A happy morning

This morning I took my time for stitching instead of reading my newspaper completely - seemed to be more joyful anyway. Again I got carried away with my ideas - what a wonderful embellished year this will be :-)
Here's the result of some happy hours - all buttonhole stitches except that first attempt on drizzle stitch. My good doggies were patiently waiting.

A little crazy

For a long time I wanted to make a crazy quilt but for many reasons I never got around to it. Since my sewing space or projected studio :-(( still is under construction but I had to use my creativity somewhere I started sewing small crazy blocks (needing just the space for my sewing machine and cutter and mat) and embellishing them. It probably will end in some weird crazy quilt but in the meantime I do enjoy what I do.
Thanks to TAST 2012 I'll hopefully have additional 52 blocks to add by the end of this year!

The center blocks of my quilt - all I do now is work around it :-) and having a lot of fun!!

Little escapes

After signing up for TAST 2012 I decided to spend some time doing just what came to my mind. First thing was a Christmas heart for someone who had some complaints about me not showing my feelings :-) so I created something that does show without words and this was much fun to do.

Then I stumbled over that link at Sharon Boggon's Pin Tangle : http://italian-needlework.blogspot.com/2011/12/aemilia-ars-needle-lace-freebies.html, got me the two books "Fiori" and "Bordi" for a birthday present and even the  wonderful "Un bordo aemilia ars". Got started right away with the little flower motive of "Bordi". The result is way from being highly perfect lace but something that gave me a lot of satisfaction while doing it (including the thought that I should have begun with this when my sight was better than today....) and I like the outcome. Little doggie did too, I could save it in the last moment from being torn.

:

Getting courageous I try a flower now in deep purple!

Back after quite a while

 It's been a long, long time since my last post - somehow life got into the way. There are some small things I did in the meantime plus a crazy quilting project in progress. A small case for my navi (why not? :-)) is done and my next door neighbour ordered a case for her daughter's cellphone as a birthday present. Both are very much free-style and were a lot of fun to do and I'm quite satisfied with the outcome. (One day I'll figure out how I get these pictures in the line I want!!)

The little case for the cellphone       

                                                                                                  

 And here's the navi case:

front - closed

back and open front

 

Creative again

This little lady is not finished yet and not really dressed up (the answer is: yes, I always had this nose :-)

She is needle felted and as this is my second attempt on it I like the outcome.
This is a really astonishing and fascinating technique!
But I had to decide between working in my garden and stop the weed from taking over or continue with felting so I did take the garden option when the rain  finally decided to stop.
Inbetween I tried that triangle biscornue but that's something I'll have to think about for a while. There was a link for a tutorial of a 15 sided biscornue on Sharon Boggon's site Pintangle so I thought this would be the right thing to train my fingers and I finished it today.
I love to embroider but I'm not the regular stitching type :-) So I did 15 small crazy quilt blocks and put them together with all the stitches I could think of at the moment. When I showed it to my nextdoor neighbour (she's always very excited about the new things I did create) she said what I had in mind without putting it in exact words: there is so much to look at! You turn it over and there's something different and another twist and you discover some tiny details - like going for a stroll.
Maybe even pillows could be made this way - using quilt blocks and sewing them together - the same thing only larger. I'll try that some day.

Now I know why funerals are so important - they give you the chance to bring something to an end that isn't over without. It's the "moment in time" that is the place for tears, memories, maybe fury (why this one had to go) and you can let it off and leave it there. Of course you take sadness with you but something is finished and the scar starts healing - slowly. I also noticed that it is very relieving to let go, to cry and not to hold onto yourself because it's the right thing to do in the right place at the right time.

Here comes the 15 sided biscornue:

the only thing I'm doubting are the red buttons - size and colour. But those were the only ones I could find at the moment and it will be no problem to replace them if I run over "the perfect one".

Mourning and Biscornues

It took me quite a while to get on safe ground after my friend Erika died on April 29. In some aspect this left me falling into pieces even it always was in the back of my head that there was this possibility. After it happened I seemed to circle around my personal loss - repeating lots of feelings I had eight years ago when my husband died - especially being the one who is left over. And (which is the difference to those days) I'm not in charge of anything to do, just assist the funeral tomorrow. So maybe this is one of the reasons I didn't even try to keep myself together and almost drowned in sadness - assisted by a weather someone called "winter, very poorly painted pink" because actually it's spring and supposed to be warm and sunny and flowery all over the place.
So I had lots of time to spend and happened to stumble over the word "biscornu"
which I never heard before. Searching the internet I did find out and here's my very personal result. The first one is made of two embroidered crazy quilt blocks, the second one two pieces of embroidered fabric. Making this one I tried to do a piece of raised lace (the star in the middle) and felt adventurous again. It looks pretty coarse compared to those fine white elegant samples of real lace since I used No. 5 pearl cotton but I do love it. Another "first time"!

Now then - there's some unexpected sun outside so I better get going. But one of these days I'll try to find out if a bicornue can be done with an evensided triangle. Enjoy your day!

Metamorphosis

Today I went shopping with my friend Barbara and her daughter at a small art and pottery fair nearby (same procedure as every year, yes) and we found someone who made very interesting jewellery out of old silver cutlery – rings, bracelets or pendants. I was so fascinated that I decided to skip the felted hat and go for a ring and a bracelet. The ring used to be a spoon and the bracelet a fork with two prongs. So pretty in my eyes!!! And a lot to think about where the old life of both took place!