Puttello gave.  I decided that I would make this concentina book my way.  There are all these wonderful arty pieces up in the facebook page, mine isn't arty at all. 

I started with the idea that I would fill the book with images of my favourite things.  Number one being old embroidery.  I then cut a strip from one of the tablecloths that I want to use for recycling. 

Guess what, it wasn't the size given, but I used it any way.  It just meant that I had to re-invent how the book folded.

Then I found some old fabric that I had used in some class or other I was teaching that had prints of lots of things I like.  I cut these out and put them next to the embroidery slip stitching them into place.

The material in the table cloth was some kind of rayon mix, a bit slippery so I decided to line it with a cotton fabric.  Now, I could have used a more arty fabric but as this little book is about some of my favourite things I choose pink fabric, my favourite colour.  Not trendy or arty at all but I like it, so in it went.

I cut the fabric with my wavy roller cutter and machined it in place.  On the top edge I wrote " some of my favourite thing" over and over and on the bottom edge I listed all the things I had included in the little book.  Emotionally that  gave me a good feeling, just writting them down made me feel good.

Then I had to work out how to tie the ends off as it didn't fold the way it should.  I decided to put a button and loop on one side and tie it off on the other.  I got my bag of threads that I had bought in Guatemala,  I bought them for embroidery but they are really meant for weaving.

I selected all the pink threads and decided on the shiney one.  This was sold as silk but I'm sure it is rayon and it is untwisted.  Twisted thread is something we take for granted, winding it onto a holder was a challenge.  It acted just like flat silk, catching on my fingers and nails.  What a trial.  Crocheting the cord was also interesting.  (There has to be some kind of tool that helps you twist thread.) 

The embroidery on the front cover is a copy of a design that I saw on a tablecloth from Sri Lanka. ( The math used for dividing up the edge is actually very complicated .)  Then I got out my button box and the butterfly yelled 'use me'.    I didn't want to add anything to the back cover, so I didn't.

This book thing isn't really me but the exercise made me think and I did like writing down the things I like and maybe in the future some family member might look at it and say "Gee she liked some weird things!!"

WIPW

Lots of projects ready to go and I intend to start tonight.

A new simple stitching.  Nothing fancy and I intend to follow the designers instructions for this one.

I have now mounted up the new Smorjg piece.  I'm a bit apprehensive about this one.  The thread count of the fabric is 44, not sure how the eyes are going to handle this.

I have started on the week 6 exercise for Textile Designer club.  This week is Mandy Puttullo and the exercise is to make a fabric book.

I have decided to use an old  embroidered table cloth for this exercise.  I have cut off one side and pinned part of my collage.  I'm not sure if the crocheted edge will stay, we will see.

And my darling grand daughter starts at her new school, Kimberly College.  Her old school wasn't catering for her needs.  She is gifted and just sitting there day in and out was not good.  She is only 9 years old but has just finished reading all the Harry Potter books and has made a start on Lord of the Rings.

It is this last project that is dearest to my heart.