An almost finish and a new start

Almost done with the 'Oriental Dress' cross stitch, just the ribbon to attach. I would have done it yesterday with the dimanté thingies, but it needs ironing first. I also got some fat quarters of polycotton fabrics in matching lilacs and green to make up a little cushion/pillow, but I'm none too confident about that. Sewing is not something I've done a lot of, and I remember all that fuss with 'Child of Spring'....

Fished out a few kits to get on with from my kit box, one cross stitch - Lizzie*Kate's 'Cherish All Living Things', one ribbon work piece - a floral gate design, and one freestyle kit by Anchor done all in metallics, 'Goldleaf Dragonlfy'. I've made a start on this last one and here's both the cover photo of what it will be like when done, and the work I've done so far. As you can see, I've done the dragonfly. I've had to change some of it as it just wasn't practical to follow the instructions all the way. For instance, the silverwork you can see on the wings I changed from fly stitch in 1 strnad of blending filament to stem stitch in Coats Ophir. The reason for this is that they printed those thick lines you can see on the waterlily on the wings and there's no way one flimsy strand of blending filament was going to cover that in!


Been reading a fair bit again and covered some of Sheridan's plays (St Patrick's Day, The Duenna, A Trip to Scarborough and The School for Scandal) and two of Oscar Wilde's. I'd read 'Lady Windermere's Fan' before, but not 'Salome', though I can't claim that my life is richer for the latter - I didn't like it at all! Novel-wise I'm about a quarter of the way through Margaret Oliphant's 'Hester'.

End of Year Exhibition

I've just got back from College where I had the pleasure of looking at all the work that's been produced this year by the City & Guilds class. The 2nd and 4th years had their own displays, whilst the work of the 1st and 3rd years was part in dedicated areas and part mixed in with the larger displays. It was very impressive! I only had one display board that, perhaps owing to my having been unable to go to help set up on Monday, got put in a corner rather than on the wall, but it was good to have something there at least!!

Here's Alison, one of the two 4th years, with her display of assessment pieces and design work:

This is the table holding many of the 3rd years' portfolios containing their History of English Embroidery, 3 other country studies and design research work based on a personal theme, which included fruit & veg, bark, ferns and dragonflies.

Here are two of the 2nd years' displays showing their assessment pieces and the design and sampling work that went with them.

This is Felicity with her 2nd year work display. She did the loveliest little stumpwork cube, which you can see bottom right with the sides let down.

The next three pictures are mostly 1st year work showing both purpose done wall displays and also many of the boxes, portfolios and handmade folders that design and sampling work was presented in. You can see mine in the corner of the second photo.

Sorry about the quality - the camera I'm using is very poor indeed and I'm looking forward to getting my new one soon!

I saw one or two of the visitors' comments that they'd put in the guestbook at the entrance and it was nice to be part of a group described as 'local talent'.=) Most of that rightly goes to the other ladies though. My part was the smallest in the whole class and didn't even get my name put on it (=(), but I rectified that by adding one of my own cards to it!!

I also picked up a leaflet describing the new course and it sounds quite good - well put together and in a sensible order. The whole structure has changed almost beyond recognition, but I think I could manage to do the 7113 certificate in the future. At least now I have a much clearer idea of what's expected and that will be a big help!

Last C&G Sample and Colour Display

This is the last of the Samples Project I'm able to share with you. Today was the last working day at College and I really only went to prepare my display, which took most of the day to mount!! This sample was meant to be of manipulated fabric techniques, but I confess, I didn't finish it and get to that part. I've posted this one before to some degree, but here it is in the full line up. The sources were a sapling opposite our flats and a bird table I found on-line. Here we have a pastel picture of the two together, then a collage using painted papers etc, and then the sample which is worked in over-dyed threads (yes, GAST and WDW) on a fabric painted background. A bit lurid and makes it look springlike when it's meant to be autumnal, but it could be worse!!

Below is the Colour Module display that I've done for the College end of year exhibition next week. The photo was awful as my new camera just won't take indoor pix without blurring them horribly. I couldn't manage with the old one - having to hold the battery door shut - in the middle of the studio etc. DH is getting me a lovely new one that will take pictures in dim light and all sorts - great for museum collections where photography is sometimes allowed, but lights are low and flashes a no-go. I just got this pic to show it all together. I think I'll try and take a better one when I bring it home and can use the old camera on it, but you can see how I put in white mounts for most pieces and also used some other colours of card and paper to tone in with the artwork and samples etc. Do you think it works?

So, that's it for City & Guilds for me for the foreseeable future. I'm not sure if I'll go back after our year away and re-start as the whole programme is changing and, whilst it seems somewhat less work and not too bad, I just don't know. We'll see.

Now that's out of the way, I can get back to some of my 'regular' stitching. =)

Some more artwork

Nothing stitchy to show just yet, (although I really must get on with some!), but here are some more of the art and design pieces I've done for my C&G work. Hope you like them at least a little bit. :) Paper-based art isn't my forté, (mostly as I don't do enough of it to develop any real level of skill), but I quite enjoy it anyway, which is the main thing.

This first one is a pastel painting of the centre of a flower which I did to be part of my colour resolved design work investigating tones and tints. This was the tints one - pale colours with 'white added'.

This one, obviously, is a collage of the Taj Mahal using fancy and metallic papers and card. The idea from here was to reproduce it with manipuated fabric techniques (part of the 'Texture' module) in trapunto. This was the one I tried to do using silk paints, but where the silver and clear guttas let me down to a mortifying degree and, after wasting a couple of hours on painstaking tracing of the outline - twice! - I had to throw the whole disaster into the bin in despair as the silk paint leaked through every single line of gutta! It didn't do that with the gold of the same brand, but the silver and clear, with their huge applicator openings that forced me to apply it with a paintbrush, were hopeless. I was, if you'll excuse the pun, gutted!

This last one is a piece of art nouveau jewelry which was to be reproduced in beads covering a large-ish button (just about an inch in diameter). It's drawn in pastel pencil, which I seem to do a lot better with than regular pencils of any type or colour and, I must say, I'd rather like a pendant like this!!

Coloured Broderie Anglaise Sample

One more sample done.=) Sadly, I can't find the source image at the moment as my laptop has died (we think the motherboard has gone - RIP Laptop!) and it's on there rather than the PC I'm posting from right now. Once I can get at the laptop's hard-drive to take my files, contacts and bookmarks off, I can add it in here, but for now I'll have to just present the pastel painting of the source photo, which doesn't look too much different from the real thing, and the stitched sample. This time we have a broderie anglaise piece worked in colour (as opposed to the traditional white on white) and on a piece of fabric that I dyed back in Decemeber.

Here also are a drawing and a collage of Haddon Hall in Derbyshire, UK, where Zeferelli's 'Jane Eyre' was filmed and which also appeared in the 2005 film version of 'Pride and Prejudice'. This was work for the first sample in the 'Texture' module, although I got no further than a total of 3 pieces of art for that!


Neither are spectacular, but the shapes are generally OK. I think the drawing is really lacking depth of colour in the main - the walls are too insipid, but I seem a bit short of serviceable grey shades of pencil, other than standard graphite. Art materials are one of the many things that are cheaper in Taiwan, so I'll stock up a bit there - and probably get a new laptop there as well.

Before my laptop did totally die (after 2 'sick' periods), I was able to do some pruning on my blog and deleted over 80 posts that were really saying nothing and editted probably as many. So, about 30% of it has now gone, which should make finding stuff and reading back for new visitors that much easier.

More art and stitching photos to come soon as I have also been working on the autumn tree sample and have taken photos of some other design/artwork that I've been doing for the C&G and will post that in spates with stitching WIPs.

'Oriental Dress' progress and some childhood UFOs

I've been doing a little stitching again and have got the cross stitching on the Anchor 'Oriental Dress' cross stitch kit done. As this one relies quite a lot on back-stitching for definition, it's really been a lot of just 'blocking in', esp in that green and white sidebar. The design is interesting here as it's clearly a Chinese dress, but the whole colour scheme is rather more Japanese with it's subtle shades and lack of red! Not to say that Chinese clothes don't come in these shades, (they do as I have a lovely light pink jacket to prove it), but it's not what you would expect. If my memory serves me correctly though, I think the whole series this belongs to is done in the same sort of colour scheme. When the stitching is done, I'm going to make it into a small gift cushion/pillow to send to the couple who kindly put us up near the airport when we went to Frankfurt and had to fly into 'Frankfurt' Hahn (which is about 90 mins drive away from the city!!) It's a bit late, but as I started it at their place and I know she likes stitchery, it should go down OK. I can't quite get enthusiastic about this one as, well, I'm not even sure I like it that much! I only bought as a desk decoration for my old job, (should I have ever got a desk, which now looks most unlikely to have happened!!), but I thought I may as well have a short and simple project on the go at the same time as all the college stuff.

My mum's been clearing out her attic (with DH's help getting stuff down to start with) and came across some childhood UFOs of mine! Well, there were three UFOs and one piece that needs some re-doing in part. Here are three of them, a pair of needlepoint kits:

Just look at the back of the completed one! What a mess! I'm going to match up the needed colours, (probably just use cheap stranded cotton for the background needed on the 2nd one), and finish them ASAP. They've been washed as they were rather grubby from hanging around - I even had one on my wall at one point, but I now wonder how I dared - there are small patches where I have tent stitch going in the opposite direction!


This is another needlepoint kit that I'd almost done. I plan to get them all finished up and then framed, but I really don't know who to give this one to. I daresay it'll find a home though.=) In fact, I have an idea, I think I know a very sweet teenager who would enjoy this made into a little cushion for her room....


The last piece is a part-sewn lion from the 'Friendly Stuffed Zoo' pattern collection that I started when I was in the Girl Guides. I didn't get very far with it, but all the necessaries are there, so I can soon finish it off with the machine and either add it to our stuffed toy collection, (which probably needs giving away, esp as we are moving!), or turned into a gift. Will post that one when there's something recognisable to see on it. Anyway, these date back about 25 years to my pre-teen days!

I've also done another line on the band sampler and decided to miss out one that I didn't like. There's an unfinished line near to the top that I also didn't like much and missed out so far as it needs beads attaching and I'm leaving that 'til last. So, now I'm looking for something to fit in the 7 threads space there is left there.....