Happy birthday to me

Do you think my daughter is trying to tell me something?
Three cookbooks for my birthday.





Gg drew this picture on the back of the envelope containing my card.

Not very happy about the being a year older malarky but worth it for all the nice thoughts and the lunch with Brian.


A small side note. My brother asked me how old I was?? I replied that I am four years younger than him, same as always :)

Atc's

ATC's. I like to try out stuff and these are a great way to pretend I am producing something worthwhile when I am really just

playing. The first has a base of pelmet vilene

painted with dyn-a-flo with a tiny bit of sparkle added in. I punched out a circle and rubbed Markal oil stick through the hole, then again just under to make the reflection. Then I tore the paper and rubbed Markal over the torn edge to make the waves. I will probebly stitch a tiny boat on the hoizon line.

For the second one, I scanned the image from a rubber stamp into the pc, enlarged it and printed it onto hand dyed fabric pre soaked in bubble jet set. Then I stitched french knots. So what? you say. I learned how to stitch french knots, that's what! One more stitch learned :)

The third atc is on a base of hand dyed fabric, with a stampers paper (angelwire, I think) and a piece of painted lace. The little heart is made from confetti fabric. The confetti fabric is a favorite of mine, it takes ages to make an A4 sized piece, so I only use tiny amounts.

Shibori/Indigo samples

This is cotton poplin, folded in half lenthways and tied onto a pole diagonally. Then squished and pushed to the top of the pole.

This piece of silk habitai was a folded concertina, lay onto the pipe and tied tightly with string, but not squished. The parts which were nearest to the plastic take up less dye than the more exposed bits.

The traditional larch pattern. I used a stencil placed on the fold of the fabric and then stitched five rows, pulled really tightly.

This circle is my favorite piece. I drew around a bowl

onto fabric then stitched lines from one side to the other,

pulled the stitching tight and tied off.

Four squares, easier than it looks, I used a stencil placed on the folds of the fabric, stitched following the lines.

I realised that one of the most important ingredients of shibori is the thread. It must be reasonable fine so as not to leave holes in the fabric, but really strong so that it doesn't break when pulled really tightly. My most successful samples were stitched using the nylon thread that Jane Callender sells.

Shibori part 2

Dipped and dangling. These are the pieces which we stitched, tied and clamped. Bags of little rocks were tied onto one edge, and lengths of string to the opposite edge. This was so that we could dangle the tied pieces in the vat without having to dunk our hands.

The pieces of silk were dipped twice and the cotton dipped three or four times. The most exciting part of the day was unwrapping the fabric from the poles which had been left to dry overnight. Loads of oohs and ahhs.