new thread painting

This is a design for a new small thread painting.  I saw the daisies while sitting outside and I thought how I could layer the leaves in different greens.  I am doing a course at Quilt uni (machine embellished surfaces) and imagine my surprise when the first lesson involved a dragonfly, and some FME lace that looked just like this.  I thought about this and decided that the layered leaves and flowers could be FME lace which would give more dimension.

since I have been laid up with a bad back, I have a lot of work to do, don't I lol.

sketchbook

here is my second sketchbook page for opposites.  I am a bit of a cat lover so humour me.

i think the opposites theme is pretty obvious.

Cro-tat doilies

Wow, at last some work to show.  I actually have been doing some crochet most weeks, however have been busy with my fibre art studies.  I made these two doilies a while ago and have just got around to scanning them.

This one is done with 2 ply cotton, and a cro tat hook which is about a size 2 to 2.5 mm.

This one is done with size 20 thread and a size 1 hook which I sanded back to make straight on DH's grinding wheel.  I do have a smaller antique hook, which I intend to use with 40wt, but it too needs a bit of adjustment because the hook sticks out too much for tatting with.
Small cro-tat hooks are hard to come by in australia, but I do remember seeing new tatting shuttles with removable bobbins you can fill on a sewing machine and that did spark my interest as the main reason I tried cro-tat was that I hate winding shuttles. Anyhow I am laid up for a few days, so in -between reading flat on my back, I might be able to fit in a bit of crochet.
Vicki

Lace edging

I have been away for a bit and started back at working today.  I did some work on my sampler for my wallhanging

The black part is the main part of the wallhanging which has several layers of sheers beneath to become visible when I slash the top fabric.  The black will have a variety of stitches and couched threads.  These will continue (as straight stitch) down into the white area which will become machine lace and a fringe.  At present I am sewing this on two layers of water soluble stabilizer.  As you can see, I did not get far. 

A week or so ago, I hurt my back and it has come back to haunt me.  I will probably have to spend a few days flat on my back, which is not conducive to sewing on a machine.  The cats, however, think it's a great idea!  Oh well, i do need to catch up on my reading.  At present I am making my way through The Encyclopedia of Machine Embroidery by Val Holmes and Freestyle Machine Embroidery by Carol Shinn As they are quite large books, both full of really great information, I am sure they will keep me occupied.

vicki

back on track again

After a very busy week with our big "do" on Sunday, I am finally back working, although I have to be away for a few days (thurs/fri).  As You can see from my design wall below, I have a few things on the go-

On the left, is a large raw edge flower which with be thread painted.
In the centre at top is a print of one of my paintings which is on muslin, ready to TP
Below that is a fish, painted on japara, which I will TP to go in a quilt for my fisherman brother
Top right is a needlepoint I am doing by machine TP (of course)
Below that is a poppy TP project by Richard Box from an old needlework magazine
Bottom right is a fabric collage of a rose, which I am making up as I go along, which of course, will be ...thread painted.

This will be a TP of a daisy bush.  It is from an exercise in Alison Holt's book.  I have done it a few times larger, to fit in a particular frame and am still working on the gravel.

This is the first stage of a simple Agapanthus plant which I am working on.  The smaller close up is where I am at with the flowers.

These two are samples of foliage following instructions in Alison Holt's book. In the first one, I sewed diagonal lines, but was not very organised about it, so I did it again (second one)  On reflection, however, I like the first one better as the second one has too much contrast and appears stripy.
So, that is where I am at.
I am also looking around with my camera for a new landscape scene for a large piece as several people were quite interested in my namatjira on the weekend.

Opposites no 1

Well, a week has passed.  It was a very important week, I suppose.  I have been busy helping with our art display and kids workshops for the fire memorial and archive launch on Sunday.  It all went well and now I have finally finished my first opposites page in my sketchbook.

This is my brainstorm, or mind map.  The first idea, which was particularly relevant right now, was fire and water.

I started with a two sided, picasso sort of face and used the yin yang symbol for the eyes.  In the diagonally opposite corners I used  an old fashioned inks pen to write opposite words - one set in red, the other in blue.  Then I painted the fire and water over the top of the diagonally opposite quarters of the face.
Well, that is my first go.  I used watercolour paint on cartridge type paper and ink pens.

Opposites attract

I have been lurking around the sketchbook challenge until I finally decided to join in and today is the new theme of opposites.  I decided to do a wordle of lots of opposite words to use in a collage later on
 
This is a very small picture but you can visit it at wordle here
So far, I have started two sketches and nearly finished one, maybe post tomorrow, with a mind map of my ideas