Getting back in the saddle

You may wish to skip the pre-amble and go straight to the pictures...

As many of you may know I finished my City and Guilds way back at the end of May and it has taken me all this time to really get the creative juices flowing. I have been dabbling at all sorts of things, but nothing has really grabbed me. I felt empty and everything seemed like too much effort, mind you the heat wave didn't help. I filled my time reading a lot of books, something I haven't done for ages, many of them rather fast moving, best seller,  detective novels bought on the spur of the moment in charity shops. Not my usual genre. (I really enjoyed Philippa Gregory's "The White Queen" bought while  watching the TV series and I now have the rest of the series of books waiting to be read.  It was a period of history I know very little about, but found totally fascinating). But this wasn't helping with my lack of fulfilment on the create front. I had no energy.

One of my traits is that I am like a sponge always soaking up new ideas, techniques and styles. So over the last year having done several workshops, bought books, seen exhibitions and so on, I felt that I wanted to emulate all the work I admired, use colour like Ruth Issett, print like Bobby Britnell, use discharge techniques like Clive Barnett as well as quilt like the Kemshalls, but not being able to do it. All the while forgetting that the purpose of all of this study was to find my own voice and apply these techniques to my own purpose. Positive action was needed as I was beginning to feel seriously fed up and perhaps verging on not wanting to get up in the morning.

Firstly I joined the local branch of the Embroiders' Guild.  Gina Ferrari is a committee member and I have met  members Gill before, as well as Pam at an Art VAn Go workshop, so I shall be in very good company. This will give me regular contact with other like minded ladies.

Next, after feeling disappointed that I didn't get to this year FOQ, I took myself out and bought a new car - well not a new one, but a newer one, something I have promised myself for a couple of years.  My old faithful was beginning to need money spent on it regularly and like every single-motor household I wanted something I could rely on, so after a couple of weeks of self imposed stress, it is accomplished.  I now own a shiny black nearly new Vauxhall Meriva. I have also changed my energy supplier and managed to fit a new front door bell!!! Things are beginning to look up. You may ask, where is Mr T in all of this?  Well, he is right behind me, but being a stroke victim he finds it very difficult to be up front in the big household decisions. This is an endless source of frustration for him as he doesn't want to leave all the responsibilities in my hands, but it is something we have to accept. So with my self esteem feeling bolstered is was time to get back to the creative stuff.

Finally, to get me going I made a list.  These are always useful, although often I don't get beyond the first couple of items, especially if they are none essential. I thought back to what I had enjoyed making right at the beginning of my quest, what I had started selling and what had brought me confidence. So I thought if I went back to these things it would get me going again. So on my list went:

 A purse 

A book wrap

A bag

A brooch

A box

A wall hanging

Over the summer I had enjoyed drawing and painting in my sketchbook the poppy that had appeared in my garden so that was my starting point.

 I started with a couple of purses and a book wrap, so I raided the fabric stash for suitable colours and bonded them onto a couple of pieces of acrylic felt.

Meanwhile I had a created another sketchbook page. I had been looking at some work on line - although I cannot remember what or where and I had the idea of an image appearing out of an abstract arrangement of colour, or an imaged disintegrating into its component colours. I was rather excited by this and got out one of the three 8"x 8" ready stretched canvases that have been kocking around for months.

The sewing got pushed aside, meals were late and after a day and a bit intensive painting I ended up with this. I had some Golden acrylics which I have been using on fabric, but I hadn't actually painted with before. The colours are so beautifully intense only drop seems to go a long way and produced glowing colours.

Now I was on a roll so I had to paint the other two canvases as well.

 Here are the three of them on a radiator. I haven't really got a good spot to photograph them and I'm too busy (yippee) at the moment to set up a photography session.

The paintings got a lovely response on my FaceBook page and I can't tell you how delighted I am with the comments. 

I am taking part in the ANB Beds Art Trail in September and although I shall exhibit my C&G quilts I think these will fit in too. After that I may put them in my Etsy shop which is empty at the moment.

Back to the list...

Two purses finished and one book wrap on the way.

What next ... well I have several ideas!

Fingers crossed the momentum will keep me going. Whatever you're doing, have a great week.

Jill

August - just

Here you see a picture of Marvin with four teeth...

... and here he is Friday with no teeth. A runny nose and a visit to the vet confirmed he had an abscess on one tooth and the other three were pretty poor so rather than put him through another anaesthetic in the future, it was decided to take them all out.

He has recovered amazingly quickly and is just about back to normal, just sleeping a it more, which means about 22 out of 24 instead of 21!

The weather has been a lot more comfortable and the garden is bursting. There have been lots of bumble bees, couldn't resist snapping a few.

The poppy has finished blooming and the seed heads are drying upside down in a paper bag.

They are irrestistable as subject matter, but I wanted to try to put my own take on them.

I made a card rubbing plate and used candle wax as a resist. In the enable above I colour washed the paper first.

Of course I had to create a few sketchbook pages too.

I bought myself a packet of TAP Transfer Artists Paper, it is like Tee Shirt transfer but you can not only print on it with you ink jet, but you can paint and draw on it too and you can use it in fabric, paper, wood, metal and glass.

Here I have used a photo I took of an old door, it has transferred perfectly. However the fabric is stiffened by the transfer. I thought I'd try a small whole cloth journal quilt and made a start, but now I need a bigger range of threads. Not sure when I shall get to the shops. 

I still haven't made my mind up about visiting the Festival of Quilts this week. I shall regret it if I don't go, but my back has been giving me a bit of trouble so I'm dithering.

Whatever you're doing this week, have fun.

Jill

Three weeks of news ... is it worth it?

Rather a cooler, damp morning so chores completed, a good opportunity to catch up with everyone on-line. I have been fiddling about with various ideas, but haven't actually completed very much. But I will share any way. I carried on with the poppy theme. Starting with an Derwent's Inktense pencil drawing on pelmet vilene, I then machine embroidered it. 

I shall add some hand stitched anthers, but not sure what to do with it yet.

I also did some more detailed Inktense drawings on cotton.

I turned these three into lavender bags.

 I also been playing in various sketchbooks.

novel brush wipe...

I have also decided to join the Embroider's Guild and nearest branch in Letchworth has Gina on the committee. I very cleverly joined in in time to attend their Summer Supper and listen to a very informative talk by Wendy Cotterill on spun bonded  fibres, mainly Lutrador; enjoy a delicious buffet supplied by the committee and buy a piece of velvet and dyed scrim from Sandra Beech and try a little idea she had, to keep my hand in.

 And finally a photograph of the most amazing sky last night, which made me think of mother-of-pearl.

Not sure what I will be doing next, but I will eventually keep you posted.

Jill

Going with the flow....

I'm letting the pictures do the talking, however I will add a few words. I'm still reconnecting with my creative direction. I've been taking a few proper photographs again, rather than snaps with the iPad.

Last week I went to the Isle of Wight to visit Dad. There was a beautiful sunset the first evening and this is the view from the pub where we ate.

Sunset at Gurnard, IOW

Wednesday I went for a morning walk on Egypt Esplanade, where Dad lives.

Egypt Point - the most Northerly point on the IOW.

A morning cloud

Crab shell

We drove to Bembridge for a wonderful seafood lunch, and then came home the long way round. There are lots of spots to stop and enjoy the view the Jurassic coast, the Needles are just round the point here.

"Jurassic Cliffs" given a vintage postcard treatment.

 Back home this poppy has appeared in our vegetable garden. Mr T has had special orders not to pull it up. When it opened, it was this dark beauty.  Next year I hopefully will have more poppies than I know what to do with, but not in the vegetable patch.

Of course I just had to draw it, but I had to work from my photographs as I couldn't sit in the veggies.

With the first two I wanted to just capture the glowing colour. I have a new, large selection of Koh-i-noor ink based watercolours which were perfect for the colours.  I outlined the petals with a permanent fine line pen. I have loads of them in different thicknesses, I also like them when they are beginning to dry up and they may a scratchy line.

This was an analytical drawing which I like to do so I can understand how a flower works, and then I can be more inventive. I also looked at lots of images of poppies.

 This drawing took quite a while using different size pens. It looks a bit rigid, what is wonderful about poppies are their floppy, crumpled petals.

I used the app Procreate to draw this purple version. You can change the background colour and the dark one gives the drawing a lovely luminous effect.  I keep going back to it and adjusting it, trying to make the petals look delicate and not thick.

This field poppy was 'made up' after looking at some images on the web. After drawing it in Procreate I opened it in Vintique which is a photo editing app for the iPad. I then added the distressed texture which seems to work well. Now I have learned what the Photostream does on my iPad I connected it to my Mac and recent pictures are shared on both machines without me doing anything!

I had to get out the sewing machine to sew a patch on Mr T's gardening jeans, so I used the opportunity to add some more stitching to this small piece I started on  Bobby Britnell's workshop. I can't decide what to do with it. Possible a bag.

I also made this little newspaper and wire rose after seeing a demo somewhere. (Photo given a vignette with Vintique)

Last and not least, of course I had to get my July calendar page ready. This was simply done by drawing round a 4cm square 31 times and then adding a wash round the squares using Brusho paints. I then added a few stencils - the letters belonged to my grandfather and the leaves are what I cut from a cereal box for some sketchbook work. So they didn't get too soggy, I used a nearly dry brush and block paint.

I have used rather more words than I originally intended, however I realised that I do like sharing how I do things. A lot of you are great practitioners in your own fields and very knowledgable, but if you would like me to document my methods and share them please let me know.

Lets hope the forecast is correct and we are in for some Summer weather at last.

Have a good weekend( I know I'm a bit early)

Jill