My Day in Cups of Tea Journal Quilt

Back from their No Theme July the Sketchbook Challenge team's August challenge is: Tea and Coffee. I will admit that at first I wasn't very inspired by this despite the fact that I do love to drink both. My coffee intake is restricted to a double espresso in the morning to kick start the system and after that it's tea all the way. The first thing I thought to do was to dye some fabrics such as calico (muslin in US speak) and lace in very strong instant coffee and I ended up using the calico for the background of the piece. But nothing else came to mind till I browsed through the most recent issue of The Simple Things magazines.

There I found a page called My Day in Cups of Tea with accompanying pictures featuring someone's day and an interview with her. I just about managed to prevent myself shouting YES!. Not only was this a great idea but it would also provide me with the opportunity to practise staging some photographs and even more enjoyable, hunt for the many teacups hiding in various cupboards. Here are some of the pictures I took.

I think I bought this fruity teapot and cup way back when I lived in Largs. The lace came from my vintage stash and the piece of fabric was just hanging around in the studio and fitted the colour scheme. You will notice that some of the pictures have books in the background. It proved to be hard to avoid having them in the photographs as there are books here everywhere you look.

This is the picture I loved most out of all the ones I took. Not only do I love these kitty teacups (designed by Rosina Wachtmeister) but it's sitting on my favourite book from this summer and in the background is a silk cushion which was the very first piece of silk painting and quilting I ever did back in the summer of 1989. Note that even then I was a "circle lady".

The cup above is part of a French hand painted set which was acquired from a shop in Bath just before we moved to Scotland. In an impulse when looking for new curtains. I spied this in the shop window, went in and bought the entire service and used my old curtains in our new home instead. A decision which I never regretted! The biscuit is for purely decorative purposes!

The other two cups came from my collection too. The one at top left is hand painted too and given to me by a neighbour while the cup at bottom right came from my mother in law and is even older. It has no markings to tell where it was made. I don't use these cups as they are too precious but it was a joy to photograph them for this occasion.

As you can see the journal quilt is quite simple really, a bit like a scrapbook page. I added the time to the pictures using Photoshop Elements and printed them out onto inkjet canvas sticker sheet (from Crafty Computer Paper). They were then layered onto white felt to make them look more like old fashioned photographs. Then they were arranged onto the machine quilted, coffee dyed background and stitched down and beaded.

I borrowed the title from the magazine article too and treated it in the same way as the photographs. Finally I wanted the background to look a bit like a tablecloth and finished the edges with vintage lace stitched down and beaded.

Now I'm off to enjoy a cup of tea. Looking at all those teacups has made me thirsty!