The first rose and other miracles of nature

The weather is about to turn and rain and wind are on their way according to the latest weather forecast. In itself not a bad thing as Scotland is suffering from drought! For a country associated with rain this is a rare occasion but our Spring has been one of the driest on record and just today the newspaper showed us pictures of very low reservoirs and lochs. Even the stony and rocky shores of Loch Lomond are on view. So rain is desperately needed to avoid water restrictions.

But before the rain hits us here are some more pictures of the wonders around our house. At the top is our courtyard where almost everything is now in bloom. The first rose is also out and I'm sorry but I have no idea what this one is called. It's one that we bought at one of our garden visits and the foliage is a strange bronzy shade which in the autumn turns into orange and red. The flowers themselves are very dainty indeed, and so beautiful.

Another of my favourite flowers, the foxgloves are also out in force. And much loved by the bees! Bees have suffered from some form of disease in recent years and many have died. I read somewhere that if all bees die men will probably only survive for another 4 years after that so it's very pleasing to see that they are back in large numbers here in Macbiehill.

A Wilderness Byway Spread

It's been a few days now since I last made a spread for my Vintage Gluebook due to gardening duties and simply sitting in the sunshine reading! But I missed it, so today gathered up some of my new vintage books (now there's a contradiction in terms!) and started to cut things out till I had a selection to choose from. Everything on this spread is truely vintage apart from the blue strips which were a gift from our teacher Mary Green (but of course originally also vintage).

The image of the peaceful cottage on the right comes from a selection of the Badminton Magazine published in 1897. It's probably widely available still as I only paid £3 for it which made it much easier to cut into it. The monk as well as the boat come from a bound issue of a children's magazine called Chatterbox, published in 1907. It is in quite bad condition and the only damage to my purse was £0.50!!

Alpha Stamps Garden Postcard

Still trying to catch up with all the art made during the last few weeks and even months and this time it's one of the projects I made for the last kit I received from Alpha Stamps. This was entirely devoted to Flowers and Gardens and you can find all the information about this here. It was certainly a kit close to my heart as far as subject matter was concerned and a great one to finish my commitment as a member of the Alpha Stamps Design Team.

I made 2 postcards as exemples for the postcard swap organized by Lenna on her Creative Swap website and then made another 4 postcards to participate in that swap. I've shown you those already on a previous post

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This postcard was entirely dedicated to roses and I decorated both sides. The fabric images are all from Alpha Stamps Pink Roses collage sheet and the paper flowers, butterfly, cameo and Postcard stamp are also available from Alpha Stamps.

You can also see this postcard in the Alpha Stamps advertisement in the latest issue (no. 31) from Cloth, Paper, Scissors magazine. I received my copy today and it was lovely to discover it on page 87

Casting a shadow

The weather remains lovely, sunny and warm and in the evenings I continue to go for long walks. It's very dry everywhere and the newspaper informed us today that this has been the driest spring since 1929 here in Scotland. Another record weatherwise after the winter snow ones.

This (again according to the paper) has also produced a proliferation of wild flowers the like of which is not often seen so of course I have tried to capture it in pictures for posterity! The white is clover and the yellow lady's slipper! When I came home and uploaded my pictures to the computer it turned out I had also captured myself, not just once but twice. It happened because the sun was still shining brightly and when I took the pictures I could not actually see what was on my display screen due to the glare, so just pushed the button in the hope the camera would record what I wanted it too. It duely did its job but also captured me. Oh well!

The photo of the peat field was taken because I love the geometry of those long parallels, there is just something about them that speaks to me. Perhaps one day I'll do something inspired by all those pictures, who knows!

The flags are out!

You might think this is because of the celebrations just mentioned in my previous blog post but John had hung these Tibetan prayer flags up when I was away teaching on Wednesday so they greeted me on arrival home. He hung them so that I can keep looking at them from my studio.

When I went to the Tibetan Centre at the end of May I bought these together with the flags now hanging at the top of the potting shed with the thought that I wanted to distress them. In various circles there has been a Hang Outside and Distress Things project (known as the Erosion Bundle Project) in which bundles of paper and/or fabric are tightly bound together and hung outside for a season or two in wind, rain and sunshine to make it all look old and vintage.

So when at the Tibetan Centre I bought a long line of prayer flags with unfinished edges to do this with but then decided that we might as well enjoy them while they were being distressed. I had not gotten around to doing anything with them however and John decided to put them up as a surprise. They look great hanging in the trees and it will be ever so interesting to see what they will look like a year from now! By that time I hope to have thought up a art piece to use them in.

Celebrations

And isn't it amazing how things can change in the course of only one day! In all honesty with me my mood can go up and down in the space of an hour, let alone a day! From deep down in the dumbs to high up in the clouds! And at the drop of a hat!

Today we went for a lovely pub lunch with our neighbours and on coming home my quilt Flower Petals was returned by courier.It had been at the National Quilt Championships which were held last weekend at Sandown, U.K., quite a long way down south from Scotland. I don't often manage to get there myself and as we had the lovely garden party by the Thistle Quilters I missed the show this year.

Therefore the surprise to find a rozette enclosed with my quilt was even more special. Apparently Flower Petals had won the 1st Prize in the Theme section of the show (the theme being A Taste of the Tropics) as well as a Judge's Choice. What joy!! I was still blocking this quilt a day before I had to ship it to the show and I'm sure that must have helped. It will be one of the quilts in my exhibition next year but here is a taster of both the whole quilt as well as a detail. It has a wealth of beading on it, as well as Swarovski crystals. It's not for nothing that I'm sometimes referred to as the queen of embellishment! Give me a surface and I will decorate it.

Volunteers Spread

As per always when I wrestle with officialdom (don't ask, it's too boring for words but the Kafka-esque situation I mentioned some blogs ago has developed into sheer lunacy!) or feel frustrated in any way, I go shopping. And by the way I also go shopping when I'm happy which when taken together means I spend quite a bit of money at all times.

Fortunately I hate clothes and food shopping, and on the whole have quite moderate wishes and instead I find my way to second-hand shops and specially second-hand book shops. So when life feels like it might be getting on top of me I head off in my car (driving also calms me down) and go treasure hunting. Yesterday I managed to buy 7 books and a huge vintage ledger all for under £25. And today I made this spread in my Moleskine journal using bits and pieces from my newly acquired books. Everything in this spread is pure vintage apart from the bit on the bottom-left side of the left hand spread (with the Presented word) which was a gift from our Vintage Gluebook teacher Mary Green. I printed it off onto vintage paper though!

The girl could be me. throwing up my hands in horror!

My blog in book form

I kept reading in various online groups about making books out of your blog and of course I could not help investigating further and I'm ever so pleased I did! I received my book of the blog from the 27th February - 27th May 2010 including all the comments and it looks wonderful. Even John was deeply impressed. He is no longer online at work (as he's retired),banned from using my computer at home and he seemed to enjoy reading about what he was missing.

The company who does all the hard work to make this possible is Blog2Print and if you have one of the standard blogs such as those hosted by Blogger, Typepad and Wordpress, all you do is give them your blog URL, the dates you want them to cover and they do the rest. You even have a choice regarding the front and back cover pictures that you want to use although I went with the standard choice of first and second picture. You can also edit the blog i.e. leave out certain posts if you prefer etc.

My dial-up connection at home is too slow to indulge in too much editing and in any case I felt I simply wanted the entire contents. It's surprising how much I had already forgotten about life lived such a short period ago!

I'm going to try and get my entire blog printed in due course bit by bit, money permitting, and I look forward to the future when I might find myself in very old age sitting with these publications in my hands and remembering the past but then again perhaps I will still be too busy even then making art!! Sure hope so. Having said that I have already caught myself re-reading this first blogbook several times.

Macbiehill Walk

Much as I love and adore John, I sometimes (well quite often if truth be told) need time on my own to concentrate on thinking. I know quite a few artists meditate and I have tried but it's not really my kind of thing.

But when I go for a very long walk I loose myself in my thoughts while at the same time still able to observe my surroundings so during these long, sunny evenings I take myself off without husband or dogs, but with my camera (and also my mobile, although switched off). It's lonely on the hills (I've never met anyone!) and if something should happen there is no help out there so John makes me take the phone. The wild open spaces are what I love about being there, all the sounds are generated by nature and there is utter peace.

The absence of dogs also means a much better chance of seeing the wildlife and I have seen many deer, foxes, and buzzards while on the moors although none that will stand still long enough to take a picture. Fortunately the wild flowers (such as Scottish thistles and cotton grass) are more obliging.

Up there it's lovely and fresh because there is always a breeze. You can tell by the pictures of adjoining hills how high up I am during the walk. It was a wonderful way to celebrate the Solstice yesterday and I always return refreshed in mind and body.

Another Vintage Gluebook spread

Everything on this spread is vintage although the image of the peaceful village is a copy from one of my vintage cards. I simply can't get enough of making these spreads! And I'm so happy I spend £15 on buying the book full of postage stamps at the Antiques Fair recently. It's paying off its weight in gold! I adore those old stamps and sometimes they provide just that final touch a spread needs.

Summer Solstice

Not sure if one is meant to wish everyone a happy Solstice but it definitely was one long, happy and sunny day here at Macbiehill, overseen by our own local goddess ( at least that's what she seems to think she is, Troi the greyhound) so here are some pictures to show you.

Tea in Somerset Studio Gallery

Until I see it with my own eyes I somehow seem to doubt that my work has actually appeared in publications. However my copy of the most recent issue of Somerset Studio Gallery (Summer 2010) is now in my hands and I can show you the picture of the I want my Tea fabric postcard as it appears in the magazine, page 180. You can order a copy by clicking on the button to the right of this blog which takes you straight to the Stampington website. They are the publishers of this and other delectable magazines.

I made it ages ago (July 2008!) as part of my commitment to Alpha Stamps and if you want to find out how it was made you can read all about it on a previous blogpost here.

Red, White and Blue

After the debacle of the English football match, the Dutch did me the favour of winning their one against Japan. No, I did not see it (I greatly preferred the garden party!) but I'm celebrating it nevertheless by uploading pictures in the colours of the Dutch flag (horizontally from the top red, white and blue). I went for the pastel versions, though!

They are an admittedly more pink than red poppy just about to come out, wonderful white (well whitish!) foxgloves and blue poppies.

I'm particularly pleased about the last ones as they are notoriously difficult to grow but they seemed to have liked the harsh winter and the clump is definitely growing.

Pearl Spread

I've decided there is only one way to go to try and keep up on this blog and that's one step at a time! I'll try upload more than one post per night although it will depend on my dial-up if that works! Of course it does not help that I keep making art although today this spread in my Vintage Gluebook was the only thing that came out of my hands. Fortunately I'm ahead of the game because during the England-Slovenia match I spend the entire evening in my studio and managed to free-machine quilt an entire border. By the sounds of it a much more productive way of spending the time than watching that particular game!

Another lovely sunny day today and I had a Larousse encyclopaedia in my hand as well as a gluestick to make this spread. The flowers come from a 1905 postcard but because I did not want the thickness of it in my Vintage Gluebook, I copied it and used the copy. The red roses are another detail from a vintage postcard which I used to make a background (using Paint) and the birds are from an endpaper in one of my books, and are also a copy. The Pearl text is from the same postcard as the flowers and the sentimental poem comes from one of my vintage books.

Garden Party

I went to a lovely garden party in Edinburgh today, dressed in a floral skirt. You don't often see me in a skirt, floral or otherwise, but floral was our theme. We were so lucky with the weather as it got more and more sunny as the day went on. We all brought savouries and sweets for lunch, sat in the garden, and talked quilting non-stop. It was the final meeting before our summer break, of the Thistle Quilters and we handed over our challenge pieces. I'll write about mine in more depth in another blogpost and show you a picture in the very near future.

I enjoyed seeing the lovely garden (with a stunning summerhouse, now there's a thought!) and could not help noticing how far ahead even Edinburgh (only some 12 miles away) is compared to Macbiehill. The roses were already out and in full bloom. No sign of that here yet although the buds have started to appear. But other things such as the lupins have suddenly opened up and are putting on a marvelous show. It's like all of a sudden the plants nudge each other to get on and make hay while the sun shines or in other words start flowering now that it's lovely and warm. Lupins are John's favourite blooms which is why we have rather an army of them but they truely are lovely. Pink and pale blue (those are Jacob's Ladder) is not a colour combination that I find particularly attractive, really too cute, but in this case I'm prepared to make an exception.

I have also started a new project (no, it's not spring cleaning, I'm not that daft!!) and joined The Sketchbook Project and will write more about that and maybe ask for your help, also in the next few days. What I said some posts back is still true.: I'm doing rather too much living and my blog can't keep up. Not a bad complaint to have, really. Hopefully I will be able to catch up soon but for now I'm back to our own garden to enjoy the sun some more!

Busy as a Bee spread

The vintage gluebook spreads keep growing and today I added another one to my Moleskine Journal. I wanted to inject some colour into this one and added a vintage butterfly Victorian scrap to the mix. I then discovered that the lime green was hard to integrate into the other vintage colours but eventually managed it (I think!) by added the postage stamp on the left which picks up that lime green.

The lovely lady on the left hand page was from a download from our teacher Mary Green (the Lucile calendar) and I overprinted her onto a vintage page from one of my books.

Spring Walk

After having that explosion of creativity and activity I took the day off today, simply because the sun was shining. Those kind of days are rare in Scotland and I like to make the most of them. So my studio door was opened wide and I sat on the terras reading. Granted the books were sort of job related about mixed media, and quilting but nevertheless it felt very much like a holiday!

Of course the dogs still needed to be walked even though Troi, the greyhound, was far from keen to venture far in the heat (well relatively speaking, it was warm for Scotland, about 21 degrees Celsius).

The first thing we noticed was the Laburnum tree before we even went out of the gate. Due to the severe winter and the late frosts the show was not half as spectacular as last year but still the golden rain (this is what the tree is called in Dutch i.e. gouden regen) gladdened my heart.

The next treat was the hawthorn blossom of the tree by the old railway bridge. This tree really was decimated during the winter snows and most of the branches are barely attached to the old trunk. I stopped John from clearing them up as I was afraid the birds had already begun nesting and to my amazement the branches actually produced blossom. And in abundance. The smell is glorious and can be smelled even at our gate.

The white looks spendid both on its own and against the bridge. What texture.

The old railway line makes for a very peaceful path and so does the forest. It's extremely rare to meet anyone else and I can enjoy the beautiful scenery including the horses in the field.

On the way home I came across this large clump of lovely little blue flowers and on coming home and consulting The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady concluded they must be Germander Speedwell or Veronica Chamaedris to give them their Latin name. So pretty!

Garden Variety Postcard Swap

The inimitable Lenna Andrews is organizing another fab swap and of course the temptation proved too much for me and before I knew it I had signed up. This swap is run in conjunction with Alpha Stamps and they and Lenna will provide prizes! .

You can find all information on the swap here and once you sign up you will also receive a wonderful PDF file from Lenna giving all the necessary information as well as a great description of how she made her postcards. Of course the requirement is to use images from Alpha Stamps but this is hardly a punishment as they are so fantastic. Specially for this swap there is an entire page dedicated to the theme of the swap: Garden Variety on the Alpha Stamps website.

I was lucky enough to receive some of these beautiful supplies as a member of the Alpha Stamps Design Team. In fact, it was the last time that I received their Design Team kit as sadly I have decided to leave the team after being in it since 2007. My exhibition next year and various other commitments meant there simply was no time left but of course I will continue to order their collage sheets and join swaps on their Alpha Stamps Yahoo Group. I'll upload the samples I made with my last kit in the next few days but here are the 4 postcards I made for Lenna's swap

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I also made 2 ATCs, one as part of the swap and one for Lenna. I used the Alpha Stamps Sunflower as well as Tallulahs' Flowers collage sheets and as you can see could not resist adding some more sparkling transparencies to the ATCs. I promise to give that a rest for some time now!

For the postcards I used two different fabric-paper backgrounds and even the back of the postcards were decorated with a Postcard stamp as well as a rose stamp (both available from Alpha Stamps), as well as a flower postage stamp.

These PCs and ATCs will be winging their way to Lenna before too long and if you want to be in with a chance to get them join the swap!

Campari and Orange ATCs

The colour combination for the Colour Groupies this month is also a wonderful drink which I got to know one sunny day in Sorrento, Italy many, many moons ago and which has been been a favourite ever since, both the drink and as I discovered making these ATCs the colours too.

Lenna, Debby and Caryl, my fellow Groupies, have now received their cards so I can show them here. I made them on the 7th May i.e. not recently but only mailed them off at the beginning of this month. The images and transparencies I used are all from Artchix Studio collage sheets and the backgrounds are strips of batik fabrics in the appropriate colours. Beading, decorative machine stitching and vintage texts were added to the mix. The cards are all quite different this month and as always I made one for me to keep. A romantic one, what else is new??

Lundi Spread

No, it's not Monday, I know, but I did not have a vintage French Wednesday page so had to use Lundi instead. As no-one came and spoiled me I decided to do it myself and gave myself licence to make a spread in my Vintage Gluebook Moleskine Journal. It took most of the morning but it calmed me down no end so served its purpose.

I have found participating in this class in some ways life - or at the very least art changing and I can really recommend the class highly. You can still sign up and will find all the lessons ready and waiting for you. Our Flickr Group is also very active still.

Apart from the sliver of map on the left hand side of the right hand page, everything is truely vintage (and that means at least 100 years old in my vocabulary). I spend a lot of time cutting out the figures with all their details but I think the effort paid off in the finished result!

Artchix Circle Card

My motivational daily tear-off calendar (from Louise Hay) this morning read: "Life is meant to be simple and easy". The moment I read this I knew it was going to be anything but today, which says a lot about me! Anyway as expected the day wasn't either simple or easy in any shape or form and I even used the word Kafka-esque to describe the situation I found myself in on the phone (speaking to a building society!!). I could hear the person on the other end taking a breath, considering whether it would be worthwhile asking and then deciding against it. Probably just as well!

As ever when I find life a grind I retreated to my art and decided to make an ATC for the Artchix Studio Lottery on Flickr. We're a group formed after the Artchix Yahoo group closed (they moved to Facebook) and we are still running the lottery with a different theme every fortnight. A winner for the last one (themed By the Seaside) was announced and the new theme is Circles. I had one background left from my Summer in Paris ATCs (previous post) so put that to good use and added the circles as shown (all from Artchix Studio collage sheets of course). I then could not resist grabbing the sparkling transparency and sticking it on. I added some free machining in turquoise around the circles, added a sparkling heart and finished the edges with turquoise zigzag stitching. Perhaps I was also sending out a message to someone, anyone: Spoil Me! as I was definitely feeling sorry for myself.

Summer in Paris ATCs

Today has been one gigantic explosion of creativity. No idea what suddenly came over me but whatever it was I need more!!

At the end of the day I could cross off 3 items of my to do list which is a very good thing as yesterday I added 2. The two I added will require a lot more work than the 3 that have now disappeared but still the satisfaction felt wonderful.

These ATCs were started the day before yesterday and as you can see I could not resist using some more of that sparkling transparency. It's my new favourite supply and as per almost everything I guess I will put it to good use while my fancy for it lasts. I tend to flutter from one new thing to the next, and I guess I (and John!) can only be grateful I don't do the same with men!!

The ATCs were made for the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group and had to feature both an image of the Eiffel Tower as well as of Marie herself. I found (just where does all that stuff come from??? Do I buy fabric in my dreams?) that I had a pack of 5" square samples all featuring travel, travel texts, travel posters and yes, the Eiffel Tower. So I made a medley of them all on a background of Fast2Fuse, quilted it with zigzag stitches and then cut this background apart into ATC-sized pieces. The images come from Alpha Stamps fabric sheets Young Marie as well as Off with her Head.

After covering the entire ATC with the above mentioned sparkles I added hearts and flowers as shown, ironed a fabric to the back of the Fast2Fuse and zigzag stitched around the ATCs. I made 4 for the swap (including a hostess one) and one for me to keep, seen above.