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A quick hello from Spain where it's hot....and hot and thank goodness for air conditioning at siesta time which for me is stitching time.
A little glimpse for you of the tiny amount of embroidery I have done since I arrived.
A word of warning for you..... I am so in love with this place I may never come home.
The first two images are my holiday essentials....I say that yet there's a big but.....I have never, ever stitched on holiday before. Poor light, wrong chair, no time, too busy doing touristy things. This time might be different. It's a different kind of holiday....we shall see but I make no promises.
Top left corner in the first image and the left hand side of the second image....a pouch I made some time ago which will hold my embroidery whilst I am away. I knew it wasn't possible to have too many pouches, you never know when they will come in handy.
The other images? Randoms from the past week or so. The wool was a gift.....I drooled. It's the pompoms which got me excited, I won't be taking up knitting I will be removing pompoms and using them elsewhere for titivation. It's called ''Jester'' wool and I do believe you can get it here.
OK, can't linger....I have a plane to catch. (still need to pack too and get a few hours sleep)
You can check up on me on my Instagram whilst I'm gone if you like.
Miss you already.....
Two pieces of embroidered cloth, scraps, stitch, overlay, sequins, tassels, small padded cloth beads, bullion loops....
These pieces will find their way into my artist book, the one I am making for myself, the one I hope will be the first of many, my own collection, my own library of artist books.
You can read about the beginnings of this idea and the process here.
In that post I showed you beaded page edges. Today I want to bead page surfaces not just edges. Watch this space.
Overlay...layering fine cloth....the first image today is the piece I cut to form part of the embroidery I showed you yesterday. It's vintage lace with a little machine stitch on the surface and a fine, scrim edge which I created myself. The second image is more stitched scrim, created yesterday afternoon. I have overlaid it onto several finished pieces of embroidery to illustrate the softness it adds to stitched surfaces, the ''veil'' like appearance it takes on.
The new piece of stitched scrim will be used in small stitched pieces for my own artist book, added to whites with stitch, beads, gimp and anything else which might take my fancy...
Yesterday I had a hankering to bead page edges, it's a new addiction and seeing as how pages and page edges come in useful for artists books it's not a waste of time either. I have promised myself the next artist book I make will be for me. In fact I want a whole series of them, six at least.....that's the next 2 years sorted out then lol. With that in mind I gathered a few bits, scraps, soft ''old'' cloth, some machine stitched scrim I created myself and played a little with stitch.
It's not very obvious in these images but the scrim is stitched in a grid like manner and it's use as an overlay had completely passed me by until I rediscovered this piece yesterday so in approximately ten minutes from now I am going to make some more....
Last time you saw this there were two pieces, now there are three. Each piece consists of strips of silk, various silk cloth, silk muslin, silk scrim , silk net, silk habotai and crinkled silk. They are all randomly stitched together in strips before I begin the hand embroidery. I'm planning on taking this on holiday with me to embroider whilst I relax.....not on a beach, on a balcony so don't worry there won't be any sand. Before I go I would like another two pieces to join on here making five in total. I love the weight of the joined pieces, the drape of them and I'm thinking if I don't have much time to stitch I can at least fondle this regularly to get my fix.
My latest finished artist book.....there is a very short video here, a silent movie of me turning pages. The early stages of the next ''artist book'' are happening already, that one will be for me. I'm also making progress with my veil piece......also for me. Self indulgent maybe? Why not...we all need to treat ourselves every once in a while.
The ''artist book'' class where detailed demonstration of the creation of this little book is given is now available as a ''work on your own'' package. You can read more about that here.
Gingham, pink, cross stitch, silk, sequins and bullion knots......sampling for a drawstring bag, a pillow, some toggles and perhaps a few buttons too. This is work which has been completed in the first week of ''studies in stitch''. I am trying very hard to restrain myself and not begin my drawstring bag before I finish sampling....it's hard, I am excited at the prospect of a gingham and silk drawstring bag more than you could imagine, especially one which has such pretty sequins.
By the end of this week two weeks of class will have passed. We are then having a two week break so I can go on holiday before continuing for another ten weeks when I get back. If you want to join us then just take a look here. I will be closing my shop on Tuesday of next week whilst I am away.
Tomorrow I will show you my finished ''artist book''. There will be a very short video and lots of images.
I had a very productive afternoon yesterday. More lace cloth was created, another piece to add to my ''veil cloth'' and more pages were filled in my artist book from class. The book is finished now and as soon as class have seen it I will make you a little video. Meanwhile I have a very short video which I made for Instagram of stitching pages in action....
When you saw this two days ago these were separate pieces.....I couldn't help myself, I had to join them. Piping cord, patterned cloth and hey presto. Joining these has made me anxious to make faster progress with this. It was my intention to create one more surface to take away with me when I go on holiday and embellish as and when I was relaxing as opposed to doing ''touristy'' holiday stuff. Now I want to make another surface and concentrate on that seam before I go away by joining it to these two and then embellish the surface when I am away. That will mean taking a much larger piece away with me as opposed to one small section. I like that idea. I like the thought of having a more substantial piece of this to handle and even if I do minimal embroidery on the surface it will be a pleasure just to look at it every day as opposed to suffering embroidery, cloth and sewing withdrawals which is what usually happens when I am away from home.