Stitching

 This is a piece of vintage French, linen bedsheet. I am stitching in blue imagining  the line of the weave. The slow repetition, the mind is focused on the needle and thread. The blue changes as the length is finished and a new shade needed. Mindful, slow stitch, reusing as I turn something considered quite ordinary and domestic into something different. As a fragment of its former usefulness , altered. 

I am finished 

I am not finished

Transformed as a grub to a night moth against a starry sky 

Sampling

 Sampling for stitch. Using unbleached very soft calico as a base I stitched in stranded embroidery thread.

Running stitch, overcasting to make a pleat and then more pleats with running stitch going both ways to form a checkered texture.

The top one is really soft and lovely to hold and the two lower ones look fabulous on the reverse side.

Much more subtle indication of the lines with the blue still showing through. Still a lot of texture.

Postcard for travel

 

Postcard for my friend Rebecca who is a member of Broadstrokes. This year we are sending a postcard to other members on their birthdays relating to travel. The travel we cannot do at the present time, travel we have shared or spoken about or travel yet to come.

So this represents a place that both Rebecca and I think fondly of as we both have lived there for a number of years , mine early in my childhood and Rebecca later on for work committments with her husband.  The back ground is a vintage paper guest hand towel . My mother purchased packets of these in the 1960’s and sent to relatives as gifts. So I acquired a packet unopened from an Aunt when clearing her house. They really are too beautiful to use for a hand towel in the bathroom .

I added some cotton fabric, a vintage NZ stamp and the greeting in text at the top. 

Rust dye

 I attended a workshop run by Grace Cross in the last weekend of June. Three styles of rust dyeing or at least using iron to make prints or colour onto fabric and paper. We used chemicals only for one technique and even though it gets glorious golden colours I am not wanting to continue to use this method. However I have made some wonderful samples that I will use some way in collage or small pieces.