LALHEZAR

Wise Women Bookmarks

2009-08-18T16:33:00.002+10:00

It is only a few weeks to the Annual Exhibition of my local Embroiderer's Guild. I have been spending time finishing off my entries including these Wise Women bookmarks. I have made a total of 12 of these beaded bookmarks. They are easy to make and I get to use up all my odd left over beads.

Mosaic cards

2009-08-17T09:37:00.002+10:00

Last week was the monthly meeting of the Paper Ars group I belong to. We made paper mosaics from handmade papers we had completed in the past. I really enjoyed doing it so when I got home I made some additional sheets of mosaics. The method is to cut the handmade paper into strips and place the strips on jac paper (double sided sticky paper) and then glue strips of cord beween the strips of paper (or paint from a tube with a fine tip point). When this is dry cut the strips in the opposite direction and then place these strips with the other side of the sticky paper removed onto card and again put strips of cord or paint between strips of paper.

After I completed the sheets of moasics I then cut out shapes and made these cards . I was very happy with the result. Hope you like them

ATC Swap

2009-07-13T17:22:00.006+10:00

Today I received two very beautiful ATC's from Solange Bonnet and they came beautifully wrapped (see picture 3). I really love them both - the colours are lovely , as is the design and the quality of the work is outstanding. Thank you so much Solange. I love them

Journalling pages

2009-07-01T15:44:00.002+10:00

I have been experimenting with journalling and here are my first attempts. I am not especially happy with the results as they really don't tell you very much. I like the colours but I would also like them to speak out with a story and they do not do this. Next time maybe.

Stencils

2009-06-26T16:25:00.002+10:00

As part of the course I am doing I had to make a stencil. To do this I downloaded a photo of a wrought iron window grill and printed it out. I then cut around the part of the picture I wanted to use and then traced that onto freezer paper. Once the stencil was made I placed it on black paper and sprayed it with Moon Shadow Mist (see the second picture). I also used the stencil for other activities and when I was finished it looked almost like wrought iron itself. I then rubbed it with oil pastels, more spraying and goldfinger rub on. Finally I found the white backing of an old dinner napkin that I had used to soak up left over paint and put it under the stencil. This is the finished stencil in picture one. I thought they both finished up quite well although they look quite different from each other.

Collage Patisseries

2009-06-23T16:39:00.002+10:00

I love taking photos of the patisserie shop windows in Paris and have been experimenting with using them as a basis for my art work. This collage was made using magazine pages cut into small pieces and glued to make the pastries. The background was done with soft pastels, shaded in to give perspective and depth. I was quite pleased with end result.

Background for Embroidery

2009-06-21T17:22:00.002+10:00

Another of my projects over the past couple of weeks has been to make this background. I painted a piece of Vsieflix (Bondaweb) with acrylic paint and when it was dry ironed it to a piece of dark purple felt. I then took pieces of different coloured organza and cut them into strips and turned the heat gun on them to distort into small and odd shapes. I then arranged them on the vsieflix and ironed them on. I then covered all this with a piece of white organza. Then I used the heat gun to burn back the white organza. Finally I ironed a chiffon scarf over the top. I have yet to decide exactly what embroidery I will do but I think it will be a landscape type of thing.

Birds

2009-06-20T12:18:00.002+10:00

Here is a piece of work I did for my creative sketchbooks course. It is a collage made using my hand coloured paper torn up into little pieces. I drew the birds on paper and used Japanese brush and inks to paint the branches. Then I glued the coloured pieces of paper onto the drawings. It was a really good thing to do and I am going to take this idea further in the next few weeks.

Faux Encaustic ATCs

2009-06-19T16:24:00.003+10:00

Now that my digital camera has returned from its trip to England (along with my husband) I have been busy taking photos of things I have done over the last couple of weeks. One of these is making ATCs using the faux encaustic technique by covering the bottom of an old iron with aluminium foil and drawing on the foil with wax crayons.

A few weeks ago our Paper Arts Group had experimented with this technique and I decided to do more, this time, on black paper to see the effect. Here is the finished product.

More Necklaces

2009-06-04T20:22:00.004+10:00

I have also been busy making coloured papers but I cannot show any at the moment because my husband has gone to England for a couple of weeks and taken the digital camera with him. I shall have to wait until he returns before I can photograph and then post them. In the meantime here are several more of the necklaces I have been making.

2009-05-28T15:27:00.002+10:00

The day Doreen and I went to Bredbo to take pictures (see my earlier blog a couple of months back) we took lots of them (of course). Here are two more.

More necklaces

2009-05-27T18:41:00.003+10:00

I have been busy making beaded necklaces for the last few weeks. These are just three of them. I have managed to sell a few and, given a few away to family (my daughter and grandaughter). I am planning to enter some in this year's annual exhibition of my local Embroiderer's Guild. I love getting the beads together choosing which beads go to make necklaces that are so different from each others even though the technique remains the same. It is very interesting to see how a change of bead size, shape and colour can make an original necklace.

Mythical Creatures

2009-05-07T09:42:00.003+10:00

This little creature is one I drew for the drawing class I am attending. We were asked to draw a mythical creature and I decided I would do an underwater creature. After drawing we were asked to colour it. I used my Koh I Nor watercolours. I love these paints as their colours are so beautiful and the clarity of the colour is outstanding. I really enjoyed this activity and can see how they might be used in my textile work.

Beading

2009-04-17T21:21:00.002+10:00

In addition to my felting and dyeing I have had a blitz on making beaded necklaces. So far I have made six. These photos show two of them. I will add the others to the blog shortly.

Dyeing and Felting

2009-04-17T20:59:00.003+10:00

I am participating in the Creative Challenge for the Canberra Embroiderer's Guild annual exhibition later this year. The brief for the challenge is to use running stitch on a piece of fabric no large than fat quarter size to make a three dimension item. I have dyed two pieces of silk georgette, one of which I then felted (see Picture One). I based the colour scheme on the Australian King Parrot which has distinctive colouring of almost irridescent green head and wings and a bright scarlet body. I now have to do the stitching and turn it into something - I think I will make a bag. I still have to decide what I will do with the second piece of fabric which is not yet felted. Maybe I could make a nice scarf to go with the bag.

Creative Sketchbooks

2009-03-26T17:17:00.002+11:00

Part of my most recent work for this course was to draw several sketches from a plant source. This is my work. (pictures 1 and 2 show my sketches) and picture 3 is an image of the original eucalyptus leaves and nuts. This course is really interesting and challenging but doesn't make you feel that you cannot do it. I know my drawing has to improve but nonetheless I feel this was a reasonable attempt for a learner.

Preserving

2009-03-24T18:15:00.002+11:00

My husband Alf is a keen vegetable grower and here is his latest lot of tomatoes, capsicums and zucchini - turned into a sauce and preserved for winter. Don't they look good - it makes you want winter to arrive quickly - which in Australia it is not far away.

Photo expedition with Doreen

2009-03-22T20:51:00.004+11:00

Doreen has already written in her blog Creative Meanderings about the really lovely day we had at Bredbo taking photographs. You can see Doreen here along with my photos of fences. I had a fixation on them that day. They really are good means to provide perspective in a picture. I hope to do an embroidery with a fence in it. Bredbo is a small town about an hour's drive from Canberra an although so so dry as you can see from these pictures the ambience was beautiful. So quiet, just the sounds of birds and a lovely light breeze blowing and the warmth of autumn in the air. Doreen bought a delicious salad for lunch. It was a great day.

New Papers

2009-03-12T20:40:00.003+11:00

Part of the Creative Sketchbooks course I am doing is to create some papers made from brown paper and watercolour paint. This is what I managed to do. I was very happy with the outcome and it has given me some food for thought about how to take this technique further. I feel I am beginning to get back on track and have a number of ideas bubbling away in my head for further experimentation.

Tassels

2009-03-03T19:20:00.003+11:00

Aren't these tassels just fantastic. So beautifully made and elegant in look and colour. I just love them. I wish I could have bought them all home with me. Oh well, it was lovely to look at them.

Apples and Pears and Biodiversity

2009-02-26T09:48:00.004+11:00

When in France at the end of last year we visited Liz and Peter Maidment (see her blog at http://lizzie-artembroidery.blogspot.com/ and they kindly took us to an apple fair where there was a display of heritage apples and pears. There were over 400 varieties of apples and 200 of pears (I think). The first picture above shows a few of the pears. The picture in the middle shows apples (this one with red flesh - I wonder whether the wicked stepmother in Sleeping Beauty would have liked one of those). The final picture shows one of the tables of apples. After the fair we came back to Liz and Peter's place and had an apple tasting (alright I admit we also tasted some wine) and it was really interesting to taste the difference in the apples. I think farmers who preserve the old varieties of fruit and vegetables are doing the world a real service.

Creative Sketchbooks course - module 2

2009-02-20T13:46:00.002+11:00

I have just completed module 2 of my creative sketchbooks course. I learnt quite a lot in this module, particularly about the use of pastels and oil pastels. This picture is of one of the pieces of work I completed for the module. It was done by using an aperature to either as a negative or positive image. I really like the subtle effect you can get with the pastels yet at the same time retaining a very definite image. I can see lots of potential for this in the textile world.

Wise Women 2

2009-02-19T13:19:00.002+11:00

As you can see I have found the solution to "side wise woman" as shown in my previous post. This is my second attempt at making a "Wise Woman" - I wanted it to be brightly coloured and I think I have been successful at that. As I fully complete the next two I shall put them up for viewing.

Wise Women

2009-02-19T11:50:00.004+11:00

At the end of last year the creative group I belong to had an activity making wild women. Most people did one using the needle felting technique. I of course, never quite being on track, decided to bead mine onto a stiff background. The result was that mine turned out looking more like an owl than a wild women. I really like the idea of wise women and will turn it into a bookmark - more connection to the idea of "wise". Since then I have made 3 other of these and am really enjoying exploring different ways of decorating them. I don't know why this picture is on its side. I turned it around in Picasa but it didn't seem to have any effect. Before I post anymore of my wise women I shall work out how to make them stay upright.

Bushfires and Flooding

2009-02-19T11:43:00.002+11:00

Australia is really a tough country in which to live. It has been a terrible time for so many people either inundated with water or terrified by fire. I think most Australians have been traumatised particularly by the fires. The television has shown so clearly the horrific loss of over 1800 houses and so many people affected by losing all they possess. Worse still is the death of over 200 people and still many missing. I don't think life will ever be quite the same again for so many many people. My heart goes out to all.

Pots in the Louvre

2009-01-25T11:18:00.003+11:00

This is a picture of an ancient container that I took in the Louvre in Paris last November. I love its shape, particularly the spout but I particularly love its colour - so sublte in its shading. I suspect that it the original colour may have been much darker and over the course of several thousand years it has faded to wonderful colour it is now. But of course I am no expert on ancient pottery so I don't really know. Nor do I know its history - its hard to remember anything once you get home - except that I was looking through their islamic and persian sections when I took the photo.

Potted Olives and a new blog

2009-01-18T19:52:00.002+11:00

Another of my Paris pictures. These were beautiful little olive trees - obviously pruned to keep them small but as a group they looked so inviting. This week I put a link to a new blog run by Liz Maidment who is a embroidery artist who lives in the near Avignon in the south of France. She does really beautiful work, of beautiful scenes of southern France. She has also been to Australia several times and has produced some really original interpretations of the Australian landscape. Her blog can be found herehttp://lizzie-artembroidery.blogspot.com/.

Cyber Fibre Exhibition

2009-01-11T19:15:00.004+11:00

Last year I swapped an ATC with Susan Lenz to go in her Cyber Fibre Exhibition that is currently underway at Vista Studios, Columbia, South Carolina USA. I am amazed and astounded to find out that I have rated an honourable mention for this ATC. After mailing the ATC I promptly forgot all about it until today when I received a phone call from Doreen of Creative Meanderings to tellme that my ATC has received a honourable mention.

I just want to say thank you to Susan for all her hard work in organising the exhibition and also thank you to Ellen Kochansky for giving my ATC an honourable mention. I can not include a photo of it here because I forgot to take one before I sent it to Susan but there is a photo on the Cyber Fibre website.

I also want to say that Doreen and her grandaughter Ebony's work is featured on the Cyber Fibre site and is fabulous - such beautiful colours. You can see this work at http://cyberfyberexhibitioninvitationalart.blogspot.com/ Also lots of other beautiful work by other fabulous fibre artists. Well done everyone.

2009-01-10T19:53:00.003+11:00

I have finished my first lesson in Creative Sketchbooks and even though I wasn't too sure about what I did the comments on the work were very encouraging so I hope all continues well with the next lot of work. This picture is a design based on the lesson.

This is a photo of a small town about an hours drive from Avignon in South of France called Goudargues. It is a beautiful little town where you can sit either side of the canal which runs through the main street to have coffee or lunch underneath the plane trees and listen to the water running by. Truly delightful.

Determination still on track

2009-01-08T16:11:00.003+11:00

This is a photo I took in the grounds of Blenheim Palace in November 2008. It was a great time of the year to get some beautiful colours and reflections in the photos.

So far (it is only a week) I have kept my new years resolution. I have finished the first module of the Creative Sketchbooks course and sent the material for checking. I am not very sure how well I have done so it will be interesting to see the outcome. Aside from this I have been doing some family history research and have been corresponding with a second cousin I had no idea existed until this week. She has done a lot of work and even sent me pictures of my great great great grandfather who came to Australia in 1839. I am hoping that what I learn from the creative sketchbooks I can use in connection with my family history research, though that, I think is a long way off.

Happy New Year

2009-01-04T11:52:00.003+11:00

My new year's resolution is to work harder on my textile and art work, particularly increasing my skills and creative ideas. I have started Linda Kemshall's Creative Sketchbooks online course and have received the first module that I am working on. Its interesting to find out that the more I do the more I realise I haven't done it very well or very creatively and it makes me want to start again. I guess I cann't do that everytime so I am going to work on improving my work incrementally with each unit of work. Determination to improve is my new year's resolution.

This photo was taken at Monet's garden at Giverny in November 2008. It is so easy to see where he got his inspiration to create all those beautiful paintings.

Christmas Time

2008-12-17T13:05:00.002+11:00

It is getting closer to Christmas and I am finding it even more difficult to get back into my craft activities after my holiday. I am working on the basis that once Christmas is over I will be able to focus better on what I want to do next. In the meantime here a some photos to help provide some inspiration

Time to get blogging again

2008-12-03T10:42:00.004+11:00

I thought it was time to put an effort back into my blog. I have just spent five weeks in Paris and came back with lots of photos, although I was planning on following in the Breakfast in Paris blog and taking 5,000 I only managed 1,000. My husband thought I had gone mad when I started taking photos of manhole covers. According to a friend , Jean Littlejohn, finds lots of inspiration in their patterns. I myself was rather taken with the patisserie windows as inspiration -as much by the taste (of which in fact I had very little) as the actual colours and patterns.

Dyeing on Line

2008-04-27T15:45:00.003+10:00

I have had another creative splurge with dyeing and felting. I have been experimenting dyeing both fabric and wool tops in similar colours but using different types of dyes. I used Procion for the fabric and acid milling dyes for the wool tops. The wool tops didn''t turn out as dark as I would have liked and I think that is because it didn't get hot enough during the heating proces. Despite that I do like the colours. One is a lovely soft mottled pink with a slight green tinge while the other is green and yellow although the colours are not as muddied as the first length. The second and third pictures show the fabrics and after dyeing. The first and last pictures show the fabrics (the smaller pieces)after felting using the wool tops. The large piece of fabric is silk and I don't think I will felt that although what I will do with it I am not sure.

Cards made from my papers

2008-04-19T10:58:00.002+10:00

Following on from my last post I was asked what I do with the papers. I usually make gift cards that I decorate with a piece of a paper. I do this by looking at the larger papers and finding areas that are suggestive, in an abstract sort of way, of something for example, under the sea or in the night sky or just sections that I find interesting or appealing to me. Then cut this piece out and find a card or card stock and backing paper and make a card from this. Here is an example of a card I made from an paper I made a while back. It has a water colour and ink background that I then over printed several times with monoprints made from acrylic paints.

Latest papers

2008-04-10T20:17:00.003+10:00

I am finally over my virus and have gone beserk trying new ways to make papers. I looked back through my Cloth Paper Scissors and found an article by Ruth Issett in Issue No 10. The first three pictures are papers based on crumbling brown paperand painting it with lustres and metallic powders mixed with acrylic medium and then painting it with inks. Number four uses gel medium and lusters mixed together and painted on watercolour paper. It was then over stamped. Number fiveis something I made up using Ruth's idea of coloured gel medium on black paper but after drying I then sprayed it with Ink Refresher and painted it with pearl ex powder paste and sprayed that with water letting the colours run.

Chillis and tomatoes

2008-04-07T20:22:00.001+10:00

Do you like chillis? Each year we grow a crop of chillis for using in cooking during the coming months. My husband turns them into mush adding salt and vinegar to perserve them. We also grow lots of tomatoes and coriander. They make a great photo I think. They must be inspiration for some future work.

ATC SWAP

2008-04-07T16:26:00.006+10:00

I have finally started getting my act together after feeling rotten for the past several weeks and today was certainly a good start in the right direction when I received these two beautiful ATCs from Debbie Baker. I hope you enjoy looking at them as much as me.

I must apologise for the photo - my camera seems to be doing things I don't want it too and I don't know why. I took this picture the right way up but somehow the camera has a mind of its own and put them sideways. I changed them in the Picassa program but when I upload them to the blog they change back. Any clues why?

Before I became ill I had been making some ATCs (some textile and some paper arts) and was wondering if anyone would like to swap with me. I have about 10 textile and 10 paper arts ones so first in first served.

Beaded motifs

2008-03-30T13:11:00.003+11:00

I have been sick with some kind of flu or virus for the past week and have not been feeling up to doing any creative activity. I thought I would have a look back through pictures of some of the things I made in the past and came across these items. They are made using a large bead (of any size or shape) and beading around this in a free form manner. I use a needle threaded with nymo and a diffeerent stitches such as peyote, brick or just what I make up. I use a variety of smaller beads, different sizes, types or colours. Although I don't start with any particular design in mind, I do like looking at undersea photography of coral and other creatures and these two remind me of that.

Happiness

2008-03-24T19:01:00.003+11:00

My grandaughter Louise was married on Easter Saturday. She is a truly lovely young woman and Sam is a very lucky man. I know she is equally lucky to have Sam in her life. They have our love and best wishes for a fortunate life together.

My watercolour papers

2008-03-18T19:42:00.000+11:00

These three pictures show my own ideas of making papers. These were done by using a piece of watercolour paper. I put a water colour wash across the surface using three colours, yellow, green and purple. While it was wet I sprinkled some rock salt across the surface. While it was still wet I splashed dollops of very wet paint in the colours already used. I then let it dry and removed the salt, then stamped it and sprinkled embossing powder across the stamp and heated it with the heat gun. Finally, I put a very light and wet wash in carmine red across the surface. I really like the finished item

Wonder Under, Bondaweb, Vsieflix - Painted Paper

2008-03-18T19:21:00.000+11:00

What do you do with the paper off the back of your Bondaweb after you have painted it and used in some really creative manner. I had piles of paper I saved all of which had paint left on it. I decided to try to make use of this and here are the results. The first picture shows the paper after I added a nappy liner coloured with Shiva Sticks and then heated so it adhered to the paper. I then stamped it and sprinkled embossing powder and heated it again. The second picture shows a pile of paper beads made from the Bondaweb paper with some embossing (done as described above) on the outside .

I am now going to give some further thought to how else this paper can be used

Paper Transformed 2

2008-03-18T19:19:00.001+11:00

This is a photo of the artwork I made in accordance with the directions for Wax Paper Batik described in Julia Andrus's book on page 81. I really like the effect and am going to experiment more to see what I can add to this.

Paper Transformed

2008-03-18T19:11:00.000+11:00

I recently purchased Julia Andrus's book "Paper Transformed" and have been experimenting with some of the techniques in the book. These two pictures show the technique listed on page 54. The first photo shows the technique exactly as described. Photo two shows the results after I added an acrylic paint monoprint and then rubbed Treasure Gold over the surface.

Migrants and craft in Australia

2008-03-14T18:13:00.000+11:00

A couple of weeks back I found out that the Migrant Resource Centre in Canberra was looking for people who can help migrants to Australia to learn to speak english. I have been thinking for a while that I would like to do some volunteer work so I decided that I would go along. I have been for the last three Friday mornings and really enjoyed myself. At the moment it is not a large group but it is quite diverse. There are women from Russia, The Philippines, Brazil, Sweden, China, Poland and Macedonia.

The idea behind the group is for the women to undertake craft type activities and in the process help improve their english language skills. I really enjoy it because I am learning about the world of migrant women in Australia and all the difficulties they face adjusting to a new life. Australia is so far away from almost everywhere in the world and I can already see how hard it is for them away from their families.

From my personal point of view I am also enjoying hearing about life in other countries. I will talk more about this as I learn more. So far I have been teaching beading using a needle and thread to some of the women. Others are learning knitting and crocheting. The leader of the group, Diana, brings along all kinds of materials, wool, beads, embroidery materials and the women have a choice about what they would like to do. She also makes a beautiful morning tea, Today we had advocado dip on sour dough bread, fresh nashi pears and grapes. A veritable feast.

I feel that this is a really worthwhile activity and look forward to seeing what else I can do to help our new citizens and what I can learn from them .

2008-03-12T09:42:00.000+11:00

I have been doing some dyeing with the cramb jar method (described in an earlier blog of mine). This time I used up some left over dyes and crappy cotton fabric I had - I am not too sure what I think of them. A couple of the smaller pieces I quite like but the orange an acqua pieces look a bit boring. I am thinking I might over dye them later to see what happens. I'll make sure to post before and after pictures shortly.

While I was out photographing the clothes line I though I would take a couple of pictures of the rest of the back yard. It is a beautiful time of the year being early autumn and as you can see the leaves are starting to fall. Maybe some inspiration can be found from these pictures.

Printing on Fabric

2008-03-08T12:50:00.000+11:00

It has been a couple of weeks since I put anything on this blog because of family commitments although I have been able to continue doing some things in the work room. These photos are not in the correct order but they do show my experiments with printing from glass. The third photo is actually the beginning of the process. It shows some squares of silk (of various types of silk) that I dyed with procion dyes. I used three colours, a green, violet and magenta and painted the dye on. I then joined them together on the sewing machine.

The first picture shows the piece after I mixed some acrylic paint (with textile medium) onto a glass plate and then placed the fabric on top of the plate allowing the paint to form a random pattern on the silk. I then left this to dry. The second picture shows the piece after I repeated this process with second and third colours randomly placed on the glass plate and each left to dry between colours

I really like the effect on fabric but it also works really well on the papers I make and tomorrow I will show pictures of my more recent paperart works.

What I did with Tree Bark - Felting

2008-02-19T22:36:00.000+11:00

When I posted the picture of the tree bark I thought I really wanted to do something with the idea but I wanted to use completely different colours and I wanted to use felting as the technique with some hand embroidery. I felted pieces of hand dyed muslin (cheese cloth) into the wool top (bought already dyed), some had been machine embroidered before felting. Others were just the dyed fabric. i also cut up other pieces of pre felted muslin and embroidered them onto the completed piece of felting. The picture on the right shows pieces of felt I made that I then joined together to make one larger piece of felting. The left hand picture is the finished piece after I joined the pieces of felt together and then hand embroidered it with running stitches.

Embellished Felt and Machine Embroidery

2008-02-18T15:19:00.000+11:00

This is a sample I have been experiementing with. I made a piece of felt with the embellisher and then I cut it up and placed some pieces between two pieces of gold netting and other pieces on top of the gold netting. After this I free machine embroidered on top. I showed it to Doreen of Creative Meanderings and she said I should show it on my blog so here it is. The first picture is the back of the work and the second more brightly coloured picture is the front. I don't think the pictures show the stitching very well . I am not sure what I will do with it yet, if anything.

Inspirations from Trees and Coffee

2008-02-13T08:51:00.000+11:00

Coffee
I made myself an iced coffee on a very hot day a couple of weeks back. To make sure it was really cold I put the coffee in the glass in the freezer only to discover I left it too long and it started to freeze. After adding the milk it formed these lovely frozen pieces of coffee on top. I thought it was worth a picture and in fact I have been thinking about how to use it in some artwork.

Trees

Out working one day with the camera (a fairly rare event because I always to forget to take it)
I found these two trees with such wonderful bark that I couldn't resist a photo for inspiration.

Paper Arts - Picture to decorate a card front

2008-02-05T13:32:00.000+11:00

This is a piece of cartridge paper on which I painted using water colour paints
This is the same piece of paper with nappy liner (it has been coloured using glitter shiva sticks) and then heated so it will adhere to the surface of the paper
This is the final piece after stamping, embossing and using the heat gun.
These are the products I used to enhance the surface

Felting and Dying

2008-02-05T12:50:00.000+11:00

I have been experimenting with dying fabric - this is silk chiffon which I felted after the dying process was complete. I dyed the piece of fabric using the cramb jar method and only two dye colours - a basic yellow and magenta. After dying I used wool tops to felt it using the nuno felting method (although I did not leave any unfelted fabric as is often done). This piece of fabric was completely covered on the back with wool tops for felting and as a result the front surface is totally wrinkly as in nuno.

Cramb Jar Dying method

Place some dye at the bottom of a jar, place dry fabric on top and then drop the other colour on top of the fabric, or around the sides., depending on what you are trying to achieve. Cover gently with water. I also add soda ash water before leaving overnight.

More inspiration

2008-01-29T14:49:00.000+11:00

This is another photo (of Grevillea Robusta) I have in my collection that can be used as inspiration for work. I am still waiting to discover what I can do with it. Next week I start concentrating on new work for the year so I am going see what I can do with it. Somehow mywork turns out different from what originally inspired me and I don't know what this says about me.

Squash in France

2008-01-25T12:45:00.000+11:00

I took this pictures of pumpkins (squash) in France at the markets in Sarlat at the end of 2006. Aren't they colourful and interesting shapes. I want to use them as inspiration for future work but I am not sure what this will be yet. I am going to spend the next week or day letting them float in my mind till the inspiration arrives. Perhaps they will provide inspiration for you as well.

More paper Art

2008-01-24T09:04:00.000+11:00

This is another one of my paper art pictures. It was done by using the method described on 21 January ie. gesso, watercolour, paper serviettes sprayed walnut ink and goldfinger. Hope you like it.

Paper Art

2008-01-22T16:01:00.000+11:00

One of my interests is creating papers that I use to create cards. Over the last few days I have made a few different ones - just for the fun of it. This is an example of one of these papers. It has been made by with a paper serviette glued on a painted gesso back ground. Then I stamped an image on top and embossed that with embossing powder. As you can see because of the uneven surface the stamp image was not precise and this was the effect I was looking for. I just wanted to highlight the flower without covering it over.

My general technique is to use watercolour paper which I cover with gesso - back and front and leave to dry. Then I use either acrylic paint or watercolour and paint over the gesso - any colour or combination of colours and leave to dry again. Then I use drop paint onto the base colour (or you can put dip your stamps into acrylic paints and leave a series of marks (or any kind or description) and leave this to dry. From this point on you can stamp with pigment inks, or glue serviettes onto the surface. You can emboss where you have stamped or spray walnut ink over the surface or any combination of these.

Finally you can use gold finger or treasure gold to highlight surface uneveness to give it life .

Pad Folio

2008-01-16T16:19:00.000+11:00

This is one of my embellisher made felts that I made into a pad folio. The fabric was made on a back ground of normal machine made felt with layers of wool tops, silk fibre, knitting fibres and other various fibres. It was based on the concept of a forest of trees but as an abstract idea rather than a real life representation. I also made a beaded tassel to attach to the tie. I hope you like it.

At long last

2008-01-16T15:27:00.000+11:00

It has been almost 12 months since I was able to make an entry in this blog. This happened because (a) I lost my password (b) computer problems (c) camera problems (d) frustration.

Despite all this I have managed to do quite a bit of work during the year. I bought an embellisher and experimented with this, I did some dying with procion dyes, I attended a traditional felting workshop and made a number of interesting samples.

As well I did quite a bit of beading - making one of my ornate necklaces and other bits and pieces.

I have also done a bit of paper arts- making papers to use for card making and making book covers.

So over the next little while I am going to photo these works and put them on this blog in the hope I can amke a contribution to the world of textile and paper arts.

Memory Book

2007-02-04T15:25:00.000+11:00

I have just finished this fabric book this week. Each page is actually a pocket for keeping special things in so I call it my memory book.

It is made from several different interfacings - one very heavy for the in between pages and lightweight shapewell for the actual pocket pages. I hand dyed these first by spraying with different coloured dyes that I then allowed to mix on the interfacing. I then did some machine embroidery finally embellished this with a few sequins and many, many french or colonial knots in a variety of different coloured, types and thickness of threads.

The cover is made with silk paper that I made (although I bought it already dyed) and embellished mostly with beads and a tissue paper motif that I also made.

Hope you like it

2007-01-28T14:39:00.000+11:00

Over the past couple of years my main creative focus has been on beading . This is one of the third major piece I have created and sold. They are mostly made from miyuki delica beads worked around central beads and are quite time consuming to do. I must say I don't work to any design but just let the beads be my guide in terms of colour and design.

I haven't started a new necklace yet because I am now doing some hand embroidery to create a fabric book with pocket pages that I can be used as special place for keeping momentos . Also I have started working on a challenge projectfor an exhibition later this year.

Once these are these two items are completedI think I shall start on another necklace.