i bought myself these as a small reward for getting my new job. i applied for a job that i thought i had no hope of getting and then had an interview and was then offered the job - great enchuffment ensued.
i found the cloudburst earrings at a lovely new shop in high street, thornbury - the curious oyster shoppe full of intriguing things like bags and wallets made of old inner tubes, vintage clothes and quirky jewelry
i was sorting through the most recent photos for the previous post when i found some from a couple of weeks ago when we had dinner with most of my family had dinner to au revoir my sister and her husband. they are now in deepest darkest south america, having a wonderful time but 2 weeks ago they were with us at pizza farro. a proper review post is on our food blog eat our way up high street.
there is a 12 year age difference between me and my little sister - sometimes it shows but mostly it doesn't. we're very close and chat, usually by email, most days. we share a love of grammar and etymology, a profound zero tolerance for ignorance and a passion for all things yarny and textiley, although penny is more yarny than i am and makes the world's best socks. she's also faster and a neater knitter.
here we are chatting and her lovely husband kent and our Mother paying due attention to the conversation. pizza farro has very cool decor and excellent gelato and i'll be very glad when they're home...
this has been a quiet weekend as i spent the second half of last week nursing a sore throat/headache variety of virus. m. le docteur prescribed rest and no talking so i spent a trappist few days until full voice capacity was restored yesterday.
i have done most of the quilting on my second big piece for southern lands batch #2 so i should be able to finish it next weekend. here is the first stage of layering eucalyptus dyed blanket over silk satin and linen. i then did the usual array of chopped up synthetics and organza. this one is much harder to quilt though as there are multiple layers of organza which keep shifting - prompting much tooth-grinding on my part.
i did get to stock up on some lovely japanese rayon thread at embroidery source which is just down the road in fairfield. it is a small aladdin's cave - aisles of shelving towering up to the roof, laden with cones of sheeny rayon in every imaginable colour. i was fairly restrained and limited myself to immediate needs. the lovely man said if i changed my mind about the colours or ended up not liking them i could bring them back for a full refund even 3 or 4 years hence.and i forgot to show these treasures from the grampians. part of the textile festival was a traders' hall and i restricted myself to some treats from spiral dyed. the cockatoo feathers were a gift that i found on my walk to the shops. there were dozens and dozens of cockatoos all shedding feathers lavishly so i didn't think they would mind if i took a few once the southern lands quilts are despatched (by the 18th of april - eek!) i am going to play...
i started writing a post about the cloque workshop i did a couple of weeks ago but seem to have run out of steam.
i have a sore throat and feel rather ill - after dropping w at school this morning i came home and went straight back to bed. i slept all morning but still feel sookily yuck so might hie myself off to me le docteur tomorrow.
that's all - hopefully back with a more vivacious, if not viviparous post shortly
(the photo is a random tree photo - am thinking of turning it into a quilt)
a couple of weeks ago i went to grampians textile at hall's gap and did philomena hali's 2 day workshop in cloque - a technique that permanently changes the structure of cloth using a caustic soda solution. the emphasis was on safety and we all had respirators, a face mask and thick rubber gloves. i did get some minor caustic soda burns on my arms from residue on the rim of the bucket and it's not fun. but the results were amazing - this is one of philomena's samples philomena is an artist from alice springs, whom i met last year and who makes amazing things. here are some of the samples she brought with herapart from cloque, she taught us a number of shibori, smocking and other fabric manipulation techniques and dyeing with procion dyes this was the view from my cabin and this was the welcoming committee i haven't taken any photos of the bits i made but will over the next few days
make a burnt quilt. to celebrate my 400th post here is a quick run throughwith a bonus video of me glamorously burning a quilt at the end :)
step one a fire proofbacking - i usually use wool - either felted jumpers or jackets or in this case, wool blanketing. this has been dyed witheucalytus leaves using india flint's methodthen strew the surface of the base withchopped up bits of synthetic - i use a mixture of polyesterorganza and tulle. i also mix in some small bits of silk, lame, sequin waste, wool and silk fibre and other bits and pieces that won't necessarilymelt but will add depth and texture to the finishedproduct. when you have a thick enough layer then carefully cover the lot with tulle and or organza and pin like mad. if you don't pin enough, especially around the edges, your bits of synthetic will shift and fall out, which is a Bad Thing.
carefully transfer the quilt over tot he sewing machine and free motion quilt your heart out, making sure that you cover the entire surface of the quilt and don't leave large gaps, unless that's part of the design. if there are large expanses of unquiltedness then the synthetic layer will just drop off when you melt it. take the quilted piece OUTSIDE and use a respirator as the burning process can be quite fumeyand it's not worth risking your health to make art. at bets you'll get a headache and at worst, who knows but those fumes are likely to be carcinogenic. so it's worth investing in a good respirator that's designed to fend off chemical fumes.
so appropriately garbed and ventilated, work over the surface of the quilt with a heat gun (you can also use a soldering iron but i find the heat gun much quicker). don't use the sort of thing that takes paint off walls - that will melt your entire piece and possibly set everything on fire - which we don't want. take it slowly and melt things down as much as you want.
and here is the finished product - it measures 149 x 43 cmand here's the film of me in action (note i am in a well ventilated outside laundry, well supervised by the CWA)
i bought myself these as a small reward for getting my new job. i applied for a job that i thought i had no hope of getting and then had an interview and was then offered the job - great enchuffment ensued.
they are now in deepest darkest south america, having a wonderful time but 2 weeks ago they were with us at pizza farro. a proper review post is on our food blog eat our way up high street.
and her lovely husband kent and our Mother paying due attention to the conversation.
pizza farro has very cool decor
and excellent gelato
and i'll be very glad when they're home...
i then did the usual array of chopped up synthetics and organza. this one is much harder to quilt though as there are multiple layers of organza which keep shifting - prompting much tooth-grinding on my part.
and i forgot to show these treasures from the grampians. part of the textile festival was a traders' hall and i restricted myself to some treats from spiral dyed. the cockatoo feathers were a gift that i found on my walk to the shops. there were dozens and dozens of cockatoos all shedding feathers lavishly so i didn't think they would mind if i took a few
once the southern lands quilts are despatched (by the 18th of april - eek!) i am going to play...
i started writing a post about the cloque workshop i did a couple of weeks ago but seem to have run out of steam.
philomena is an artist from alice springs, whom i met last year and who makes amazing things. here are some of the samples she brought with her
apart from cloque, she taught us a number of shibori, smocking and other fabric manipulation techniques and dyeing with procion dyes
this was the view from my cabin
and this was the welcoming committee
i haven't taken any photos of the bits i made but will over the next few days
then strew the surface of the base with chopped up bits of synthetic - i use a mixture of polyester organza and tulle. i also mix in some small bits of silk, lame, sequin waste, wool and silk fibre and other bits and pieces that won't necessarily melt but will add depth and texture to the finished product.
when you have a thick enough layer then carefully cover the lot with tulle and or organza and pin like mad. 
if you don't pin enough, especially around the edges, your bits of synthetic will shift and fall out, which is a Bad Thing.
take the quilted piece OUTSIDE and use a respirator as the burning process can be quite fumey and it's not worth risking your health to make art. at bets you'll get a headache and at worst, who knows but those fumes are likely to be carcinogenic. so it's worth investing in a good respirator that's designed to fend off chemical fumes.
and here's the film of me in action (note i am in a well ventilated outside laundry, well supervised by the CWA)
