Postcard for the Embroiderers's Guild Stitching Together Exhibition

Holding the case that contains my postcard

Coming soon is the City of York Embroiderer's Guild Triennial Exhibition "Stitching Together" which will be held at the Tithe Barn, Church Lane, Nether Poppleton, York, YO26 6LF from Friday 22 June to Sunday 24 June 2018.  One of the exhibits is a series of postcards stitched by members which is also a competition.  Each postcard depicts a place and you have to guess where they all are.

 

Calico & pelmet vilene

My contribution is a postcard of a lighthouse that I chose to applique and stitch.  The lighthouse is one I have visited and that I have a photograph of.  (I haven't included the photo here in case it helps anyone guess where it is!)

 

Materials - dyed calico, cotton & yarn

The base of my postcard is calico bonded on to pelmet vilene which I then coloured with Inktense watercolour pencils and blended with a wet brush.  While this was drying I made a pattern for my lighthouse and cut out the various pieces from cotton and dyed calico that had bondaweb ironed onto it.  

Painted background and lighthouse pieces bonded on

Once the painted background had dried I peeled off the bondaweb backing paper and ironed the lighthouse pieces into position and machine stitched them in place.  Next, with a Frixion pen (which irons off) I drew on the extra details I wanted to stitch - the rail at the top of the lighthouse, the windows  and the pattern on the glass.

Lighthouse pieces machine stitched, frixion pen detail still visible

With this element of the machine stitching finished, I chose some yarn for the vegetation, laid it on the postcard and free machined it in position.  
 

Vegetation stitched in position

At this point I thought the background colours needed strengthening so I added some more Inktense colour.  When dry I hand stitched some extra vegetation.

Background recoloured and more vegetation handstitched

Then I machine stitched the front of the postcard to the back with a zigzag stitch.  The back of the postcard was piece of natural calico bonded to pelmet vilene.  Afterwards I printed off a copy of the postcard onto fabric and made a container to keep my postcard safe.  That's me at the top of this post holding the container that my postcard's in.

Finished postcard

Do you know where it is?  If you do, don't tell anyone - come along to our exhibition and enter the postcard competition and guess where they all are! 

The exhibition is open on Friday 22 June & Saturday 23 June from 10am to 5pm and on Sunday 24 June from 10am to 4pm. Entrance £3.  There will be tea & cakes!  Hope to see you there. 

Bloom! - A Floral Festival in York

Paper Flower

I have recently had great fun at a workshop run by Deborah New for York Learning making flowers for the community art flower wall at York Explore (the main York Library for anyone who's wondering).  This is part of the Bloom! festival in York, running from the 5-8 July 2018 and beyond.  The festival is celebrating the 250th anniversary of the Ancient Society of York Florists - who have held an annual horticultural show since 1768 - which is quite an achievement!  There are lots of things botanical going on and you can check them out here. 
 

Flower out of bin liners and pipecleaners

Flower out of old bags

Flower out of plastic bottle, fruit netting & more

 
Here are some of the flowers that were made by other people...

If you want to get involved why not make a flower or several - they could be knitted (if you want some flower patterns check out my blog here and knit them in any bright colour you like!), stitched or how about trying out some recycling or upcycling and invent a flower.  

Melted straw flowers

Since the workshop I've made a few flower heads from melted straws (thanks to Jessica Grady for the technique - watch out for more about Jess in another blogpost!).

So, if you want to get involved your completed flowers have to be with Claire Douglas at the City of York Council West Offices (open 8.30am to 5pm Mon - Fri) by 30 June 2018.  There are also more workshops on Sat 16 June 2018. Contact York 01904 554277 or email Claire at claire.douglas@york.gov.uk for more details.

Go on - make a flower - you know you want to!

Just arrived at The Ropewalk (& don't forget to see the exhibitions!)

Coral & Lava Necklace

Have been over one of my favourite bridges (the Humber Bridge) to make a delivery to The Ropewalk in Barton upon Humber.  I always like going - lovely things to buy in the Craft Gallery, interesting exhibitions, good cafe, great garden with sculptures and you can find out all about the history of rope making at the Barton Ropery in the Ropewalk Museum.  The building has a characteristic ropewalk from its ropemaking days - hence the name!

So I delivered some People & Places brooches and their map pouches... 

People & Places Brooches

and some button brooches and knitted wire birds...

Button brooches

Knitted Wire Birds

some mermaid and femmes fatales brooches...

Femmes Fatales & Mermaid Brooches

 large and small domino brooches...
 

Large Domino Brooches

Small Coloured Domino Brooches

coin brooches... 
 

Coin Brooches

and some fish and bike bags...

Fish Bags - Lino printed

Pink Bike Bag - Screen printed

and the ever popular Liberty print fabric necklaces...

Liberty Print Fabric Necklaces

New this time were some semi-precious necklaces too...

Semi-precious Necklaces

Until 10 June 2018 you can catch the Surfaces exhibition by Pete Moss & Clive Redshaw.  I especially loved Redshaw's tapestries but check out his paintings too.  Pete Moss's ceramics had great depth of colour...

Clive Redshaw - Know It Will Be Soon (tapestry)

Clive Redshaw - Spring Lookout (tapestry)

Pete Moss - Golden Steps (multi-fired ceramic)

Or take a look at George Hainsworth's recent work (fab textures!) on view until 3 June 2018...

 

George Hainsworth - Under Canvas (oil/collage)

 

George Hainsworth - Moon reflection (oil)

And don't forget the sculpture garden...

Ropewalk Sculpture Garden

If you are in the vicinity it's a must see! 

Stitched Postcard Workshop at Olive's Nest, York - May 2018

All set up and ready to go

My second Stitched Postcard Workshop at Olive's Nest took place on Saturday.  After the excitement of the Royal Wedding, we had a very peaceful afternoon stitching...

Lara busy stitching

Vanessa measuring up

Mary-Ann stitching away

Everyone's birds were looking lovely...

Lara's postcard is almost finished

Mary-Ann's lovely bird is progressing nicely

Vanessa's postcard nearly complete

Vanessa finished hers off at home straight away and here's what it looks like all finished...

Vanessa's postcard - all ready to send!

Thanks to everyone for coming and to Gaynor at Olive's Nest for making us welcome.  Take a look at the other workshops available at Olives Nest here.

Spoon Carving with Dave Atkin of Woodwyrm

Woodwyrm Spoons by Dave Atkin

Recently I've been out of my comfort zone but having great fun learning how to carve a spoon with Woodwyrm AKA Dave Atkin.  Dave has been making spoons for several years now.  It all began when his brother showed him how to carve one and he caught the bug. After a few visits to Spoonfest, an annual celebration of spooncarving in Edale, Derbyshire and lots of practice, Dave became quite an expert.  Following lots of interest at York Open Studios 2018, Dave now offers spooncarving taster sessions.  It was at one of these sessions that I had my first go at spooncarving.

More of Dave's lovely spoons on display in his studio in York

First, Dave split a log so I would have a piece of fresh wood to work on...

Dave splits a log

Log ready to start work on

Then using one of Dave's spoons as a template I marked the spoon shape on my piece of wood...

Dave's spoon was used as a template to draw round so I had a shape to work to

Dave demonstrated how to use a couple of different axes and I began to hew out my spoon shape.  Never having used an axe before, I hadn't realised quite how unwieldy I would find it - especially as Dave made it look so easy.

After a bit of axe work my spoon takes shape

Once I had a good shape axed out, Dave showed me how to use a knife to define the shape and make it look more finished...

Dave demonstrates using a knife

I found this part easier to manage than the axe.  Dave stressed that it's very important to take care as the knives are very sharp...

My spoon is definitely becoming more spoon like

A special spooning knife with a curved blade is used for carving out the bowl of the spoon.  With instruction, and some help from Dave, I carved mine out.  And here's my finished spoon which I'm very pleased with...

Once it's dried out in a couple of weeks I can add a bit of oil to it and put it to good use in the kitchen.  (Or I might just display it as my first ever bit of woodcarving!) If you fancy a go too - here are the details...

Thanks for a great afternoon, Dave!

Handmade Notebooks at Olive's Nest, York

Everyone working hard

On Saturday we had a very full house at Olive's Nest for the first Handmade Notebooks Course...

Decorating notebook covers

Everyone had to concentrate to get their 4 different notebooks done - but phew everyone finished!  We were helped along with constant tea & coffee refuelling and fabulous cake supplied by Gaynor who runs Olive's Nest.  (Sorry to say there are no cake pics - it disappeared too quickly!)

Love Hearts also available for refuelling

It was lovely to see everyone's finished notebooks.  And now everyone knows how to make them, I hope there'll be lots more made at home...

A selection of notebooks made

Thanks to Katherine, Hannah, Angela, Gina, Rosemary, Alison & Rimi for coming along, working hard and making it such a fun afternoon. And thanks also to Gaynor & Jem for looking after us so well.

I have another workshop - Stitched Postcards coming up at Olive's Nest on Saturday 19 May 2018 from 2-4.30pm if you fancy joining me.  If that's not for you, check out the other workshops on offer here. And to book a place contact Gaynor at Olive's Nest - email: olivesnestworkshops@gmail.com or call into Olive's Nest at 4, Scarcroft Road, York, YO23 1NB.