Nuno Felting day

Update on the June meeting
To confirm the June meeting will be on Saturday 4th January
It will feature Nuno felting with Mel.


Learn how to create beautiful nuno felted pieces -I will be so happy if my felting looks even a little bit like Mel's sample that she showed us!


The requirements are the same as below but it is on Saturday
hope to see everyone there!
I'm looking forward to it as its my post inspection outing. Hopefully I'll manage to do things right as at the moment I am so tired I'm doing so much wrong, I'm dropping everything or just not hearing things properly. I'm getting on everyone's nerves as I'm so drippy at the moment! Still it will be fun and I'm looking forward to getting back into the textiles!


See you there !
Oh a reminder -please bring with you any items that you made last meeting so that I can take photos for the blog! Thank you!

Meeting June

Nuno felting

Next meeting we have Mel helping us to create some wonderful nuno felted fabric. I am so looking forward to this as I don't felt well. I seem to trying to felt my fibres for ages and they never want to blend together. Others just give it a roll and hey presto instant felt!
So I am really looking forward to learning how to do this as I really love the delicate nature of the fabric created and also how to use the fibres to create such lovely designs.


Mel has sent me a list of materials that we will need so here is it.
I am not sure whether we will be going for the Friday evening (3rd June) or the Saturday all day (4th June). I'll post the date as soon as I know.
But here are the requirements

Nuno Felt - Material List                

Materials

• Fleece/Wool tops
• Fibres -  silk, bamboo, soya, flax, thread, etc
• Fabric - scrim, muslin, organza, silk etc or scarf (not tight weave)

Equipment

• Table cover
• Large towel (to help mop up spills)
• Large piece of voile or net
• Large Jug or bowl to hold water
• Soap (olive oil soap, soap flakes, liquid soap, or washing up liquid)
• Rubber gloves if you don’t like getting your hands wet
• Bubble wrap large enough to hold the fabric you are working on.  A second piece; can be same size or slightly smaller.
• Although not necessary, a long, narrow tube or stick; broom handle diameter to roll bubble wrap around.
• Scrap bubble wrap/small pieces to cut up if you want to
• Scissors to cut bubble wrap
• Plastic bag to carry wet items home

Mel has a selection of fleece


Can't wait to give it a go,
Lesley

Send me your photos!

So sorry I had to miss the last meeting. I have been playing host to wonderful government inspectors in work. It's been a pretty busy time and quite stressful as all such things are no matter how prepared you think you are. But hurrah they are gone now and I hope they are happy. Have to wait a while to find out but hopefully it all went ok. I am now almost back in the land of the living although horrendously tired. I am falling asleep as soon as anything good comes on the television. Not fair - I've missed so many Say Yes to the Dress episodes!


But I know that everyone had a piece of linen to create some wonderful stitchery. I've not seen anyone's work but would love to. If you have finished them or even if you haven't could you bring them to the next meeting or email me a photo so that I can add them to the blog. I will be very jealous of all your lovely creations of course but I would love to put them on here for everyone to see.
I can be more on the ball with the blog now so if there is anything that you want me to add-
any events that you know of that would be useful for the  group to go to
any ideas that we could add to classes (especially as it's coming to the end of our calendar so new ideas will be welcome for next year's programme)
any work that would like to show or ask advice on- any techniques or new books that would be useful for members
 or even
any social events that you would like to invite us to- always available for coffee and biscuits!


Many thanks !
Lesley

Gelli printing

Had a lovely day (once I found the venue- I am so useless with sat nav!) Gelli printing with Sheila.
I've done lots of gelli printing before and I am beginning to get the hang of it now. I have to say that I started with my favourite colour yellow as I think well it can be turned into so many other colours can't it!
But over printing and adding bits and bobs - well I just love the gelli block and I get totally carried away once I start. I think that the acrylics you use can make a difference though as I am going off the acryla range which I find quite plastic like so was much happier with these prints as I used Paper Artsy chalk paints which I really love.


Anyways- we printing loads on paper and fabric and then cut them all up and added them to a larger piece of fabric and sewed them. I didn't finish and still haven't ( I blame school inspectors!) but I really enjoyed it. I like the montage effect of patchworking all the different pieces. I am going to stitch something over the top and going to add more bits to it which I can do now the school inspection is over !


Well here are some photos of what we did.

This one was mine- once I'd placed the different pieces onto the background fabric. I've put some stitching over the top but have to do lots more now. I've also decided to add some other bits that I was doing on something else that wasn't working out. But it's a great background and I made that many prints I could do so many more!

Here is Sheila's

Here are some more pieces- apologies Sheila if some of these are yours too ! I didn't put any names on anything I took, they are all fab though!

Greetings!

Well there were a few of us at the last meeting, so many people feeling poorly. I do hope you feel better soon, this dreadful cold and lots of other bugs seem to be hanging around. Let's hope the sun shines soon and everyone feels much better.
But we did get some stitching and lots of chatting done. It was great to see some of the embellished pieces that we did at the last meeting. They look amazing. I love Angela's idea of creating grades of colours in her design. It sounds beautiful.
I haven't managed to do my one stitch piece yet although I did spend a long time doing a stem stitch on a girl's face so I could use that as my one stitch although it was all a bit even. I have been re-reading Constance Howard's book of stitches and I really want to do something more textural, like we did for our stitch samples. I think it works well when you can layer the stitches and distort or push the formation a bit.
But here are some photos of the evening.
Here is Mel's design- coloured beautifully with the Inktense pastels. She made her design into a wall hanging using an amazing piece of driftwood that she found.

Here is Angela's design - a work in progress. I think that it looks a bit like a dragon and I can't wait to see it all coloured in.

Here is my design, I finished colouring it and I used the Caran d'ache watercolour pencils and water.

Averil also finished her Roll up Roll up design. She also made another one. The dyes (procion) are so vibrant and expressive.

Our next meeting is in May. It's a full day and I am sure that it will be a great day with even more work to display. Please email me any photos that you wish to add !

Many thanks!

painting

I have joined a painting program online called Life Book which is why the button is now on the right. It's a more positive approach to painting and drawing looking at creating ways of enhancing your feelings and making you think about the good things. Plus you get lots of tips and advice on how to use paints and different techniques. So I thought I would post some of the pictures that I've done on here as lots of people on the site put the process they went through on their blogs. I haven't managed to take photos of the processes yet and I'm a bit snowed under with work but I am hoping that I'll be able to soon. I am sure that you could add fabrics or stitching to the pictures and I've learnt a lot about acrylic paints which is new to me. I just tend to paint them on everything but don't really understand much about them. So its been really good. Plus there are a few meditations you can do which help you with creating pictures and inner strength. I love such things as I truly believe in the power being within you.
So here are some of the pictures that I've done, I have followed the tutors and the workshops and really need to develop my own style but I am sure that will come with the more I do and by learning more too.

Meeting 1st April

Don't forget everyone we have a meeting on 1st April in the evening. It's One Stitch Wonder so I'm guessing we need to take some fabric and threads and of course our one stitch!
Will post more details as I get them!
Can't wait to see everyone. The sun is finally shining so hopefully everyone will have had a lovely Easter Weekend.