In which I shade a fox

So, the next step in my foxy embroidery is to decide what's what.  The fox in the background is going to be done in silk shading, and the front fox will be in metallic silver thread.  I'm going to work on the back fox first - the cunning mate. 

I looked at pictures of foxes (and Tessy cat) to get a feel of the direction of fur, and marked that on my fox drawing.  I've been using my Bamboo tablet for this - I find it's easier to work on my computer (I use GIMP for working on images) because I can just erase lines easily, and resize things quickly.  Again, looking at pictures of foxes, I coloured the fur in with six different colours, to show roughly where my silk shading will change colour.

The next stop is to go to one of my craft suppliers in town and have a look at colours of embroidery cotton to use.  I've got a dark blue shiny fabric I want to use as the background (it's the one I used for the shadows in my stalagtites piece), and I'll take that along to hold up to embroidery cottons.  I want the cunning fox to be sandy-silvery - not as sandy as a real fox, but not as silver as the fox in front.

In which there are foxes

I’m starting a new embroidery project.  For Christmas/ my birthday (no I am not the baby Jesus, it’s just these two events happen very close to each other) I got the RSN’s book on Silk Shading and A Beginner's Guide to Goldwork by Ruth Chamberlain. So, I want to do a project that combines silk shading and goldwork.  And I want to do my own design, because I get bored working to other people's designs.  I'm nothing if not overambitious. 

I also got Biophilia by Bjork for my birthday - my fave song on this is Cosmogony where Bjorkles sings about creation myths.  I loved the lyrics:

"And they say back then our universe was an empty sea
Until a silver fox and her cunning mate
began to sing a song that became the world we know."

It reminded me of Fennec Fox (Dog Star) a paper and stitch sculpture by Anne Lemanski, which I saw in Fibrearts Magazine.  

So - the plan - to make an embroidery piece with silk shading and goldwork based on Bjork's silver fox and her cunning mate.  I've been doodling foxes - especially fennec foxes - and come up with a basic pattern.  Watch this space for more in the design process!

In which there is a weekend

I didn't do much crafty stuff this weekend - in fact, I decided to pull the plug on a project.  Last year a friend gave me a fleece which I could card and spin, and then make into something.  I had visions of going from sheep to shoulders and knitting myself a cardi or jumper.

The fleece was from a Balwen sheep - they're little, brown, badgery Welsh sheep.  I looked a pics of Balwens on the internet and got excited.  When it arrived before Christmas, the fleece was very messy - this little sheep obviously loved rolling in hedges - the fleece was full of thorns and sticks.

So I cut off the poopy bits, washed it in Tan Tech scour, dried it.  Picked out as many twigs and grass seeds as I could.  It was still very messy with seeds and lots of dandruff.  I tried handcarding it and they didn't come out.  Boo!

So this weekend I borrowed Fiona from Grace and Jacob's drum carder, and tried it in the drum carder.  I carded the same batt several times, and it still looked messy and full of what my family calls gruck.  So I've reluctantly decided to abandon this project - there's no point spinning wool that I don't want to use.

But I did have a play with a rubber this weekend and carve myself a little stamp of a needle and thread - here it is.

In which I reflect

Welp, I’ve finished the Textiles 1 course with the OCA.  At the beginning of the course, I wrote:

“I'm taking this course primarily for my own enjoyment and growth.  I love the creative crafting that I do, but I've felt recently that I'd like to push myself more.  I have a lot of passion but little formal knowledge!  So I'd like to gain skills, and put 'tools in my toolbox' to help with my artistic expression.  I want to stretch myself, and surprise myself with what I produce!  Like a lot of people who weren't good at art at school, I have a bit of a fear of drawing and painting, so I'm looking forward to pushing myself to use these methods to help with my textiles.

“As I work full time, I'll be studying for the course in my spare time - evenings and weekends.  If this course goes well, and I'm able to balance it with my work, I'm quite keen to go further with the OCA.  I'd like to do the level 2 textiles, and maybe some courses on printing and drawing - who knows, it might end up as a BA!

“I love church textiles, and I've made a few stoles for a friend who was being made a Deacon in the church.  That's something I'm keen to develop, and combine the church's liturgical images and traditions with Christian symbolism and my own imagination.  I'm hoping to focus on this in one of the projects.”

A year later I can say I’ve enjoyed the course and I feel I’ve grown as an artist and crafter.  I am delighted with the range of techniques I’ve learned on the course, which I hoped I would learn.  What I didn’t expect the course to do is help me grow as an artist and designer.  I’m keen to carry on with more OCA courses.  I loved the printing part of the textiles course, and I’m going to do the Printmaking 1 course next.  I then hope to do the Drawing 1 course, and when that’s complete, move on to Textiles 2.

I did indeed use my faith in the artistic progress, and what I have learned has helped me express my faith in other ways.  I find creating can be a meditative, prayerful experience. What I didn’t expect was how much I remembered the string making I used to do as a teenager in the archaeology project I was part of.  I loved making the plaits and braids, and realised I love the ancient roots of these crafts.

I’m reading "Textiles of the Arts and Crafts Movement" by Linda Parry at the moment, and it’s helping me clarify thoughts that have developed over this course.  Reading about the importance of both artists and makers in the Arts and Crafts movement has shown me how both these elements are important in my work.  I love being the imaginative artist, but I also love the craft in producing the items.  I’d love to make more of the basic elements – spinning my own wool, or weaving my own cloth, but using them for my own artistic expression.

I started this course feeling like someone who dabbled in crafting.  After finishing this course, I feel like an artist and a crafter.  The frustrating bit is that the more I see of others’ work and see the potential in the methods I’ve learned, the more frustrated I become with some of my work!

In which I embroider a burning bush

I love embroidery and back in the summer I wanted to create something that allowed me to practice different embroidery stitches.  I didn’t want to just do a sampler of different stitches (I can get a bit bored with other people’s patterns) so I decided to design a piece.  I’d been doodling trees or bushes at a church training day where they mentioned the burning bush, so I decided to use that as a motif.

I looked through my Good Housekeeping embroidery book (don't laugh - it has really clear pictures!) for stitches that I thought would suit the design – I needed stitches to make up the trunk and foliage of the bush, and the flames could allow me to try other filling stitches – ones that filled a space rather than creating a line.

I decided to try my hand at long and short stitch, stem stitch, coral stitch, French knot, bullion stitch, satin stitch and chain stitch.  I mapped out where I would use these on a little diagram, and painted a sketch of the bush to think about colours.  I matched these colours with embroidery cotton.  I made a template for the bush, traced it onto my black fabric, and started to stitch.

I started with the trunk, and tried my hand at long and short stitch, based on the pictures in the embroidery book I had. However, I got the RSN’s Silk Shading book for Christmas, and I’ve since realised I did the long and short stitch in this embroidery incorrectly!  Oh well.  I outlined the trunk with stem stitch and coral stitch, and embroidered French knots and bullion knots as the foliage for the bush.

I played around with different stitches for the flames, and when I’d finished them, the design still seemed incomplete. So I added the text “You are on holy ground” using a Rustic Roman alphabet from Graham Leslie McCallum’s “4000 Alphabets and Letter Motifs”.






I think it’s still not quite finished – I want to tidy up some of the flames and perhaps add a border to it.  I’ll either frame it or back it and turn it into a wall hanging, and I might give it to Holy Rood House, a retreat house in Thirsk where I sometimes stay – being there always feels like being on holy ground. 

Finished textiles piece!

I've finished the final project for my Textiles 1 course for the OCA, in which I had to design and create a textile piece.  I chose to design a piece based on stalagtites in Cheddar caves, and here it is!

It's sitting on a white towel here to show it up - the bottom bits dangle loose.  It's a wall hanging, hence the loops at the top.  The purple/silver fabric is from a 1920s dress, and I used the reverse side, so the purple thread is most prominent, and you just see a hint of silver thread.  I machine embroidered over this with variagated pinky thread to give more colour and texture.  I soaked it in a solution of PVA glue, moulded it over some bottle tops to get the bumpy bits at the top, and reinforced this with thread once it was dry.

This is hand appliqued onto the blue fabric, with darker blue fabric also hand appliqued to hint at shadows.  I machine embroidered the edge of the hanging with silver thread to mirror the pattern on the purple fabric.

Overall, I'm pleased how the textures and design worked, I'm just not 100% satisfied with the colours...

In which I inject a cat

We went to the vet yesterday, and I was taught how to inject a cat.  You pinch the scruff, insert the needle, drop the scruff and squirt in the insulin.  And hope the cat doesn't squirm around. 

In fact, I've been more alarmed by this than Tess - I've given her two injections so far, and she wasn't bothered by them.  In fact, she's more annoyed/ disrupted by our ear cleaning session.  So Tess was fine, but I almost fainted after the first injection.  I'd never have been a good vet!