Bottoms up

At the very start of the year, I had an urge to buy some chicken wire..

I then started to weave it into a sort of chimney shape (supposedly for the ill-fated machine embroidery group project on "chimneys", which has since been allowed to die quietly as nearly all of us ignored it and carried on doing other things ...)

I am pleased to announce that this morning I FINALLY had a bottoming out ceremony for my woven chimney - it had been sitting bottomless on the bookcase for about 6 months.  I even added a bottom to a felted coiled chimney (and that one was started even longer ago, in July last year...)

I quite like them, but the chicken wire chimney is a bit squishy:

The turquoise one is a bit more robust, as the felt overlaps itself and there is a massive length of thick copper wire attached all the way around...that was interesting to sew, I can tell you.  Nearly had an eye out...

Fun.

Why this sudden burst of procrastination-busting finishings off?  I'm exhibiting with the Wednesday Workshop group of the local Embroiderers' Guild branch, and it all kicks off on Thursday.

Losing the thread?  It may be too late...

It's the law

...to have a honey ice-cream

if you ever find yourself in Aberaeron.

Like the Girl and I did on Monday.

It was our first day "out" since arriving here on Friday:

Not least because the car suspension had complained very loudly about being driven down the track to the cottage and we didn't want to push our luck by driving out again until we really needed to:

This is the view from near the top, by the road (I say road, it has grass growing up the middle and the hedgerow threatens to touch both sides of the car...)

And this is approaching half-way towards homemade cakes and an awaiting Mamgu:

Thank heck there is now a cattle-grid and not a closed gate.  That was always fun when arriving in the dark of winter...

Since we returned, well-fed on welsh cakes, maids of honour and apple tart, the Girl has been a bit busy:

We finally dug out the peg loom (lurking in the office for over a year - ahem) and a table mat was born:

And the next day, the Girl sat herself down with her box of bits and whipped up a little improv embroidery:

Seriously jealous. 

And a little bit worried that the Girl has a box of bits already. Scraps of fabric, the odd button, oddments of thread.  Uhoh.

But I did at least create something the day before we went away:

(I'm the blue one, since then I've unbeaded a bit - I had to finish for the photo in a rush).

A lovely workshop with the lovely Jill Flower.  I've wanted to do the flower workshop for AGES and I finally got the chance!  Hooray! 

Shamed and inspired

I've been shamed by Heloise into getting my bottom into gear and making something with my collage paper, instead of "filing" it!  It's a funny old blogging world - I make some paper, someone else is inspired and makes a book, I am then inspired by that someone else being inspired by me and so I make a book...

A little book, with ripped paper pages. 

I wanted to try and stitch onto the collage paper but wasn't sure how to go about it so I had to have a bit of a think (hence the delay, honest guv'). 

In the end I "bondawebbed" some lightweight cotton to the back of the decorated paper (and used greaseproof paper to protect the ironing board from the melty waxy crayons - which didn't melt too much).  I then painted it with acrylic wax to seal, then stuck on some Handel flute music that Mr Gonecycling said I was welcome to cut up because it was too hard to play, then acrylic waxed this too.  Then I stitched down some strips of silk and added some handstitches - and used my new wheeze - I stitch the paper by machine, using a long stitch length and no thread, then handstitch into the holes.  Clever, huh?  Then the stitches are exactly the same size, and I don't have to try and shove a needle through thick paper and bondaweb and cotton.

I also made a set of cards

Actually, I made these before the book.

All are in the shop now.

Show offs

What a creative lot.

On Sunday morning while Mr Gonecycling had gone cycling, the Girl painted her new piggy bank:

and I put the finishing touches to my cake for Gina

then because the Girl had lots and lots of red, yellow and black paint leftover, she painted it onto an offcut of mountboard:

Then Mr Gonecycling came back from having gone cycling and wanted to join in. 

So I gave him some lining paper and old magazines and PVA glue and crayons, and got him doing a Sue Dove.  Which he then cut up (from the reverse) and stuck onto another offcut of mountboard:

He was seriously chuffed, and I was seriously jealous, because all I had managed to do was make a bluey greeny crayony mess with my collage attempt of the day.

Beginner's luck.

I'd like to see him try getting me to write poetry. 

You should see him wince when he proof-reads anything else I write...including reading blog posts over my shoulder.

Edit: I forgot to mention that while Mr Gonecycling and I were arguing over the crayons, the Girl quietly sat and painted some giraffes (or "giffars" as they are known around these parts):

They're pretty good too.

Peat-fired rockets

Three months after signing up for it, I've finally added some things to my etsy shop!

It takes me a while to gear up to this sort of thing....

I've been inspired by the evolution of this strange creature:

and have made some baby ones:

The first unicellular baby is homeless.  It is a bit big.  And I don't know what it could be used for:



But the four keyrings are now in my shop, and will soon be joined by some others - mitosis all over the place!

Mum Norway Goat

What a day.

What a couple of days.

I tried uploading some photos of the living room yesterday.

(I wanted to Photoshop the piano where the bookcase is, and a woodburner where the piano is.  Just to see.  Nothing major planned, only whether we could bung a flue through the middle of the house and out through the roof and have four strong men move the piano across the room).

But Picasa wouldn't let me.

But what it did do was kindly delete

ALL MY FOLDERS

ALL MY LESSON PLANS

ALL MY SCHEMES OF WORK

ALL MY RECIPES

ALL MY PHOTOGRAPHS.

I was quite cross. 

(And yes, it was Picasa that did this.  All my fault for keeping photos in document folders I think).

I've managed to recover a few things, and luckily I'd printed out my teaching plans and also emailed it all to myself so I could save it onto the "downstairs" laptop....

And luckily some of the pictures rescued include precious things such as

my Mother, in Norway, with a goat.

We'd only just recovered from the car coming back from it's annual service with the Teapot Warning Light glowing red hot.  Turned out (after three return trips to the garage) they'd been too keen with the pressure washer and got water in the spark plugs.  We always knew washing the car was a bad idea and only something to be done once a year.  A bit like ironing.

So NOT a good week for technology in this house. 

I'm going to take some time off the computer, teach my ladies how to make nice things, go to the Knitting and Stitching show, and continue trying to make a lightbox so I can take superdoop photos of my wares for my etsy shop...

Back soon!