vrijdag 28 maart 2014

brother in law

 
My brother in law
(husband's youngest brother)
became sixty last Tuesday
and we celebrate that fact with a party tomorrow.
 
For a little present I made all the preparations
for another "stitch-and-burn" piece
 
by painting the "lutradur" (kind of thick polyester interface)
the "vliesofix" (wonder under) and ironing 
unpainted vliesofix onto the polyester velvet.
 
 
Cut, ironed
and topped up with polyester sheer pieces
 
 
The fun part is the stitching
with  COTTON (!)  thread
...
but
 
DON'T FORGET TO PUT THE PRESSER FOOT DOWN !
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
otherwise, you'll end up with this nasty mess of loops
at the backside
which you have to undo
and start anew
(do you see the amount of thread, I did it móre than once ...)
This happens  because, with this "quilting" presser foot,
I have to put the foot down in some semi down position ...
which I sometimes forget !
 
I did the burning today outside in the sunshine
(it stinks ! thought I didn't burn out a lot,
I did it outside anyway)
 
You can see the "60" here in the design
though it isn't too obvious in the whole piece
 
(I think ...)
 
 
In this picture against the bright sunlight
 
you can clearly see I used the leftover cut out shapes 
of the circles to complement the square design
...
no initial plan, that just happened
*
 
And in that sunny garden
 
 
BLUE  ! 
 
and a bit of brown


woensdag 26 maart 2014

felting exchange

 
I know. I'm a bit late,
but right now my March assignment
for the felting-exchange is finished.
 
I must say it was a funny theme
to make a little felt about ...
"tidy up"
"clear away"
(opruimen)
?
On top of that : I must confess :
I'm a no-good tidy up person !!!
I'm very good at making a mess,
but rather lousy in clearing things away
(ask my dear husband and he totally agrees with me on this)

So I decided to make something with two sides :
one : a mess,
the other : tidied up
 

As you can see (I hope) I started with the tidied-up side
(the mess lies next to it)
 
Then I covered it with white, the next layer was gray,
and on top of that the "mess"
 
Loops and free standing parts on this side
 
"order" on the other side 
 
It wasn't a simple one this time I think,
I hope Anneke likes it.
(I think I like the messy side best  ;-) !) 
Tomorrow it will go in the mail
 
(with some extra precautions to keep the "mess"
nicely standing up, instead of lying flattened out in the envelope)

dinsdag 25 maart 2014

mending a hole

 
There was a hole in a brand new trouser
of little grandson
(someone probably snipped off a thread
and snipped into the fabric as well)
 
Although daughter is a good seamstress herself ...
these kind of things always end up on my plate
 
Then
I had an idea !
The little one likes books,
now he knows there is always someone who will read aloud, and
The Very Hungry Caterpillar
is his favorite of late :
he loves to poke his tiny fingers through all the holes
 
First some interface on the inside
 
my green embroidery floss and a cup of tea
and a sharp needle
.....
 
and this is what I ended up with !
 
(so sorry the little one can't see the caterpillar on his bum ...
or ... I might make the butterfly,
if he gets a hole on his knee)
?
 


woensdag 19 maart 2014

... the quick brown fox ...

 
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
.....
what an amazing sentence this is !
 
And who ever invented it ???
 
I remember when I first saw it
(waaaaaaaaay back in highschool probably)
I could hardly believe
that all the letters of the alphabet
are in such a short sentence !
(ha, check for yourself, if you don't believe me)
 
Here is another brown fox (though not so quick)
still soapy and wet
but nearly finished !
 
Making daughters wet felted cats was so much fun
that I couldn't wait to give it another go 
a fox this time.
(though Gabi's PDF is for cats,
a fox should be made in a similar way)
 
I love foxes
I love the way they walk, love their wit, love their colour.
 
I know : when you have a farm with chickens,
you probably don't love foxes.
It's a predator no doubt,
but lots of other beautiful animals are.
...
 
"The making of the fox" .....  with an interested spectator ...
(ah, the white blob on Bagheera's face was a spec of soap on the lens)
 
It'a a challenge to get two equally large ears !
 
Although I didn't have any black "Bergschafwolle"
the dark gray colour with which I " built" the frame
worked well enough
 
Here he is (or she) rinsed, dried in a towel, shaped again
and waiting till he's totally dry.
 
(Then the last akward job : making the nose mouth and eyes !
with a felting needle this time)
 
 
 


maandag 17 maart 2014

40 !

 
These last weeks I've been busy,
but nothing of that ever appeared here
...
because it was a secret !
 
Today daughter celebrates a special bithday :
 
*  40  *
 
Oh my ... 
yes, that means :
 I've grown forty years older as well,
since that sunny Spring day she was born !
No, the time didn't pass in the blink of an eye,
we've had lots of wonderful times together
 
(and some not so wonderful, but that's life)
 
and she "gave us" also three wonderful grandchildren.
 
These wet (!) felted cats were one of her presents today
They are look-alikes of her own two Birma cats
(that stay at our house at the moment)
 
 
 
 
I made them with a PDF tutorial
I bought from my German blogging-friend Gabi
her felted animals are awesome !!!
 
 
But there was another present.
(I did this before, for two friends : and it was always a big succes !)
 
I had a little heart-shaped book
and asked a lot of family and friends to write / draw
something for her in it.
 
The book started its journey
but very soon I realized it wouldn't be finished in time,
if it was really sent to every person on the list.
...
So I started sending out double pages
to people who lived far away,
and asked them to return the finished page to me,
that helped a lot !
Ha, it was so special to recieve an envelope and open it !
 
But you can't imagine how many people thought
they weren't "creative"  enough ...
but let me tell you :
all the pages were special !!!
 
Then ...
the little book started to loose pages like leaves in autumn
GRRRRRRRRRRR
 
I finally solved the problem by buying a good sketch book
from my art supplies shop
and swithched the pages into that ... saved
pffffffffft !
 
 
 
 
 
 
A random selection of the pages
(so don't believe it when people say they're not creative)
 
Instead of drawing  I did some (thin) stitching
(which I had to hide when daughter payed us
an unexpected visit)
 
The fun part (for me) is
that there are bits and pieces of far-away blogging friends in it
(thank you Jude, Eva, Sus and Heike)
 
It was really a special gift !
I want to deeply thank all those people who participated
to make it a succes
 
!


vrijdag 14 maart 2014

sun .... ? (14 - 3 - 14)

 
Sun or no sun
what a big difference it makes.
 
The last few days were really spring days :
warm sunshine and and new colours in the garden.
 
bluuuuuues !
 
And fresh greens (daslook)
so fresh and green you could eat them ...
and that I did !
Last year I learnead from Lynne of the Textile Treasury blog (UK)
that she found lots of this plant along the road
(I think she called it bear leek)
which tastes like garlic 
She made pesto with it and put it in a salad
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm
 
Today
the morning started gray and rather cold
 
but what a special sight it was
LOTS of spiders had been very busy !
 
 
There even was a magpie
that didn't flew off the minute I took my camera
like aaaall the others did !!!
 
Ha! no wonder : he didn't see me :
I took the picture from the kitchen window,
he was on the other side of the street !
 
 
But there is always a little Rainbow very near 
 
 
;-)