Waiting

My machine went in to the repair shop on Friday so I'm waiting to hear what is wrong. How long it'll be before I have her back is any one's guess they had a whole array of machines waiting to be looked at before mine so there must be a sewing machine virus going round at the moment :)

It's frustrating not to be able to get on with things but in the meantime I'm keeping myself amused with these booksAnd on Saturday I spent a day in London and had a visit to Tate Britain.First time I've ever been. It was an interesting experience and lots of food for thought, but I have to confess that there were a lot of pieces there that I just didn't understand and left me feeling confused. I guess I'm just not intellectual enough to get some of this modern art stuff!! :)

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Let's start with the good shall we?

I went to the Malvern Quilt Show on Friday, lots of fantastic and skilled stitching on display made me want to cry thinking about my lack of skill! I managed to console myself with a bit of retail therapy though and treated myself to this batch of lovely threads.Now for the bad news, and I'm afraid it is BAD. My sewing machine Jemimah has stopped working :( I was merrily stitching away yesterday and the power just went. I've tried the basics, changing the fuse etc but she just won't fire up. The really bad news is there aren't many repair shops round here I've phoned the couple of closest ones and the earliest anyone can take a look at her is on Friday, so I'm out of action for at least a week. That really is cause for crying!!
So that's the good and the bad out of the way, you may be wondering about the ugly. Well that's me I'm sat here typing this in my pjs and I haven't brushed my hair either .... but I'm not showing you a pictures of that! :)

Been Doodling

I haven't much felt like sitting at my sewing machine the last couple of days. Have been feeling a bit restless for one reason and another. But I have spent some time on more work for chapter seven though.Doodling with lines, circles and spirals. It's been fun. Next step is to interpret some of these doodles in stitch.

Stuck but all is not lost

After making a good start with the praries yesterday, I've hit a snag and need to wait for some advice from Janet before I move on. I figured that rather than wait around not doing anything I'd make a start on chapter seven - the first foray in free stitching. I'll be keeping notes on the computer that way I can easily print them out and stick them in the work book when it comes to going back to write up the chapter.I have done some free stitching before, but never with fabric in a hoop. I'm struggling with the hoop thing a bit but I guess it's the same as everything else - takes a bit of practise to get used to it. Anyway I'm quite happy doodling away in stitch. If you need me today you'll find me sat at my machine with a smile :-)

Preparing Prairies

After a day off yesterday I've been hard at it on the machine again today, making a start on the first samples for chapter six.I picked out a range of spicy colours and have been stitching in to a band of calicoIt's nearly done. As soon as it is it will be chopped up and turned in to prairie points. I've never played with prairies before so it should be fun......... I did get to see some ever so cute Prairie Dogs on a trip to a local farm centre yesterday. I know nothing to do with embroidery but surely you've come to expect a bit of randomness from me every once in a while ;-)

Module One Chapter Five Submission of Work

What a palava. I had this post all set up and ready to appear here yesterday and then with all the blogger issues it went and disappeared.. Never mind, photos upload again and hopefully they won't go anywhere this time!




Having never studied colour before this has been an interesting chapter for me. I still have a long long way to go until I can claim to have a good understanding of colour, but this has been a fun an interesting way to start out on that journey.

Thinking about Triangles

While I couldn't progress with the painting yesterday, I did have a little look through the work that will be coming up in chapter six. Working with prairie points, and I'll be making my first resolved piece.

There is a lot of stitching to be done before I need to come up with the idea for my piece but I have lots of things whirling round in my head at the moment. Here are some of the things that are inspiring me right now.

I have some potential ideas inspired by the butterfly and the spider pictures on this page in my sketchbook.Images from the Millennium wall. Prairie Points as rays from the sun or points of a star...?
Prairie Points for the roofs of buildings in a little village scene......?
Prairie points on a 3D model based on a dragon fruit.....?
These are all just mutterings for now. Lots of directions I could go in, some may prove to be entirely unsuitable. Exciting times though :)