More painted papers

The top one is my favourite paper of the day.

Painted papers

Preparation for Ruth Issett's Masterclass

I am going for the final 2 days of Ruth Issett's masterclass at Art Van Go at the end of this week. Well they were meant to be the last sessions but they have added 2 days next year for those who want to participate in an exhibition. I haven't signed up for this and am still debating as I feel very out of my depth in this class. i think I mentioned before that others on the course had either been on many of Ruth's courses, completed C&G part 2 or were tutors themselves!!! Once I decided to just take this as a learning opportunity and ignore the dreaded words MASTERCLASS I got on a lot better and enjoyed myself a lot more.

Today I have been dyeing in plastic bags. Some of the fabrics had already been printed with coloured leaf shapes and the others had been monoprinted with white paint. These pieces are drying in the tumble dryer (I have nowhere for them to dry naturally).

I also decided to paint some more papers for collaging and design work and managed to utilise the one kitchen work surface available to me.

Week 3's second sample and help with Blogger!

I can't get the photos to go beneath each other or the writing in blogger - they keep ending up next to each other so I end up posting separate posts that go backwards! Can anyone help and tell me what I'm doing wrong? I'm using the old version of Blogger I think.

Anyway - onto the second sample for lesson 3. I spent a quiet evening watching what I wanted on tv (very rare I can tell you). I watched Green Wing, followed by my absolute favourite, Casualty and then the film Undcerworld (I love vampire stuff). Whilst all this was on I managed to complete sample number 2. Really enjoyed using cable chain and loop stitch!

Personal Library of stitches - week 3

Well I am still behind but I have finished my lesson 3 samples at last. yesterday was the last meeting of the Hemingford embroidery group and I took my lesson printout and threads and got the sample below completed. We had a lovely day and all took something for lunch. It was a yummy lunch with many of my favourite things - quiche, chesse and biscuits, kettle chips and salad. I really enjoy getting the chance to spend a whole day on textiles whilst talking to like minded people!

Lutrador aerial map!

Final sample (this post has been uploaded backwards - I still can't get the pictures where I want them!)

This piece of lutrador had something called 'perfect paper' spread on it first. Perfect paper is a medium that looks like handmade paper - it's amazing! you can spread it out smoothly on plastic and then peel your piece of 'paper' off!

Anyway, I laid this piece on some felt and machine stitched contour lines around the paste. This was then painted with dynaflow which gives this lovely contoured geographic effect. I am going to do further machining to try and distort the felt, might add some hand stitching.

Next I want to try sandwiching a piece of fine finger knitting between 2 sheets of lutrador and some bondaweb. Paint, stitch and heat back. These are just some of Jackie's ideas (I have to stress that all the creativity stems from her!). i can really recommend a workshop with her. The handout explained all the samples with extra ideas to try.

Thicker threads / wool / braid was couched onto a piece of lutrador. Mainly natural fibres were used with a small bit of syrnthetic. In the gaps between couching I did various free machine stitiching. This was then painted with dynaflow in purple and yellow and heated with a heat gun when dry. I really like the colours - not my usual taste.

More Lutrador Samples

Sorry for the blurring but this piece isn't flat and I scanned it! This is a painted piece of lutrador (same paints as before) which I then machine stitched and burnt back with a heat gun. Gives a lovely lacy effect but where the acrylic lumiere paint has been used it has resisted the heat.

Lutrador and garnet gel sample

First sample is of lutrador with Golden garnet gel painted on. Some machine stitching in the areas without gel and then painted with lumiere paint and dye-na-flow. This is my favourite

Lutrador Samples

Oh dear, I've definitely been slacking with my online class work this week. I didn't get anything done at the weekend with all the birthday fun and have completely lost momentum! The next lesson has come out today so I will take both to the Hemingford stitching group on Saturday and hopefully get lots done there!

But..... I did go on a lutrador workshop at Art Van Go with Jackie Russell. Jackie has just finished her diploma at Windsor under the tutelage of Jan Beaney and Jean Littlejohn! She is a lovely lady, really friendly and generous with her information and supplies! I had to borrow her machine as my poor Elna has given up on me and refused to do free machine embroidery (I have had it serviced and bought a new bobbin but the tension is still wrong).

Here are some pictures of the samples we did - I plan to add some hand stitch to them. Jackie uses lutrador to make gorgeous hangings that look like rust. She bonds, paints, and stitches the lutrador, burns it with a heat gun and soldering iron and then waxes it! I think it would make lovely book covers and pages. You can run it through the printer, paint it, hand stitch on it....

Another sample!

Just finished this tonight in time for week 3's lesson! This has taken a few nights of dedicated stitching. The design topic this week was 'point' and how stitches can be used as points and focal points. I have really enjoyed this sample as I love woven wheels and french knots - shame about the blurry picture. I can't work out if it's my technique or the camera is on the blink but pictures seem to be worse than when I first got it. Also the colours aren't quite right. The background fabric is a dusky pink kunin felt but it looks slightly orange in the picture.

Well off to bed soon and then I'll start reading lesson 3 tomorrow.

Very excited at the moment as it's my birthday on Sunday and have lots of nice things planned for the weekend and nice presents to look forward to! I'm like a child (despite being about to turn 30) and I am all fidgety and can't sleep. Wait until Christmas - I get so excited I make myself ill!

Personal Library of Stitches - week 2

Managed to get week one's sampler finished on the day that week 2's instructions were released! Lots and lots to explore in week 2 so I made a quick start this time and completed one sampler last night (these postcard sized pieces are great!)

I started off with fly stitch, the top row is 2 fly stitches on top of each other in variegated stranded cotton with a bead in the middle.

Below that I started making patterns with the fly stitch using thick silk thread, stranded cotton, perle and rayon. There are some bullions in there and beads.

Then I looked at tying the fly stitch down in different ways - bugle beads, bullion knots, french knots, seed beads. Like the little pattern at the end - think I could use this as I like geometric patterns.

I made a cross design using fly stitch and added moss stitch in the gaps. I'd never tried moss stitch before and really liked it so moved onto that. I was really pleased with the little grid of moss stitch on the right hand side - I use silk thread and perle.

I moved on to try moss stitch in stranded cotton and then to do 2 knots going vertically and horizontally - think this would look good with a bead added on top but ran out of space (and my fingers were sore!!!)

Lastly I went back to the fly stitch that I had started with but made this a continuous row - like this a lot!

Well this is only the beginning of week 2's exercises and I am back to work next week, but I would like to try out the woven wheels using various stitches and beads, washers etc.

Online Class - Personal Library of Stitches

I have just started an online class at Joggles called Personal Library of Stitches. It is taught by Sharon B of 'In a minute ago' bloc. I have just finished my sampler for the first week (see below). This lesson was 45 pages long! I spent the first night just reading it! I have decided to work on postcard sized pieces. I am going to punch a hole and put an eyelet in the corner and then thread these on a ring so that I can flip through them easily in the future.
The top four bands are all variations of guilloche stitch which I had never heard of before. Great fun doing this, adding beads and thicker threads.
These are followed by Portuguese stitch which I couldn't really get the hang of. Not sure why I must have read the instructions wrong but it doesn't seem to lie correctly.

Bottom band is using zig zag chain stitch for couching with some french knots added - I like this.

This has taken me a whole evening to do so I'm glad I didn't go for a bigger sampler. The evening has flown by. Plenty more suggestions in the printout to try but not enough time. I'm going to move onto lesson 2 now and come back to this later.

Not sure about the colours I chose. Planned to go with pink and green which I love but the lime cotton is very vivid!

Lesson 1