Don't fence me in

There has been no series of monthly Journal Quilts this year but nevertheless a few of them have been made. This is one of them, made for the upcoming (early 2018) exhibition of Thistle Quilters. We were all asked to make an A4 landscape orientated one for a specific week this year. My week was the one starting the 28th May. The theme was to be: News, and we could interpret that as we wished.

Truth be told I have been avoiding the "big" news as much as possible for the last few years, zapping away from any news programmes as if my life depended on it. Maybe because it had started to affect my mental well-being. So no world issues but instead I found my news much closer to home.

This year has been all about Flora, after she arrived with us in November last year (1st anniversary coming up soon!) so she had to feature. During that week of the 28th May I was participating in the Artful Adventures, Stroll through my Hood project (organized by Nathalie Kalbach) where we were to look at our neighbourhood with new eyes and take photographs based on prompts she gave us. One of the pictures I took at that time was of a very old gate in the Penicuik Estate. I have re-pictured it below although this one was taken yesterday.

I combined Flora with the gate and that formed the base of my journal quilt.

The quilt was made using a combination of hand dyed fabrics (the pink and the green) as well as a backing cloth that had been used to sop up the paint in my studio (the gate). Flora herself is an image transfer from a photograph.

The quilt was machine quilted, raw edge appliquéd with hand stitching and embroidery. It has been further embellished with size 11 seed beads and sparkly sequins.

New York, New York talk

Walking the High Line

Jane and I gave a talk about our New York trip back in April to our quilting group, theThistle Quilters. It brought back many happy memories. So to celebrate here are some pages from my travel journal.

Visiting the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)

In Central Park

Edina's Roses

This quilt came home with me yesterday after the meeting of Thistle Quilters. It had been part of Thistle's stand at the quilt show in Glasgow earlier this month. The quilt was the result of a challenge to make a quilt sized 18 x 24" on the theme of "Auld Reekie", a name by which Edinburgh is also known.

After some research I discovered that one of the reasons that this is the case, was the habit of domestic servants in the past, to empty the chamberpots from the top of tenement houses into the streets below with very unpleasant results, specially for the innocent passers-by below!

I found a poem written by Robert Fergusson in 1773 which contains the following lines:

"They kindly shower Edina's roses

to quicken and regale our noses"

This refers to that habit of emptying those chamberpots of their foul smelling content.

I grabbed that poetic image of roses to use in my quilt and thus was forced to buy a chamberpot on Ebay, a first for quilt supplies!

The background is a paper/fabric collage using vintage images of Edinburgh from books and an old newspaper, collaged on a calico (muslin in US speak) background using matte medium. The frame is hand drawn and cut from a rose fabric, and then machine appliquéd on using Bondaweb, with machine done double buttonhole stitch. It is embellished with size 11 seed beads.

The chamberpot is a photograph taken from that Ebay buy printed onto fabric and machine appliqued on. I then stitched on a selection of diferent rose buttons and beads, falling down in a steady stream over the background. 

Into the Wild Blue Yonder

When we opened the curtains first thing this morning we were greeted by a beautiful morning with lingering mist and sunshine.  I grabbed my camera and took some pictures before all that beauty could disappear.

 Then I heard a whooshing sound and looking up spotted this colourful balloon slowly traversing the sky.

I loved the way it seemed to hang above our chimney.

It wasn't till this moment that I realized that if I could zoom in on it, the people in it could do the same in reverse and I was still dressed in my nighty! So I scarpered inside very speedily. But it dawned on me while driving to the first Thistle Quilters meeting of the season in Edinburgh that this balloon was an excellent image to reveal my news!

I too am off into the wild blue yonder, though not in a balloon. Instead I'll be winging my way to New York next spring on a quilting orientated trip that I won. I won't show you the winning quilt yet but here is a detail below.

This quilt (called Gelli Glory) was made for a competition on the theme of Stars and Stripes organized by the British Patchwork & Quilting Magazine on the occasion of their 30th anniversary, and you will be able to see the entire quilt in the next issue (November) of the magazine coming out in the middle of October. Once that has appeared I will post it here too. The prize is a trip organized by PandQTours and both I and a friend will be going. Going with a friend will make it so much more fun and I'm so happy she too is looking forward to it very much.

Guidebooks for New York have already been bought and the trip will included a visit to the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA, and a visit there has long been a dream of mine), the 9/11 Memorial site, as well as a trip to The City Quilter where I will receive 10 fat quarters of fabric as part of my prize. Somehow I suspect these won't be the only fabrics coming home with me. A big suitcase will be needed! You will hear lots more about this adventure in due course. It is just SO exciting!

Embellished Cuff

It was the last meeting of Thistle Quilters and we were all asked to wear a hand made accessory. I started my cuff quite a long time ago. It's loosely (very loosely!) based on a cuff I discovered in the Belle Armoire Jewelry magazine from summer 2009 in an article named A Passion for Scraps by Sarah Alford. It must have lingered in my memory as I managed to lay my hand on the right issue of the magazine as soon as I thought of making it. 

I have been clearing out my studio of all the stuff I never anticipate using again (only to make way for new supplies, you understand!) and all the samples I made for my City & Guilds Embroidery course back in the early nineties just had to go. However I found it hard to simply add them to the black bin liner of rejects so instead I thought about ways to re-use or as the term is nowadays up cycle them. And this is one of the results. The background fabric is entirely made of one of the samples. I added the black lace as well as the extensive beading. The clasp (see top picture) was an Etsy buy.

It's very wearable for me as once on, it doesn't move about on my wrist because I made it exactly to measure. So it doesn't get in the way when stitching! And it looks quite lovely too.

Wood blocks

I was at a meeting of Thistle Quilters this morning where there was a very thought provoking talk by Textile Traders about the future of ethnic fabrics in an age where the makers of such fabrics are under much pressure from the outside world. Hopefully the art of making ikats, batiks, and hand embroidered costumes won't be entirely lost and there will be help for those artists who pass on the old traditions.

Textile Traders also brought their collection to sell with them and it was almost guaranteed before I even arrived, that I would buy! As you can see 4 beautiful carved wood blocks came home with me to be used for stamping with, and to use on my gelli plate (so watch this space).

As for the blue indigo dyed fabric in the background, for once this is a jacket rather than fabric to use in my work, but in all honesty that is because I will meet up with Textile Traders again very soon on the 20th June when it's World Textile Day in Bridge of Allen.

The Sunny HIlls

The Pentland Hills were looking splendid when I returned home today. I knew however that a cold wind was blowing and it was feeling quite arctic so didn't mind the fact that we would not be going up there today. This was taken from a lay-by on the A702 and judging by the amount of cars in the various lay-bys many people did go up there enjoying the sunshine. We have been up at this particular spot close to Silverburn but there wasn't enough time left this afternoon to venture up before darkness falls.

Instead I had a very enjoyable Christmas party with the Thistle Quilters this lunchtime, with lots of lovely food and the opportunity to catch up with everyone. This afternoon will be spend on a spot of beading as I would really love to finish the quilt I'm working on before the year is out.

The clouds roll in

The clouds looked like waves rolling in and were so spectacular while I was driving along the A702. Sadly there is no place to stop on that busy road so I had to wait till I reached our little lane before I could park and take the picture. That means the radio mast also made it in but no matter. This is the reason why I can blip from the lay-by if need be, so I'm very pleased it's there!

This is my blip for today and I have also submitted it to the Lovers of Light competition on Blip. I took it on my way home from the Thistle Quilters meeting. I haven't blogged a lot this past week as I'm working away fiendishly on my secret project. Sometimes I feel that steam is coming out of my head. There is no way I can keep up this kind of work rate for too long and I will have to take time off soon in order to preserve my sanity (or what's left of that!). Tomorrow is promising to be a sunny day so that would be a great time for an outing!

Stitching the Day away

I dedicated the day to uninterrupted sewing to make a start on that secret project I mentioned a few days ago and for which I have a strict deadline. So it was nose to the grindstone or rather foot to the sewing machine pedal. It's quite surprising just how much you can do in a day, providing of course you don't do much else. And I didn't want to take a break to go and search for my daily blip photograph. So I grabbed a bunch of papers i had made using my gelli plate and chose the one I liked best  and photographed that one. Which happened to be the above image made using a mask (the figure) and my 8 x 10" gelli plate.

I can't begin to tell you how much I love my two plates (I also have a 6 x 6") and I wish I could get the circular one but it's not yet available in the U.K. The very large rectangular one (10 x 14") is on my Xmas list! But no playing with them for now till I feel the quilt I'm making is well on it's way! Everything is going suspiciously well which makes me worried!

Top Secret

I'm working on a top secret quilt about which I can tell you nothing. I can't even whisper about it in your ear! The name is Bond, Jane Bond, and I'm a quilter, ha, ha. So sorry about this lack of information but all will be revealed in due course at next year's Loch Lomond Quilt Show where this quilt will form part of the Chinese Whispers project by the Thistle Quilters group. I collected the quilt made by the previous person in the group yesterday to serve as my inspiration, and to my amazement I took one look at it (it's beautiful) and an idea immediately popped up in my head. I love it when that happens, and it was especially good for this project as I only have a limited period of time to produce the work.

So I really shouldn't have gone off on an outing today but I wanted to pay a quick visit to the first exhibition of the Pieceful Patchers, held at St. Matthews RC Church in nearby Rosewell. And I was very pleased I went. Not only were the quilts lovely but so was the tea and cake, and there was an opportunity to indulge in fabric and books too. What could be better!

And it also solved the question of what to blip today. St. Matthews is quite a modern building, having opened in 1926 and it's a beauty as you can see, designed by Archibald MacPherson. In the end I choose the above picture as my blip for the day.

Stobo Journal Quilt

This is an extra journal quilt which isn't made for either the Contemporary Quilt Group or the Sketchbook Challenge. Instead it will become part of a challenge within the Thistle Quilters group. Inspired by my 52 Journals project from 2012 the members of Thistle will be making a weekly journal quilt  where every member is allocated a week. The challenge was issued at our last meeting and we drew lots to see who would do which week. As luck would have it I drew the week that started with the 19th October. Our meeting was on the 19th itself and in the afternoon John and I went to Stobo Japanese water garden as you can read here.

I took that as my inspiration for the journal quilt (A4 size) and used one of the photographs I took on that day.

The rest of the surface is covered by couched yarns and appliqued pieces of previously strip pieced batik fabrics all in the colours of autumn. You can see it in detail above. The applique was done by hand. I sewed on buttons to the pieced strips.

Handstitching was also added and of course quite a lot of beads and bugles. These have almost become my trademark!

And talking about the 52 Journals project there is good news. All the journals will be exhibited next year in the Tweeddale Museum and Gallery to coincide with the Peebles Arts Festival. The show will start on the 22nd August 2014 and end sometime in October. We still have to arrange the end date but of course I will keep you informed here and let you know all the details as soon as they are finalized. It will be a selling exhibition so will be the last chance to see all the journals together.

Visit to National Museum of Scotland

Yesterday I together with other members of Thistle Quilters paid a visit to the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh where we were treated to a tour concentrating on the textiles in the collection. As I was dashing about yesterday I didn't have time to show you the pictures then so here they are today. The textiles covered many centuries but one thing that has remained very much the same over time is the iron! It's surprising to see how little it has changed in all that time.

 A beautifully embroidered part of a bed hanging.

 An old weaving loom 

This was part of an old part of machinery which we happened to be passing during our tour and which I couldn't help but photograph for that wonderful pattern. By the way photography is allowed in most parts of the museum apart from special exhibitions but flash isn't, and most exhibits are displayed in glass cases which makes taking good pictures rather hard. I took mine as best I could and mainly to remember those things I found particularly interesting.

A fabric sample book

 Above one page from a book of paisley pattern samples. I would have loved to see more of this book but sadly that wasn't to be. I'm quite pleased with the picture I managed to take as it shows the details of the design beautifully.

It inspired me this morning to get out the Paisley shawl I inherited from my mother-in-law. Contrary to most shawls of this kind this one isn't woven but embroidered and I thought I would share some of the beautiful details with you. It dates back to the later part of the 19th Century and is in quite a bad state as it had been folded over a long period and also has a lot of moth damage. However the amazing skill of the person or persons who worked on this embroidery can be seen clearly.

Also since I pictured these details this morning I can use one of them for my daily blip today!

Thistle Quilters Meeting

You can tell it's autumn because all my groups have started up again. Last Tuesday it was the start for the Peebles Embroidery Guild and today it was the first meeting of the Thistle Quilters. With groups come committees and with those come changes on a regular basis. Today it was the turn of the previous chairperson to step down and she received a beautiful bouquet in thanks. I immediately grabbed it for my blip today!

Members of the committee (and I am one) got together some weeks back to make her some bunting too, using vintage materials such as tablecloths and hankies. We managed to produce quite a length and you can see about half of it above.

 This is a close-up.

And here are the ones I made, not during that meeting, but ahead of time so that I could use some of my own vintage collection of laces, hankies and old linen. Of course I could not resist adding some beads!

Bunting, Bubbly, Bonnets and Blooms

Today was the last meeting of the season for the Thistle Quilters and we had a "Bunting, Bubbly 'n' Bonnets" theme which as you can see above was a great success. Taking photographs means you don't have to appear in them so I gladly volunteered! Above almost all the bonnets on show and a glimpse of the bubbly too (non alcoholic, I hasten to add but no less delectable for that). 

 A lot of fun was had by all as can be seen by the above portraits of Liz and Jane!

And some more serious things were also discussed, here between Marjory and Rosie! Rosie is a wizard at making it yourself with the most simple means, and coming up with the most stunning results! Her fabulous flowery bonnet started life as a cardboard box.

 Some people looked exceedingly elegant even though they too had made their own bonnet, entirely from scratch. This is Jan.

And here is another glimpse of Rosie's bonnet as well as that of Carol, that was inspired by Votes for Women, and uses the colours of the suffragettes. In the background you can see some of Thistle's bunting. Every member made a pennant and Jane put them all together beautifully.

I personally was very much taken by Jane's hat, which she had bought on a recent trip to Thailand. So colourful and fun.

 And more details here of the bonnets. By the way everyone gave me permission to feature them here!

As you can see I borrowed the title for our event and added blooms as well ( so great that starts with a B too!) which I photographed in our garden on my return. No excuses for featuring that laburnum flower again!

And our Lilies of the Valley are also away now by the front door, spreading their delicious scent.

Finally I blipped the valerian plant when it was in bud earlier here. It's now fully out so I could not resist the temptation to feature it again on my blip as well as here.