Creating more of my own fabric.

This piece of fabric will form another section of my anniversary cloth. I've created it from strips of fabric, lace and a line of hexies that were laid across an embroidery hoop and joined together with pins. I then, using free motion embroidery, joined all of the pieces together and though I did create a couple of holes to be embroidered with buttonhole lace.

I trimmed the piece of fabric into a rough rectangle to fit with the other sections of my cloth (the pieces I cut off will not go to waste, though, I'll use them to create samples). At the bottom of the piece there are two hooks and eyes. These are joining the fabric where there was a gap. Behind the holes and the hooks and eyes have been backed with pink silk. It's not easy to see on the pictures at the moment, they'll show up more once this piece has been damp stretched.

I've started to add further decoration onto the piece using leaves, flowers and beads from the decoration that I wore in my hair on my wedding day. I'll also be adding a bit of embroidery too.

TTFN
Louise

Finished, and new sections of my anniversary cloth

 The first photos is of the four sections I've completed so far. I say completed, but there will be more one them when they're joined together. You don't want boring seams, no do you?

The second photo is linen with broderie anglais and prairie points, there'll also bee writing and an embroidered horseshoe.

The third is created from a piece of my own fabric. There's still a little more embellishment to do on this. 

Which is the same situation with the section in the last two photos. There's going to be lots of french knots on this one!

TTFN
Louise

Jumbled words - a new page in my anniversary journal.

 I've mentioned before that one of the themes in Simply Stitch 4 is hidden words and this is my latest take on it. Using a piece of handmade paper I stenciled on the words you can see in the first two photos. I drew around my hexie template filling the back of the page with hexies to cut out. I drew the hexies on the back because I didn't want the words to be lined up on the hexies as drawing the hexies on the front I'd be more likely to unconsciously line the woods up.

I attached a strip of embroidered Japanese paper on the right and played around with the hexies until I was satisfied with their look. If you hadn't seen what the original piece of writing was you can't really work our what the words were about as the hexies are jumbled up and a proportion of them ended up in the bin.

I haven't decided whether I'm going to keep this page as it is or add anything else as yet. So watch this space!

TTFN
Louise 

Sampling with silk fibres and muslin

Sampling  is a huge part of Simply Stitch 4, trying out new and different techniques and materials. Now I'm not really used to this, making something that isn't going to become part of a finished piece, but I have been trying. 

This first one is made from wrapped threads. It's been created by cutting to slits in muslin on an embroidery ring and removing the horizontal fibres on the piece of muslin in between the two slits (I'll try to remember to take more pictures of the process next time). Next, catching a few of the vertical threads you 'wrap' them by over sewing them on your sewing machine using a zigzag stitch. You can join lines of threads together in the odd place to create any shape you want.

For the next sample I used hand-dyed silk threads. I cut off a section of threads and then took strips of the fibres, which I rolled together with my fingers. Once I had a few strands I laid them over an embroidery hoop and, using blanket stitch, I hand-wrapped the fibres (the fibres would become entagled on the sewing machine). I also added some beads, and again, joined some of the threads to each other. I bound all of the threads at the top and bottom to secure it has one piece.

Both of these samples will end up in my journal.

TTFN
Louise.

Joined together - a new page in my anniversary journal

 

This new page has been created using wallpaper for the background, some vintage lace, card and quite a few hooks and eyes! It follows the theme were researching in Simply Stitch 4 in that there are words behind the closed hooks and eyes. This makes the page more intriguing for you as you wonder what is behind the fastening and meaningful to me as I do know the secret.

I hope to create something similar for my anniversary cloth.

TTFN
Louise

Creating a travel journal

 

We're going on our first holiday for three and a half years at the end of this month. We're going to stay at the Glengarry Castle Hotel, which 16 miles north of Fort William. It's the first time we're going since I started to create journals and scrapbooks so I thought I'd create one for holidays and days out.

I used an old children's book that was falling apart and took out about half of the pages. I covered the covers with brown paper and added various bits of ephemera, stickers and lace.
 
The pages inside the book have also had bits of ephemera, lace and paper. Some pages are fairly blank so pictures, tickets, receipts etc can be added, some pages are for writing on and others are their purely for decoration. I'm leaving the odd illustration in the book uncovered too, so that they can be coloured in if it takes my fancy.

I'll share the journal with you, again, when we're back from our holiday.

TTFN
Louise

My latest additions to Folksy.

As well as making for my anniversary cloth and journal (see previous posts), I have found a bit of time to make, finish and add to my online shop at Folksy (this bit can sometimes take some time!).

A rose-scented sachet.

A cream textile brooch, mounted onto a decorative card.

A collage that I've called 'Love Birds'.

A birthday card made from vintage ephemera.
 

I also have a shop at Crafty Magpie.

TTFN
Louise