Quilt update slowdown

The quilting project has reached the next bus crafting phase. It is a bit of an odd, maybe crazy, way to do things, but I'm knitting the batting for the quilt. How can this make sense? My reasoning goes along these lines:

1. The quilt is a stash busting project.


2. The quilt should be warm, therefore it needs a filling.


3. I don't have any batting in my stash, and I don't want to buy any to add to my stash.


4. There is lots of yarn in my stash, including some bright synthetic stuff. (My mom is sweet and generous, but our tastes don't always coincide.)


5. So using the yarn just for its warmth, not its colour, makes perfect sense.

It will make for a much longer project. There's 10 cm on the needles at the moment, so I suspect it will keep me busy for a while yet. This means I'll rearrange my crafting time at home to focus on making stuff for the craft fair at Victoria Baths. I've never sold stuff before, so it feels like a very big challenge! I will make an effort to not run away and hide.

Under the influence

It was inevitable really, what with seeing so many fabric/fencing combinations, that I would give it a go. This is my newly embroidered balcony:

The fabric is some old medium weight cotton ripped into roughly 2 inch strips (I've been going through my stash to make quilt patches, just like I planned, so imagine me looking smug as I write this). I thought it would be just like cross stitch, but when I tried that it just looked like the wires were wrapped with fabric. Not necessarily bad, but a bit too subtle for what I had in mind. This 'stitch' goes across and over a gap, putting a longer section of the strip as the visible part of the stitch. I'm happy enough with it that I'm planning to do another on the other side of the balcony. The pattern is a bit twee, a bit cheesy, but that's just how I am.

I wonder how it will stand up to the rain?

Things and thinking

There's a nice-stuff-for-the-home shop on Prince's Street (that's in Stockport, in England, for readers not used to my usual geographic references). I can't remember what it's called, but I always glance at its display as I walk by. I do just walk by, as I know my home making skills don't extend to displays of nice stuff. Maybe that's why the similarity between the shop display and my art journal struck me. The signs and nice objects seem similar to the pretty pictures and words that I stick in the journal. Am I trying to make the journal into a nice home? Somewhere safe and relaxing? Just thinking.

I've had some trouble working on these pages. I really like the elements, but just can't seem to get them to work together. But it's reached the point where I can't see any way to improve it, and besides, I'm eager to start on this next set of pages.

I like the yellow and already have some pictures in mind. I nicked an old magazine from the office break room. I'm not sure about the etiquette of taking a magazine someone else has left for the office, but it is over a year old, so everyone has had time to peruse it. I also like the XYZ printed on the page and I'd like to do something with that. And I like how bits of the previous page have leaked onto these pages. When I was a kid I disliked how marker pens forced you to chose only one side of a page in a colouring book. Now I see things differently.

And on a quilt in progress note, I'm working on piecing the top together this weekend!

Let me explain

I've sort of fallen off the internet for a while. The main reason is that I was trying to be too fancy with writing up a good blog post, so I didn't do anything at all. Remember a previous post's complaint about the problems with a stamp I made? Well, though that use didn't work out, I still think it is an interesting way of making a mark, and I wanted to give a better impression of the technique. So I decided to do a proper tutorial post, letting people know how to do it and what the finished result ought to look like. But that would mean writing proper instructions and taking proper photos (maybe when my nails weren't stained green from dying yarn), and using the stamps to decorate something, proper like.

That just didn't happen, possibly because I was properly intimidated. However, because I wanted to write the tutorial, I didn't write any other posts. And because I wanted to use the stamp, I sort of stopped doing other stuff in the art journal. This morning, I decided to just skip the tutorial and get on with doing stuff again. The tutorial may happen someday, but for now I'll just show the art journal pages with a better use of the fabric-plus-plastic-confetti stamp, making the red hearts in the upper corners:


I'm sort of tired of these pages, but they don't feel full enough, so I'm going to spend a bit more time on them. And hopefully just get back into the habit of doing stuff in the art journal just because it's fun.

On the bus, I have finished taking apart the cushion covers and started reading Ways of Seeing.

not so exciting update

I suppose it is fitting in a way, as the second pages at the start of this art journal are sort of boring, that the second pages at this other start are looking a bit boring as well:

I don't get what's wrong. There's exciting stuff: ships, woman with sea shell, clock face jellyfish. But somehow I've put them together in a very boring way. Hmm. Maybe there isn't enough interaction between the different elements. I don't really know what I'm doing, so I'll just keep working on it.

Making a habit of working in the art journal after my daily Wii-Fitting seems to be working fairly well. In fact, I've been thinking about trying to attach a drawing habit to the art journalling. I routinely whine like an adolescent about how I want to draw, but I've never stuck to a plan for improving my drawing skills. I'm not sure how I would combine drawing practice with the art journalling though. Hmm, again.

In quilt related news, I'm still working on unpicking the third pillowcase. I did a bit more while waiting for the Manchester Day Parade, so I feel like I'm still making progress with it.

fabric street art

According to yarnbombing.com, today is International Yarn Bombing Day 2012, and on my way home from the fabric shop I spotted this:

Is decorating fencing with textiles a new street art trend? I ask because I've recently seen this:

And this:
Yes, that is a recent photo, despite the snow. It's from April but in Helsinki, not Manchester.

I don't follow the street art scene, so I'm not sure if this is up-and-coming or ancient history, but it got my attention.

stopping before it's too late

I've decided that this spread is done, because I'm worried that any more work on it would move it from the 'mess' to 'total mess' category:

Looking at it again, it's not bad, and I do still like it, but the additional background colour didn't really work out. I found a plastic dove shape from some wedding confetti and tried using it as a stamped image. What you do is put the plastic shape on a smooth bit of wood, then wrap cloth around it and use it like a rubber stamp. I've done this before and it's worked well, but it was a bit messy this time, probably because I was a bit tired and not concentrating well. Then I tried painting over the stamping, which made things even messier. So, time to move on to this:

I'm actually looking forward to starting on a fresh set of pages, trying out new ideas and using up some of the stuff I've collected. My problem with adding to the stash has been especially bad this weekend. I picked up a bagful of fabric and yarn at the guild meeting yesterday, then made some lovely marbled paper at a workshop at Victoria Baths  today:

Only one of those is mine, but I made 2 more before heading home. Marbling paper is fun, but what am I going to to with it? I have trouble finding space to work in, and stuff just gets lost in piles in my craft area. But I can't bear to get rid of stuff, and I can't resist getting more. Yes, I have a continuing problem.
Note: the workshop was run by Sue Shaw, who can be contacted at Hot Bed Press.