I was looking the other day at the stats for this blog and realised that there are several people from America, Canada and Australia who look at our blog, so a big hello to any of them that are still with us and hope that you enjoy what we are doing.
Spring has really got underway here. The plants seem to grow overnight. I have got two walks I go on during the lock down, for a short walk I go round the village and on my way I pass this lovely magnolia which has been a joy to see.
On my longer walk which I do about twice a week, I go up the hill behind the village and then I am into open countryside and farmers fields and there is hardly a soul around and I can hear the skylarks, it makes being locked down worth while because I wouldn't do this walk very often if I wasn't.
I have also been busy with my sewing this week. I have copies of two of Mary Sleigh's books and I found this idea in one of them.
It's just a basic patchwork but I have used my fabrics that I printed a couple of weeks ago. I just used the edges of the fabric that weren't printed so well so that I could still use the rest if I wanted to. The pattern fabric on the outside is some scraps I had from a bag I made.
The little decorations I have laid on are things I have been making as ideas came into my head. The top left is beadwork done on a loom. second row is canvas work in cushion stitch, third row is leather and the bottom is canvas work using a zebra as a pattern.
Not sure if this will inspire me to take it further but right now my brain has been captured by something else.
I saw this picture in one of Mary's books.
This is called a Hausa boubou from Nigeria. It consists of strips of silk sewn together and heavily embroidered to make sumptuous robes. I decided I could do this.
This is my interpretation. It is difficult to see but it is stitched all over. I used chain stitch, buttonhole and eyelets as well as straight stitch. I really enjoyed stitching this piece and decided I would like to do another.
Instead of neutral colours I thought I would like to do something with a more African colour scheme. I won this pack of Mulberry Silks fabric and threads and thought they would make a good piece.
I found some other fabrics and lots of threads so watch this space for the next piece of work.
I have been allocating Wednesday mornings for 'messy' work. So I got my gelli plate out again and did these leaf prints. A technique I found on Youtube.
Paint your gelli plate with black acrylic, lay the leaves on, take a print. Take a second print if there is a lot of black paint left. Remove the leaves and use them to make a print, leave the gelli plate to dry. When the plate is dry cover it with a pale coloured acrylic and take a print. You should get the black leaf designs coming through the pale paint. Mine weren't so good, I think the paper I used was too thick and using red instead of black didn't work at all.
But you do get some lovely painted leaves which I covered in acrylic wax as soon as the paint was dry.
One last thing. I found this idea in a book. Take a used face wipe and wash it clean. When it is dry, paint it with watered down acrylic paint. When that is dry, stencil on some molding paste. When that is dry, paint it then attach it to some felt and free machine around the molding paste with gold thread.
This is as far as I have got. I thought the colours were a bit dark so I have just used the end where it was paler. Not sure what colour to paint the white paste. Hope to finish it for you next week.
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