Sunflower Duet

'Sunflower Duet' is an acrylic on canvas artwork I completed this week in an art workshop.  I am fairly pleased with this, while still being aware of my naive skills at present.  I enjoyed painting this and used brushes to start and then using a knife to paint with for the first time.  It was tricky and fun all at once!

Green and Co. Scarf

Wow, I've just been introduced to the craft of felting and have made this lovely scarf. In essence it was easy, though time consuming and quite tiring on the arms.


I bought 3 silk scarves from a little shop in Moffat, on the boarders of Scotland, at the end of August this year. I talked to the lady about using them in a feltmaking class and said I would send her a photo of the result, which I did.


If you are interested then read on for the Method...


• I cut 1 square scarf into 4 strips. 2 strips for each makeover.
• Tacked the 2 rough ends lightly together making 1 long scarf.
• Placed the material on some bubblewrap and old towels.
• Using marino wool in matching colours I teased out pieces to lay all along the length top & bottom.
• I then tucked this undernieth and teased out another layer of coloured wool over the top.
• I placed a light layer of wool under and over the join to hide the tacking stiches.
• A length of net curtain over the top.
• The next stage is to sprinkle a generous amount of soapy water or plain water rubber over with a bar of soap.
• Rubbing up a lather and helping the wool to knit with the silk.
• Add more water or soap as requried.
• Then the work is rolled up, with the bubble wrap but not the towel, onto a rolling pin or leg of an old stool!
• A couple of elastic bands to hold it all together.
• Rolling back and forth about 100 times.
• Unroll and check to see how well the wool is attaching to the silk.
• Roll up again and roll back and forth another 100 times!
• By this time arms are aching and have worked up quite a sweat!
• When happy that it is fixing together, unroll and remove the work from the other materials.
• Rinse it out and remove much of the soap.
• Next the fun bit...
• Scrunch it up and through it down onto the towel.
• The wool will shrink and the silk will gather.
• Keep doing this until again you are happy with the shrinkage.
• Leave to dry fairly flat.

Voala!

It took me 2 morning workshops to complete this scarf. I have not made another yet.


Make 2 per day and you could sell them at craft fairs and have muscles like PopEye!



Do you think you would get paid for the labour involved?

I think not! I was great fun though.

Record of Past Profiles 1

This is not my first profile, as I have only just decided to archive inthis way.

I was born 1961 under the star sign of Aries the Ram. I'm married with no children and 5 grandchildren. I trained in Natural Health and ran my own business in complementary medicine for 5 years, giving this up to concentrate on my current job in psychiatry as a Technical Instructor, teaching IT to adults with mental health issues. I am now also responsible for the Art & Crafts Department and am enjoying a renewed interest in all things Arty Farty and Crafty Dafty. I am dyslexic having just recently been assessed, so if you see any errors please comment. I am researching my ancestral past and have visited relatives in Surrey & Sussex and viewed an ancestoral home in October 2007. I have also traced a relative from a different branch of my family and they live in Reading. I contacted them in 2009 and hope to meet up with them some time. I also run a Family Research group at the day centre where I work and one lady has so far been able to link into Royalty! We are confirming this just now 2010.

Cyril the Caterpillar

I got the idea for Cyril the Caterpillar from a magazine, but the owner of the magazine took it with them, so I made it up from the visual memory. 

He's very simple to make.  Just casting on 30 stitches and knitting around 20 rows for each colour.  Each section of his body was done in a different stitch pattern. 

Knitting straight until all eight sections were complete.  I stitched him up like a sausage, only stopping at each change of colour to stuff and pull in to produce the shaping.  I used old buttons for eyes and nose and crocheted on a tonge.  I could have stitched on a smile instead.  However, I like the cheeky look.  I found a load of white dufflecoat toggles and used these for his feet.  He feels good to hold and is quite floppy.  His feet clatter about on hard surfaces.  I have made a few more which have sold on our craft stall.

I do like Cyril, but don't really know what I will do with him.  He is currently crawling along the top and over the edge of my wardrobe, while watching me type this blog right now!

Afghan in Greens

I've been workng on this one for months.  It is made from oddments, some soft but some more corse.  It will make a warm lap blanket over the top of clothes.  Maybe for someone sitting watching TV or going out in a wheelchair?

Unfortunately the photo is a wee blurd.  I may take it again and re-post it.

This one has not turned out as good as I was expecting.  I think the colour coordination is not quite right, or the combinations for each patterned square is not balanced well.

Cutsie Bags 3

I have progressed on to bags with shoulder straps now, and I really like this one.  I love the colour combinations and the button from my collection of old buttons.

This one below, was a bit of a mistake, as I did not do enough chains for the strap, but carried on anyway.  It can be put over the shoulder as a short bag.  So someone may buy it from our stall.

Cutsie Bags 2

This is another selection of my new

Cutsie Bags.

I like this one particularly because of the range of colours. I wanted to do one with Chakra colours like a rainbow.

This one uses a lilac colour which may not show up as well as I would like. I only just had enough wool to finish of the handles.

 All these bags are made either from oddments or other unwanted wools.

Cutsie Bags

I was recently involved in the Barnaby Festival in Macclesfield. My Art & Craft department exhibited some artwork and crafted goods. We were able to sell the crafted items, which brought in some money for the department. While there I saw some lovely knitted and crocheted hand bags. It got me to thinkin' and I came away with some ideas. We had a couple of knitted hats that were made some time ago and had never sold, so I decided to UpCycle them into bags.

I crocheted one from scratch.  I made it in a round shape like a hat then put handles on it. 

I wondered what it would be like if instead of working from a round, I worked from a chain and worked around that.  The result was this one below.  I went on to crochet some more which will be in my next posting.

These I call 'Cutsie Bags'