Published

You know when you've had a glass or two of wine and you love everyone?
And you want to hug everyone and tell them you love them?*
(*I have to add here that when I wrote this I HADN'T HAD A GLASS OF WINE..I just felt the same warm feelings...)
Well...perhaps you don't but I do, and  blogging makes me feel like this.
There are people who comment without fail on my blog and to whom I can't reply with email, notably Heather and Connie and many others, and I would love to give you all a virtual hug. It so lovely to have you take the time to comment.
Not just you, but others.
 Thank you.
Now, I just thought I'd pop in with a creation I did a while ago but which is just about to appear in Quilting Arts emag. I'm sorry I can't link to it. I don't quite know if its available yet.
So:

 here it is in all its pinkness

 Available now ssshhhh you know where.

 In lovely silk and velvet and of course its in the worst colour to photograph. There's a matching heart which can be a pendant or a brooch. Also available.

The silk is shot lilac and orange which gives a luscious pink.
Or should I say raspberry?

Can't even think of a title for this post.

What a long time its been since I blogged.
The main reason is that I couldn't get a decent photograph of the piece I wanted to show.
Here it is now..the best I can do in more ways than one.

Its about 10 inches high.

I've had it out ready to photograph for days now and every time the cat got near it I moved it, until this morning when I found him perched precariously on the back of a chair fast asleep..on top if it. So that big crease down the centre is a result of his 'ironing ' it with his one-stone bulk.

Now the history of this piece is this: I HAD to make myself do some sewing so I got a piece of my felt from a previous post and stitched some motifs onto it, using the different coloured shapes as a guide. It was a battle I can tell you.

But the final piece was far too busy and confusing . The background colours were too busy, and you couldn't see the stitched parts.

So after a discussion at the felt group (I do love them all) I had a go at using the embellisher to force the white felt on the back through to the front to soften the spaces between, but it didn't work.

( I didn't take any pictures of it at this stage.)

I had made some felt at the felt group meeting using some softly space dyed wool tops given to me by Lesley, and I rather liked the result so I cut the motifs out of the patterned felt, and stitched them onto the softer allover  coloured felt.

I prefer this background, but the effect of cutting thick felt is a little unsatisfactory in this instance. The wispiness of the edges disappear, but other things appear I suppose. Its a bit lumpy.

I did a bit of hand stitching inspired by Jude. I like that.

 This exercise poses a few questions.

Gives me  a few headaches. I need to be more in control of the shapes I lay down on a plainer background so that they will show up when I've stitched on them. So I need to have a clearer picture of the finished piece even while I'm making the felt.

Must try harder.

I'm still reluctant to commit myself to sewing which is tough because I am supposed to be exhibiting with a group in May.

Lost my way.

Thanks for all the wonderful comments since the last post. I feel so grateful and sad I can't answer some because I can't find you . The latest of these is 'bea'. Thank you bea.

In other news: it was my husbands Birthday over a week ago on a saturday . We were going out with family on Sunday so on his birthday we just had a little trip to Staveley near Kendal, Cumbria, where we had a walk by the river in lovely frosty sunshine,

Along the way we saw a beautiful house almost all one end is glass..what a spot to live.

 Further on we saw signs saying 'Save(whatever it was) weir.'.this one. I don't know any details, but I can only imagine the floods if this wasn't here.

Then we finished our outing with a coffee at Wilfs, a cafe in Mill Yard . We read papers and patted dogs..so civilised , they allow dogs and walking boots in.

Then we had a look round Mill Yard and saw one of our favourite kinds of building!

Patchwork corrugated iron.

Wonderful.

Knitting and stitching and healing

Thank you for all the very comforting and revealing comments on my last post. 

Now I want to draw a line under that part of my life..lets call it a blip and hope thats what it is. We'll see.

Unfortunately I am still unable to get on with any meaningful sewing which as I said is rather worrying because this is the year  that the group I belong to are supposed to be exhibiting. I was full of inspiration for this poetry themed work when I returned from Ireland last Spring, but my ideas have fizzled away. They had to be put on hold so I could get on with brooches and tweed things to sell, and now I can't even sit and stitch a little heart or flower.

So I am finding life a bit boring. Thats a terrible admission. Wondering what to do with myself and longing for the urgency of being too busy and gripped by inspiration. 

I managed to kill half of Saturday getting a worm pill down the cats throat. I have played far too much facebook scrabble. I know how to spell words, the meanings of which are a mystery.

This is what I have been doing during my 'dark' time. Just for the sake of something mechanical and repetitive to concentrate on, I took two of my motifs and some felt and some hand threads and this is what I came up with.

I do like the felt with the addition of hand stitch, its quite soothing, but  I don't know what to make of this as a 'piece'.

Its about 10 inches by 6.

The colours are lovely on a small scale.

I like the combination of machine and hand sewn 'spots'.

 And dashes

 But does it have a presence in its own right? Is it worth continuing or is it merely a doodle?

My lovely friend Margaret traipsed into town and then to my house with wool and needles for me to have a bit of knitting on the go. Its been a life saver.
I'm not such a great knitter but I think I can manage 7 stitches a row. This is fun to do and apparently I can get two scarves from one ball. Its called 'rico can-can'. Google it if you want to know more.
Goodness....I'll be signing up for Ravelry next and I don't even know how to count rows.

De Profundis

The title of this post is from a prayer I learnt at school. It is translated as 'Out of the depths'.
That is where I have been ..in the depths.
I had toyed with the idea of doing a follow up to the post called 'Pumped' with one called 'Slumped' but to be truthful, at the time I didn't even want look at my screen, or read anything on it.

Now I am  recovered but I feel that to remain honest in my blog I must tell the story.

Since the end of November until about two weeks ago I was in a black hole. I have just read the wikipedia definition  of A Black Hole and it works perfectly as a metaphor .

Medication initially made me feel so ill I thought I would never return, but  thankfully is now replacing whatever is missing chemically and making me feel better, positive, optimistic. I have even made an appointment to be referred to have my cataract fixed.

From inside the black hole, as black holes do, I absorbed the care and love of my family, my husband who must be the most patient man on the planet. He brought me small amounts of food and kept me going when I could eat next to nothing. He did the Christmas shopping. Cleaned the house while I opted out. Walked me slowly in the snow to get me out. Protected and cared for me. My Mother, 83,  came and ironed for me(..not that I cared about creases,) while I lay on the sofa.

My friends phoned and visited and watched me doing nothing. Supported me.  Felt group and Embroidery group friends e mailed, wrote and sent me cheery news. Told me not to worry. Sat and knitted while I sat and did nothing.

Church friends visited, prayed for me, the priest was amazing. When I went to Christmas Eve mass I was welcomed back warmly, lovingly.

My wider very far apart friends  spread the word amongst themselves, my college friends of 40 years . They supported me with emails, texts and phone calls.

And of course, my blog friends. Helen and her delightful daughter Polly drove 60 miles to visit me at home and brought me encouraging gifts as well as their loving support.
I had  many e mails from individuals enquiring where I was
 When I spilled the beans, you would be amazed at the number of fellow sufferers there are out there in blogland.

And that is why I am writing this.
Not to be dramatic, or to gain sympathy, but to show that when you think everyone else's lives are perfect, its only part of the story.

I don't even know what brought 'it' on . Nothing in particular but a series of minor negatives triggered a state of mind I hope I don't have again.

I am so thankful for my ordinary life at the moment.

Now I await the return of my desire to sew.
I have none at all at the moment and that is a worry.

A Moment....

.......of tranquility

Not the Harris Tweet I promised a month ago.
(Creativity eludes me for the moment, chased away by the black dog )

But a heron caught motionless on a therapeutic walk.

Pumped....?

Special requests are always fun to do, if a little daunting. I was asked to make a pumpkin , by a lovely lady who has previously bought pieces of my work. So we put our heads together, she showed me some pictures and here it is. A brooch about 3 inches high and 4 inches wide.

Thank you as always for lovely comments. I am sorry I am a bit behind with replies and blog reading.(And cleaning the house but you don't need to know that)

Thank you to all who came to my personal 'Craft Fair.'

I sold quite a lot of pieces but then I got tired of the tedium of listing.

I am now working on two big orders for shops.

 I started with a piece of purply pink felt and used it all up.

The colours are far more vibrant than they appear here.

These are all spoken for.

And.........

Yes, the Harris Tweets will be making their annual appearance. 

Very soon.

There are 6 on order.

Another possible horror story...we are soon to receive a lesson on TV in Machine Embroidery from 

an estate agent.

I can't wait.

Roll up roll up...

 Come to my craft fair.

(UPDATE: there would have been a lot more in my etsy shop but my VIRGIN MEDIA BROADBAND is behaving appallingly and I keep losing  things halfway through listing. Meanwhile there are one or two new things and some I listed have sold)

Its reassuringly expensive.
Or is it? I saw a truly horrible and badly made felt brooch in a shop last year for £25.
Mine are nowhere near as expensive as that and are made very carefully indeed.

My tree hasn't been painted but I thought, in view of my second 'we regret you have not been chosen' in two weeks I have decided to have my own Craft fair right here on my blog. (Well I was rather snotty when I outlined my proposals for presenting my work so I suppose I deserve it)
I am not one for hanging around where I'm not wanted so I'm sticking to where I seem to be appreciated (Thanks) .

 I am now in possession of some lovely things I discovered only recently, called 'pad bails.' I ordered some which were very cheap from a seller in China. I think they put them in a bottle and dropped them in the sea because it was 19th October when I clicked 'buy now' and they still haven't arrived.
However I got some in three days from a UK business.
They enable the making of pendants very simply so I've made  pendants from some of my felt shapes.  The necklace part is composed of 4 cords and an organza ribbon and as far as I can, I have matched the colours.

(The three on the right are now SOLD. I haven't put the other one in my esty shop yet )

 These leaf shapes below are awaiting transformation into brooches or pendants..oh sorry, the middle one on the top row is already a pendant on a purply necklace. You can see it on the tree in the second picture.

 I like this one below, it reminds of a little fat bird. (Oooh little fat bird...rings a bell)

SOLD

 So here is a lovely pale duck egg flower on matching cord, and there's even a matching purse.

These will be appearing in my etsy shop soon.

But it takes time..listing.

All the stock I have on one side for Craft fairs is going into my shop.

I feel strangely liberated , not having to produce vast amounts speculatively, and am looking forward to making some more things which have been requested by two Galleries.

Its a funny old world.

One mans meat etc.

I went a bit mad when I made the Harris Tweed order and produced a lot of extra square brooches.

These will be in my etsy shop too. But because listing takes so long, there will be a few at a time. You could always check out the price and then contact me directly.

I have had a bit of a boost lately from Quilting Arts Magazine, who are putting my article with these brooches in, into a free e book available here.

SOLD

 I just have a couple of that type from the article which I couldn't bear to part with available now.

You know where