Just Play or Perhaps Beginnings?

In my year of silence not knowing if I had anything worth saying

I filled my cup with play

mostly unsuccessful

but that's not the point is it.

Touching cloth keeps my tanks full!

Challenging myself to exploring colours I normally shy away from.

My hands often picked up greens.

It is easy to return to old favourites....

....easier still to come up with dismal choices!

All who know me know I cannot work with blue

Well, I probably can but I resist anything blue

And now I have to make a piece for a show called Blue!

Trouble is whatever I come up with must be nearly 100% blue.

Not be easy for me.

A couple of clever friends have suggested that I use my normal colour pallet and then dip the finished piece in an indigo vat.

Could be an interesting experiment

Using lots of different fabrics and threads

They would all take the dye differently.

Hmmm.

Pink...not my colour either

Back to the comfort of greys and browns

Working with new new colours hasn't been my only play.

Taking apart old work

Is a slow unpicking process

A meditation

 Wondering if they have a new story to tell.

Love Getting Started on New Work

Starting new work

Pinning bits and pieces

Here and there.

Sitting down to ponder on how I feel about these combinations

A book of Egon Schiele landscapes catches my eye

I pick it up

It opens to a painting Autumn Tree in Turbulent Air

Which takes me back a few years to a walk in the woods

When I came across an uprooted tree lying across my path

It's roots swirled and curled six feet into the air

A rock still held tightly within their grasp

At about eye level.

Amazing

Exciting

Synchronicity

And so the story begins

The strip of fabric on the right

is silk velvet

with the texture of tree bark

I started by rusching it onto a pre-felt base

Treated it very badly in the washer and dryer.

Once dried I unstitched the rippled velvet

from the pre-felt

and....

....voila!

Lots of work but worth it in my opinion

Meanwhile out on the dykes

our morning walks have been pretty dramatic

Not that the sunrise is of any interest to the Rusty Pups

They prefer to have their nose to the ground

Or look into the distance wondering how far we will go today!

 I hope your new beginnings are exciting to you too.

When You Run Out Of Thread....

....You take the opportunity to work on

other (and thank goodness smaller) commitments.

Small 10" squares for a show

"East Meets West"

organized by

SOFAAR

To my surprise I think this one is finished

despite the fact that it is not covered in stitch

from edge to edge.

Minimalist!

On the other hand this one is certainly

stitched to the max.

....Then you move on to start new work.

I have saved all the small offcuts from "Stone Pathways".

This break from stitching has allowed me to organize them

into colours and....

 ....and arrange them onto 2" squares....

....then sew them together

into what could end up as a stone or cobbled pathway?

And with time to breathe this week

you sit and appreciate wonderful linens

given to you by a friend.

Thank you Andrea!

Winter seems to have arrived in Spring this year!

I am freeeeezing

Perhaps next week the snow and the cold will go away.

Eagerly awaiting my thread order

needed to finish "Stone Pathways".

The Ebb and Flow of Daily Stitching

Sometimes the wrong side

the shadow side

is more than the front

Sometimes the right side

and the wrong side

compete

Like the ebb and flow

of daily life...

...the ebb and flow of daily stitching.

Studio Musings

Lengths of cloth

are being discharged

Simple circles....

dots and dashes....

spirals....

and lines.

I have a series

of three pieces

in mind.

Work in Progress

Started by stitching myself in black thread

except for the red glasses of course!

looked way too boring

it needed a bit of fun

It's on a very sheer lawn

can't add anything too heavy

so stitched on some sheers.

Now I'm wondering what to do

on the enormous amount of background that surrounds me.

Do I add stitch?

Do I stitch in a myriad of colours or just white?

Decisions

Decisions

Holding on and Hanging out

I've missed the geese on my morning walks.

Now I know where they are.

Down the other end of the basin in Diane's garden

hanging out with a pheasant!

Meanwhile the marshland around the dikes

is turning into gorgeous warm autumnal colours.

Funny that we are given this visual feast of warmth

before the white coolness (freezingness!) of winter takes over.

The studio needs a clean-up

But not too much...

It's good to keep....

things in sight...

 to remind me of where I have come from....

and perhaps where the next stitching should go.

Working in the Shadow of the Sun

Dappled stitching stretching back towards the sun.

Kisses and crosses hide in the shadows.

Every new stitch affects the whole.

There is a push and a pull to balancing my work.

As the stitches in the shadows increase

that first row of tiny flames around the sun have faded into insignificance.

So as I stitch my mind wanders back to them

thinking through how to bring them back into balance. 

And you will remember the beginnings of this piece involved

a million pale stitches for silver birch tree trunks.

This too is now out of balance creating a distraction rather than

adding to the whole story.

Darker, more like a shadow,  would be better.

The thought of unpicking  all that fills me with dread!

Perhaps painting/dyeing each stitch would work?!

Designing Within Shape

Years ago I found some shapes in that water photo

and forced them into pie shapes and from there into a circle.

Under Jane's guidance we all tried to get to know a flower.

We had to choose a shape and force a leaf into it.

Couldn't resist a nibbled leaf.

Tried a triangle.

Then a circle.

Didn't take much to force a lily into a triangle.

Sometimes I Lead Myself Astray

Sometimes it takes a few tries to work out how the story should be told.

Sometimes you get led down the wrong garden path.
Sometimes the story changes.

Celtic crow is on a wonderfully organic piece of wool blanket with a primitive feel to it.

Which by the way is a pleasure to stitch.

Left brain voice told me he should be grounded with some weight beneath him.
A row of conkers/pebbles were duly stitched along the bottom.
Wrong!

Looks too contrived to me...not the look I want...they will be removed.


So where to go next?

The wool makes me think of an ancient rock face.


As a participant in Jude's Magic Diaries class,
I am thinking a lot about stitch as marks from a moment in a lifetime.


Ancient rock faces are covered in markings recording
fleeting moments of the long life of this planet earth. 


The very DNA of birds such as Crow is marked with memories
that give them the instincts necessary for survival. 


I think he needs to be surrounded with stitched scratchings!

While typing this post, I suddenly noticed
the hint of another crow in the markings on the wool
and Celtic Crow is looking right at it!
Do you see it?


Gosh I love this process!
Sorry to be so wordy today.