Threads, ties, weaving and tapestry

Threads, ties, weaving and tapestry

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Forgive me, this will be a very short post from me this time. Working 12 hour days, leaves no time for anything else….other than much needed sleep….Zzzzzz!

It is also a more thought-provoking post than I would normally write.

Setting the scene….

At the beginning of October, I attended a year-long planned reunion. Ten of us, from near and far, from our class of 25 pupils (we couldn’t track some and, sadly, we have lost a few over the years) met up to celebrate 70. We left the final year of school 51 years ago, and we are all 70 before Christmas. We last met up about ten years ago. The reunion involved a two-night stay in what could have been the absolutely perfect venue for the Traitors (a UK challenge programme with extremely dark, almost sinister, plots and challenges) or ideal for a Dracula play. The house built in 1607 was extremely dark in reality with black Tudor woodwork everywhere, minimal wattage in the bulbs combined with antler ceiling lights, suits of armour, giant dining chairs with almost life size heads at the ends of the wooden arms, to describe just few items….oh, yes, and old creaky floorboards everywhere. We were a little jumpy the first night….it is definitely a venue none of us will forget!

 

01 A dark library guarded by a suit of armour

 

02 One of the dark halls

 

03 Dining room complete with a Jacobean fireplace and large dining chairs that required weight lifting champions to move! It could easily have seated 20 people.

 

04 This chair felt more like a throne

 

Our wonderful organiser gave us a PowerPoint presentation using an old 1969 school photograph (the long entire school type where pupils from each year stood on a different tier) as the starting point. Together we managed to recall names of all the teachers and also managed to name everyone in our year (76) along with many, many anecdotes.

‘Knock and open the hatch before you enter through the door’.

Anyone entering one dark passageway was in for a surprise! It was also on route to my very darkly atmospheric bedroom! Although it looks bright in these photos it was NOT!

05 Surprise

 

06 The back of the ‘surprise’

 

07 My atmospheric bedroom with solid rustic four poster bed.

There was much laughter along the way, along with excellent feasting befitting the Tudor surroundings….however, the ‘70’ balloons we used for decoration and us all singing Happy Birthday ’To Us’ might not have been recognised by any ghosts!

08 Just a simple light lunch and our birthday cake

 

The very long drive back got me thinking about Threads, ties, weaving and tapestry, four extremely significant linked words that apply to most of us. I’m not thinking about the thread we stitch with or the warp and weft or even the wearing of a tie etc, but rather how we relate to each other.

 

I see ‘thread’ as the element, or aspect that unites us. On this site here, we share a love of textiles and are united by fibres of every sort. It is the one continuous thread that links all the posts, however varied, and each of us to the other….which, we as authors, get to appreciate in the comments from our audience.

This leads nicely on to ‘ties’. They bind us together in a common cause or goal. This can be emotional, social, family etc providing connections between people, countries and for many of us the groups to which we belong.

I belong to a few groups covering aspects such as topical discussions, socialising and a textile group. Each challenges me in different ways – keeping abreast of the world around me, remembering how to socialise, (therefore not becoming a recluse as I age), providing learning opportunities and also ensuring I keep my skills honed. You’ve already noted….I’m not a member of any sport group!!!!

‘Weaving’ – We are tied by a common thread, but the weaving is how we jointly move together. The path forward may be simple or skilled and quite complex. We can move as individuals, or as multiples lacing quite complicated patterns, some over many years.

Finally, we all have a ‘Tapestry’ – Most commonly known as our tapestry of life. The intricate combination of the different people we are involved with, or we have met, blended with shared experiences or events to create a unified whole….our life!

Thus far I’m happy to report my tapestry has been richly woven although a few bare patches have undergone some patching along the way!

 

I certainly find it fascinating that these key life words are all textile/fibre related. Do you have interesting thought-provoking words flying around inside your head?

 

Ps….

With our venue described in detail via the phone, my EPH (Ever patient husband) did a great cartoon imagining us as….refined (dare I say it – aged) ladies receiving a guest!

10 Receiving our guest

Pps….

We have all agreed that hence forth….we will meet up every two years!!!

Autumn Leaf wet felted table mat
Autumn Leaves Table Mat, Lavender Bags and Sarah Snowman

Autumn Leaves Table Mat, Lavender Bags and Sarah Snowman

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Annie

Autumn Leaf wet felted table mat

I have discovered that I like making table mats!  They are easy to make, don’t require a mount or framing, and the design can be as simple as a plain colour, a pattern or repeated motif and no composition required.  That means they have a good chance of being completed.

Autumn is my favourite season – the temperature cools, the air is crisp (well sometimes, when it’s not pouring with rain! But I love the rain too so that’s OK!), the leaves are glorious colours, it just feels lower pressure all round than summer to me and has the feeling of “cosy”, and felted housewares can add a layer to that cosy feeling!

Autumn Leaves table mat on wooden table with mirror and houseplant

So this project was born of table mats and autumn leaves.  The leaves were made first and shown in our last blog post (blog post) so this post is to show the finished thing.  I say finished….but some of the bright yellow fibres didn’t felt as well as I would like so I might add some needle felting or stitching, not sure yet.  I think the dyeing process of the bright yellow may have over processed the fibres in some way as they remained a little fluffy but the rest of the yellows felted perfectly well.

Here are a few photos of the making, it was quite simple, a circle of yellow that I pre-felted before adding the leaves, that I later trimmed around the shape of the leaves after it had felted a bit.

Felting in progress

I am really pleased with it.  Originally those leaves were just my samples and I was going to make the real leaves after, but then I decided I liked them just as they were.

I managed one other small autumn project of two lavender bags, although they took weeks – I started the project and then there it sat staring at me for 4 weeks, because I thought I had messed it up.

Lavender Bag Quilting in progress

I haven’t done patchwork before that I can remember, and after I had sewed the first squares together it didn’t look right, so I gave up.  But then…..I looked at it again and realised it was just a seam allowance that was making the design look misplaced.  So I picked it up and had another go and sure enough they turned out OK.  I am very pleased with them.  The smell is divine too!  My neighbour had given me a huge lot of lavender.  Some of it stayed on the stems as decorative bunches  …

Lavender stems in ceramic jug

… and the rest I stripped from the stems and put it in jars that I leave open and shake to release the scent. But I daren’t waste it so I wanted a little project.   I don’t like many smells, but I do love real lavender.

Quilted Lavender Bags with Purple Ribbon Hangers

Lyn

I used some scrap fuzzy yarns to knit Sarah Snowman – a hanging tree decoration.  She’s 18cms (5”) tall, plus the hanging cord.  Of course there had to be felt in there somewhere so the nose was fashioned from Bergschaf wool then needle felted into the knitted, stuffed face.  Her arms are twisted floral wire and the gift she is carrying is made from fancy ribbons.

She is waving hello to you all with her free hand 😊

Knitted Snowman holding a gift

 

 

Creating a new wet felting workshop

Creating a new wet felting workshop

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I’ve recently created and run a new wet felting vase workshop to fundraise for my local community arts centre (the Horsebridge Arts Centre in Whitstable). I’m going to describe here how I planned it and show you the results. 

Previously, I’ve taught wet-felt picture-making (flat felt) and bowl-making (3D felt) but these have been full-day classes (six hours with a lunch break).  To keep the fees down, I decided the new one would be three and a half hours, so I needed to think about what we would make and how to manage the time. 

I decided on a fairly simple wet-felted sleeve, using a rectangular resist, shaped to fit a tall, straight highball glass, on the grounds that a vase would be both useful and attractive. 

I knew there was a degree of risk around the timing. If you’re making a picture or bowl and don’t have quite enough time, at the end of the workshop you will actually have a picture or bowl, it’s just that it would benefit from some more fulling at home. If you’re making a felt sleeve to fit a vase and run out of time, you’ll just take home a glass and a baggy bit of near-felt that is too big to do its job. 

After some deliberation, I decided to give it a go. I bought some inexpensive highball glasses from a local supermarket and made some examples. Firstly, I wanted a few different effects to show people the sort of thing they could make rather than prescribing a particular design. And secondly, I wanted to ensure the process was as quick and streamlined as possible to make best use of the time. 

Example 1 Lavender 

I started with this white background with sprigs of lavender. The lavender pattern was a bit fiddly, so more time consuming, than I’d expected.

Sample 2 colour fade 

Example 2 Colour Fade

A less fiddly design to show how colours blend into each other 

Example 3 – Stone effect

An even more simple design using a variegated dark grey merino topped with a small amount of white merino to give the impression of stone strata

. 

Example 4 – Blended Sea

For this one I had a base layer of blue then hand-carded a mixture of blue and green colours for the second layer, adding small amounts of white silk fibre. 

For the lavender and stone effect samples, it didn’t matter whether the vertical or horizontal layer of wool was laid down first. But for the colour fade it was important to have the vertical layer on top and for the water sample, the horizontal layer needed to be on top. 

I added this point to my notes and used these to write a sheet of instructions for participants to take home as a reminder of what they’d done.

Just before running the workshop, I made one more sample to check how long it took me to make a vase and also to demonstrate the use of wool nepps. I wanted to see if it was possible to make a flower design, without making prefelt, in a maximum of two hours. 

Example 5 – Flowers – showing layout around the resist

Example 5 – Flowers

It was possible (though I think it would have been better to have used prefelt for the flowers) but the layout did take a long time. I’d have to warn participants that if they went for something like this or the lavender they would be unlikely to finish within the class. 

On the day of the workshop I was fully prepped with lots of wool & embellishments and all the necessary equipment in the back of my car. 

I’d heard first thing that some of the town was without water which ratcheted up my stress levels, but didn’t turn out to be a problem. 

And then my car wouldn’t start. 

I was allowing 45 minutes to set up the room. Ideally I’d have liked more but the Horsebridge opens at 9am and the workshop started at 9.30am so I was already pushing the boundaries.

I won’t drag this out (having drawn a blank on a taxi and a lift from a friend I did eventually manage to start the car) but in essence I had 10 minutes to set up the room ….. and two people arrived early. 

This was not a great start for me (I was in a flat spin or as we might say in Yorkshire, a right tizzy) but I managed to calm down and the workshop went well. After unloading the materials I also managed an incredible feat of parallel parking into a tiny space, so it seems adrenaline has many uses!

The table set-up and everyone hard at work

Nine people were booked into the workshop although only seven arrived.  Here’s a view of the workspace set up.  I devised this in the ‘post covid peak’ period when people were allowed to gather but were still maintaining some distance.  Rather than push all the tables together to create one large work area, I’ve kept this table layout as it means I can interact with individuals and their work without leaning in from behind. 

I kept the introduction brief, talked participants though the samples I’d brought, then demonstrated wool layout and how to use silk fibres, nepps and wool yarn as embellishments.  

People were soon able to crack on with their layouts. When the first ones were ready, I demonstrated rubbing to take the wool to prefelt stage.  As they worked, I also introduced tools to assist with rubbing – scrunched bubble wrap, old Tupperware jug lids and plastic printing barens – for those who wanted to try them.

At this point I remembered to take some photos!  I always explain in the introduction how I am likely to use any photographs (eg to include in this blog) and ask for permission. In this workshop there was one child (his mother was also participating) so we were clear there would be no identifiable photos of him.  I also say that even if they have given permission at that stage, they can still opt out at any point in the workshop by just letting me know they don’t want to be included.

Here’s one participant at work. I like how her design is a little like her sweater.

As soon as the first people reached prefelt, I showed participants how to full using pool noodles and bubble wrap. I like to break the demonstration sessions into parts rather than showing everything at once as makes the steps easier to remember and keeps the pace clipping along rather than having one long demonstration session before people can get their hands on the wool.

Here are some shots of work in progress.

In the later stages I also introduced bamboo mats to help speed along the felting process.

And these are the finished vases ready for home. 

Five of the participants with 6 of their vases (one had finished and left before I remembered a group photo)
A lovely blue and yellow striped vase
Notice how this beautiful brightly coloured vase matches the maker’s towel!
Mid and dark blues with a little white cloud: gorgeous
Pretty in blues, which also matches her outfit
This participant fit her lovely felt to her own vase
A very dramatic blue and white seascape
A delicious seascape with beach, sea, sky and clouds
All seven finished vases – I thought they all did a fantastic job

Was timing a problem? Yes.    

I had discussed the timing issue with some felting friends (some fellow-blog writers on this site) before running this workshop. They made excellent suggestions, particularly around limiting colour choices (choosing takes some people a long time). I did intend to follow that advice, honestly, but in the end I couldn’t bring myself to have a small colour range for participants to choose from. Instead I just urged participants to choose quickly, and they did. I love that several people made colour choices that matched their clothing or the towel they had brought.

Fortunately everyone was able to stay a little longer than the scheduled end time to finish their vases. For one person it was an additional 10 minutes, for most it was about half an hour.  If I ran the session again I would add at least half an hour to the class time, possibly an hour as I’d rather people finished early than overrunning.

I always use a simple feedback form at the end of a workshop.  Two main questions: what did you like most about the workshop and what could have been better, plus a box to tick if they’re happy for their feedback to be quoted, for example in advertising future workshops.  There was a lot of positive feedback around being creative, choosing their materials, the small size of the class and the way it was taught.  The only issue raised by a few people in ‘what could have been better’ was the need for a bit of extra time, which I thought was absolutely true.    

What next? I will run another fundraiser early in 2027. All of the workshop fees go to supporting the Horsebridge and I donate my time and materials. Because Whitstable is on the coast, I may run a seascape picture workshop. Some of the coast is North-West facing giving fabulous sunsets so maybe a seascape and sunset will be an option. There was also an appetite among this group to try making a felt bowl so that’s another possibility.

Now it’s November. I have a week in the Fishslab gallery in December, sharing with two friends, and my work will also appear in local makers’ markets at the Horsebridge and Creek Creative (in Faversham) so plenty to keep me busy until the end of the year.

Shopping and Felting, I promise (New picture started & Blue Whale)Part1

Shopping and Felting, I promise (New picture started & Blue Whale)Part1

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Today we will get to felting, but first…There is a new Fiber festival, Ontario East Fibre Fest, in October, south of Ottawa (Canada). Let’s get up early and drive south just past Smith Falls to check it out. I saw ads on Facebook; it looks like there will be a good selection of vendors. Some of whom you may recognise from past shopping opportunities. This looks like fun you might enjoy joining me! Don’t forget to pack your window shopping money and meet us in the driveway by 8 am. Afterwards we can visit the cottage and continue the felting.

Saturday Morning heading to Lombardy:

The drive is just over an hour; it’s one of those places you can’t quite get to in a straight line. If we had more time, we could stop while going through Carlton Place, at the wool growers co-op and look at fleeces, but there may be some at the sale, so let’s keep going. Smith Falls is part of the canal system that runs from Ottawa to Kingston. (The locks were built to help thwart American ideas of trying to liberate us from the British. The Americans were surprised we liked being British and not American.)

map of part of eastern Ontario and close up of Fair grownds at Lombardy1.1) Map of eastern Ontario & map of the event.

Just south of Smithfalls is the town of Lombardy; we are stopping at the Lombardy Fair Grounds. There is a complex of agricultural buildings, lots of parking, and when we arrived, we could see food trucks. We had made good time on the drive, found the handicap parking, and went to start the line to go in. (We are early.)

3 photos of buildings at the Lombardy fair grounds1.2) The buildings

The event was spread over 3 of the buildings (there were a couple more they could expand into, if they had more vendors in the future). It’s a bit of a hike between the 3, but with the walker it was fine. The organisers had a good mix of vendors, with offerings from raw fleece to finished goods and tools. It was not as yarn-heavy as some large fibre festivals have been at lately, but still had a good variety of yarn. Keep an eye out for Toby’s fluorescent yarn; it glows in black light!!! Do you want to knit something for a rave? Let’s have a quick look at some of the things for sale. There is always room for more virtual fibre in your hoard! Luckily real fibre is quite squishy, so there is room for more of that too!!

3photos of things for sale at the Ontario East Fiber festival 6 photos of things for sale at the Eastern Ontrio Fiber festival2.1- 2.2 ) photos from booths

They had asked one of the local sheep shearers to demo on Saturday and a farmer to bring their alpaca on Sunday.

- Setting up for sheering, - sheering of goat, - volinteers to get sheered, - fleeces and sheep after sheering3.1- )sheep shearing (there were also 3 mohair goat volunteers for a haircut. The youngest was having his first haircut and was not impressed!)

They had arranged 2 food trucks, and one little building had Chapman’s ice cream on cones or cups. One of the food trucks was selling food featuring cheese (I found out later they had a fantastic variety of grilled cheese sandwiches, one with pineapple! The other was handmade tacos. I should have gone over to look more closely!!! Next year.

2 photos, - 2 food trucks, Husband with icecreem4.1) ice cream and food trucks

It’s now past 2 pm; if we are going to also get some raking and felting done at the cottage, we probably should head out soon. By the time we got there, Glenn was wiped, and I was busy trying to get a shot of all the cool things I found. So we put off the raking of the pine needles until Sunday morning.

3 photos - new 3D printed combs, New Fiber and handout from event5.1) Jan’s Loot from the Ontario East Fibre Fest

I wound up working on the blue whale after dinner. I can’t find more of the tongue colour I had used. It’s probably in the missing box with my photo reference pictures. So used what I had left and then started to join the top and bottom sections together.

Sunday:

Glenn inspected the progress Sunday morning

building up under-structure of blue whale5.2- Whale on chair in 2 pieces, working on felting down mouth and colouring tongue, Glenn inspecting whale with 2 parts joined

It’s amazing how weather can change over a short space of time. I was inspired by the steam coming off the creek that looked like little figures dancing above the water (looked a bit dangerous dancing on water; you could fall in and get wet).

The water was flat and reflected the trees and fall colours at 7:30 am. After breakfast, it was still calm, and Glenn spent a couple of hours removing the pine needles over the septic field and up the driveway. He made 3 big piles by the edge of the driveway.

 

While he was busy with the pine needles, I started lunch, ginger orange chicken with peppers and onions over rice. During lunch, we noticed odd noises on the metal roof and finally figured out it was pine cones being pelted by the pine trees at the house! This shock was followed by an increasingly gusty wind and the Pine-Snow-Apocalyptics!!! The beautifully raked yard, the driveway and even the previously clean porch were covered in pine needles and stray leaves! As if Sunday morning raking had never happened.

https://youtube.com/shorts/h0QWWmRMf-U?feature=share

5.3) video of snowing pine needles 

pine needles carpeting the deck, thedrive way and a photo of the creek 5.4) Photos of the area around the cottage of the pine needle apocalypses.

pine needles cerownd rectangle where car was parked which is clearly deliniated5.5)Where the car was parked during the event; you can see the per-raking level of needles under the car.

I guess we can try again next week? Oh well, I did get to work on the blue whale; he now looks more whale-like, but his fin-wires are too high. I promise I will lower them.

Monday was the guild meeting, so I was in early to set up the library, do a check of the circulation file and add a few donated books and a new magazine. Then it was time for the meeting, which was on sock knitting machines and was very interesting. I had a selection of the guild’s books on socks from the post-spinning section. (Post-spinning is things you can do with thread or yarn after you have spun it). (I also have a post-weaving section of the guild library, formerly known as sewing.)

OVWSG library display for topic of sock knitting and photo from meeting about sock knitting machines6.1- shots of the meeting/library set up

Tuesday, I have the new mini tower computer back and am trying to get it set up. I lost all my old beloved hardworking programs when the huge tower computer died. No more Windows 2010 and its fabulous artistic photo editing tools!!! No more Publisher supported by Microsoft, so I was going to dump all their products as soon as I lost my old owned copy. I had been pointed to OpenOffice, but the one I found was very clunky and took much longer to write a blog post on. I later found the newer version LeberOpenoffice, it has lots of features and is still getting updates. I wrote the last blog post in that. I didn’t have extra time to investigate it too far, but I did discover it can open Publisher files, so I’m very happy. I had to reinstall PhotoPad, which both Ann and I use, but the new version is more limited and keeps trying to get us to buy the suite. (annoying)

It took most of 2 days to edit the photos for the blog. It is still slower than windows/old photopad was, but I will create a workaround, and it will get faster, I hope.

Glenn was home earlier than he has been in over a month, so we packed up and went to Kanata for the evening. Glenn played another horrible train game for about 3 hours, and I lowered the whales fins/

As you may remember from the smaller humpback whale armature, they have upper and lower armature body parts. For the bigger blue whale, I had moved the fins to the upper armature since they seemed a tiny bit low on the Humpback whale. I realised I had added more to the underside of the upper body than I had anticipated, so as I joined the upper and lower body parts together, the fins seemed a bit high…. drat. Oh well, if I had left them on the lower armature, they would still be too low. I can relocate them down by adding an extra wire. I tried just bending them to a lower their position but that made the fin support too short. I will get that fixed before I make the wet felted skin.

I inserted a 6-gauge wire between the two armatures about where the fins should be. Then cut the trailing end of the fin wire I had mis-located and wound it around the new, much stiffer wire. Once the wire was positioned, it was time to spend a bit of time firming the area between the eye position and the far side of the fin.

adding 6g aluminum wier through whale then using original 12g to wrap around 6g and hold it in place 7.1) Fin Fixing with augmented 6g wire inserted between armatures.

Oh dear, it’s already very long. I will stop here and share the rest next time.

 

A Nuno Felt Workshop.

A Nuno Felt Workshop.

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I’ve had 2 Nunofelt scarf workshops recently. I will tell you more about the last one. Just a small class in a local hall. It is so nice to help  keep these small halls active and this one is a very active one.

The 4 ladies had a lot of fun and so did I.

The scarves were all very different. Here, they are just about to get wet.

Then everyone got to rubbing. Everything is covered with plastic. The thin painter’s kind. They are using the Starburst Tupperware lids for rubbing.

I thought I got a rolling picture, but I don’t seem to have one. So here is what they looked like finished and wet.

I got dry pictures from 3  of the ladies

I am working on being ready for our upcoming Sale and Exhibition, labelling and making soap mostly. I did 2 batches like these. I had very clean hands. I packaged my little spirals (could I call them worlygigs?), but I don’t like the packaging. So, now I am trying to think of a different way to package them.  https://www.facebook.com/events/1756344002068064    https://www.ovwsg.com/sale/vendors/

 

 

Painted Christas Tree
Painting Christmas Cards and a Bit of NYC

Painting Christmas Cards and a Bit of NYC

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Last year around this time, my group and I painted some triangular tree cards to be used for Christmas cards. I didn’t use them but found them recently and decided I would make a few to sell. The tree is easy to create. We used watercolors. Have your card size determined and make a tall triangle out of low stick tape. Then paint the center with green paints. You can stamp or brush or whatever you decide.

Painted Christas Tree

Then you can add details with stamping or black pens or paint pens or gel pens or whatever. I looked at some examples online to give me inspiration.

Painted Christas Tree

These are mostly decorated with acrylic paint and black ink pens.

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The centers can be made however you want them and the decorations can be simple or ornate. Whichever you prefer. I made a variety of styles.

Painted Christas Tree

This one is a combination of acrylic paint and ink.

Painted Christas Tree

I kept this one simple just adding gold acrylic details.

Painted Christas Tree

And the last one. Again, black pen and acrylic stamped on in circles. I haven’t added in wording. Would you add holiday wording or just leave them as is?

I haven’t gotten much fiber art completed (that I can share right now) as we have been traveling and I am working on pieces for a spring exhibition. I will share the exhibition with you after it’s hung, hopefully in March 2027. We did go to New York City again and we found some new (to us) public art. That is one of my favorite things about NYC is the free public art around every corner.

Public art in NYC

A relatively new set of sculptures just outside of Central park on the southeast corner is Dogs by Camille Henrot.

Public art in NYC

It was a circle of dog sculptures and such fun interpretations of various breeds.

Public art in NYC

So now there’s a “dog park” just outside of Central Park!

NYC Subway Mosaic

I also found a few new subway mosaics that I hadn’t seen before.

NYC Subway Mosaic

Such fun to find new ones in our travels through the city.

NYC Subway Mosaic

The details in some of these mosaics is fantastic. I hope you enjoyed seeing a few photos of art in NYC.

Textile Portraits

Textile Portraits

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Earlier this month I went along to a talk I’d seen advertised at the Louth Textile Group. The speaker was Textile Artist Holly Capstick who specialises in mixed media textile portraits and free motion embroidery.

It had been a while since I’d done any fabric projects but I’m a big fan of free motion stitch and so seeing the examples of work on Holly’s website made me want to know more about her techniques.

Holly is a very generous speaker and gave her audience lots of tips and advice on creating textile portraits. We were encouraged to handle the work on show and seeing it at such close quarters really helped us to understand the process of layering which she uses. These are some of the fabulous portraits Holly brought to show us…..

 

Needless to say I drove home that evening feeling very inspired by what I’d seen and keen to have a go myself. Holly was running a workshop the following day but there were limited spaces and I was too late to get booked on it. So the next morning I decided to have a go at home and found this photo of Mark to use as inspiration.

I got the image up on my iPad, cropped it to just show his face and changed it to black and white. 

The next stage was to make a (very) rough outline tracing to ensure the correct positioning of the eyes, nose and mouth. I placed this under my cotton fabric on the light box and traced it using an HB pencil, at the same time adding a little of the shading.

 

Holly works with paint and fabric snippets, built up on a base layer, and tops this off with a sheer silk organza. A search through my fabric stash confirmed what I suspected, I didnt have a fine enough silk organza and my synthetic sheers were all too shiny! In a way I was pleased because I wanted to create a portrait inspired by Hollys work but which looks like my own so I chose to work more simply with a base of cotton fabric, the hair and shadows created using a fine black tulle and black organza for the neck of the jacket.

I was keen to just get on with this so although sampling came to mind I dismissed that thought and got straight on with the stitching. Not the best decision I could have made! About a quarter of the way through I realised the thread I’d chosen was too dark for the wrinkles (wrinkles, what wrinkles said Mark?) so I ended up having to take those out and do them again. The bit I was most concerned about, to the point of dreading it, was stitching his teeth. I think I held my breath all through that bit but fortunately I managed to keep the stitiches where I needed them and his teeth worked out fine.

I’m really pleased with the result, its very different from what Holly was teaching but more true to my style. I did think about adding colour but decided to stick with black and white and maybe try a coloured version next time.

Members of the Louth Textile Group who were at the Portrait Workshop said it was great. Holly not only provides excellent tuition but also a light box and sewing machine for each participant to use which is particulalrly helpful as it saves you lugging your machine about!

These are two of Hollys workshop samples….

And a few of the students work in progress photos….

These are what they created on the day and will finish off at home. I know a couple of the ladies who attended and although their work wasnt finished at this stage their faces are instantly recognisable. I might have a go at doing my own portrait next….. if I can find a light enough thread to make my wrinkles less visible!

 

 

 

What if I ……?

What if I ……?

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Like a cat (and like most of us here) I have had many previous lives. At one stage I worked in finance, I was never really let loose on customers (possibly a good thing for all our sakes). When not fitting out apartments, I was strictly a numbers gal. This was before computers landed on all our desks. When they did, I found them mouth wateringly fascinating (I guess you are beginning to understand why I was best kept in the back office). The first software I had a chance to get my head around was called Symphony. It was one of the first spreadsheet packages the company bought into. I loved it. It had a great function called “What-If”. It’s still around today although Symphony is long gone.

You might now wonder why I am bringing this up. Well, I was bored recently. So I decided to play and to resurrect my own version of the ‘What-If’ function. In short, I had fun. Honestly I don’t do it enough.

So I just kept asking myself ‘what if’ questions, actioning them and seeing the results. I suppose this is the question we all quietly ask ourselves when we play….

Anyway, back to my playtime. What got me started was the question, what if I just doodle a resist? The only limitations I put on this was that I wanted an opening at the top and the bottom. Here is the result:

The resist I used

 

Next, it was decision time, the background colour…. What if I used black merino for this? Would it swallow up all my decorations? Would the whole experiment be a waste of time? So what if it was! Chickening out was not an option!

The last big question I wanted to ask was what if I laid all of the decorative elements against the resist and then laid my background? That’s not really rocket science, is it to felt blindly. But it does add to the loss of control over the piece but also provides an interesting element of surprise when the piece is turned the right side around after the resist is removed (and there’s no going back).

So here is the result of my what if experiment. I will take you through each element briefly to give you, I hope a clearer picture of the game. Each decorative element began with the question ‘What if’ so I won’t bore you with constantly repeating this. Let’s get started:

I laid a thick mix of linen and viscose on the widest opening of the vessel.

shiny viscose and no sheen linen

The reaction was quite interesting. The sheen of the viscose disappeared to a great extent so I suspect what I am looking at is more likely the linen element which was a dull red to start with. Both have adhered well and have produced a nice wavy pattern as they felted into the shrinking black fibre.

Viscose with linen fibres – viscose sheen is drowned out by the linen

I laid down some art yarn that I had purchased from someone who was reducing their stash.  This was in no way guaranteed to work as I don’t feel that person who sold it to me ever experimented with it. Here is what it looks like on the ball. I have absolutely no idea of its composition but I reckoned it was worth a try.

Art Yarn from a stash someone was selling off

 

So I meandered it around two sides of the vessel. I actually love the result! It was caught by the black merino and is firmly embedded but not swallowed. A total win!

art yarn

Next I laid down a thick layer of viscose in two different colours; first the red and then a beautiful shade of purple.

red and purple viscose (purple too close in colour to back merino – swallowed in felting)

The purple was laid over and alongside the red. Because I was working in reverse, I expected that the red would dominate the line with the purple acting as an edging when the vessel was turned right side out. I was hoping that where the viscose laid on top of each other, they might decide to mix a bit. This result was surprising as the purple viscose was swallowed up by the black merino. The red adhered beautifully and kept its sheen so it looks quite different to the fibre mix used at the opening (mentioned earlier).

red and purple viscose

 

 

Next, I used a piece of lightweight silk chiffon that I dyed some years ago and had been foolishly keeping for a ‘special occasion’. I do have to ask myself why I find it so hard to cut into beautiful fabrics (I have too many of these!).

I dyed this silk some years ago (clamped)

 

 

I expected the black to swallow up the silk completely but this didn’t happen (confession: I did give it a light shave to see what would happen). Very pleased with the result here.

Hand dyed nuno

 

 

On a rummage, I found some prefelt I made ions ago, it was time to throw this into the mix.

Remnants of thick red merino and viscose used in raised lines

I had made this red prefelt using viscose as a decorative element so I roughed up the back, cut it into strips and laid it down on the resist. I was able to play with these lines when I was fulling it and create a 3 dimensional surface on the vessel. It was fun twisting and turning these as I worked them. The black fibre migrated through and they now remind me of coils for some reason.

red viscose and merino prefelts felted in and then pinched to create ridges

Turning over to the other side, I played with the notion of a felted ‘shibori’ element. I found some prefelt and made the 3D elements stuffing the prefelt and tying it off. I then roughed up the back. I laid some black merino on top of the prefelt (avoiding the balls) so that the ‘shibori’ would protrude from the vessel background. These were then laid face down on the resist. I did not have the same control when felting as I could not get my hands near the bases of the ‘shibori’ That said, it produced interesting results.

Prefelt – shibori effect

 

My next experiment was to nuno felt some fabric into the vessel but to leave a hole where there was no merino used.

Silk, lace and pencil roving used in window and nuno (purple silk)

I was inspired by something I learned on a course with Jorie Johnson but I used a different process to Jorie’s here.   I decided to double up on the fabric to make the hole a little more interesting I used a purple silk behind a very delicate lace which came from an old mantilla someone donated many years ago. Before laying down the fabric I outlined the future hole with pencil roving, then popped the fabric on top. The purple silk extended way beyond the featured hole and it felted in wonderfully. I love the overall effect.

Purple Nuno, and window (black lace and purple silk)

 

Then I used some very special locks. The donor was a Leicester Longwool sheep aptly named ‘Bright Eyes’. These were sourced from my buddy Leonor who is the creative genius behind Eleanor Shadow (https://eleanorshadow.com/) Be sure to check out her website and all her beautiful hand dyed products.  Here are some of the locks I used.  The colours are gorgeous!

Eleanor Shadow’s beautiful hand dyed locks

 

I thought I would add a little of Bright Eyes to the mix to see how it would react to being totally felted into the vessel. The fibre kept its lustre and happily felted in without being swallowed. I do have to add that I would prefer to see these beautiful locks move freely as a statement on a piece rather than being ‘imprisoned’ in this way. Just glad I only used a few!

Bright Eyes locks felted in close-up

 

Finally, my last experiment involved taking some of the hand dyed silk I had used earlier, I gathered it by hand stitching, I laid it down on the resist so that the hand stitching was uppermost and then added the black merino background. I had no real control as to how this would felt in so I needed to do a bit of pulling to loosen up the fabric once I turned it as the black fibre had come right through all the layers. All a learning experience. Next time I will work with the stitched fabric on top of the fibre as I will be more in control and have less tugging and pulling (and cussing) at the end.

gathered silk then nuno’d

 

All in all, the play was fun. No methodical approach to sampling here, just good fun. And sure don’t we learn when we are having fun!  Here is the final piece:

 

Next: the update on workshops taken. Just one this time, flowers with Diana Nagorna. I supersized one of two of the flowers (just for fun of course) Here are the results.

 

 

Lastly, registration is open for my online course wet felting a spiral. The course will start on 30th October and run through the month of November.     You will have access to step by step videos, a downloadable PDF and, of course yours truly here in the virtual classroom. Please feel free to click on the following link to find out more https://feltingandfiberstudio.com/classes/hanging-felted-spiral/   It will be the last spiral session for 2026 and as I plan to do a bit of travelling next year I am not sure of my scheduling for 2027.

Happy felting (and playing) all!

Helene x

close up of part of jacket and braid closure
Morning Has Broken

Morning Has Broken

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My sister Jean was a very competent spinner and weaver. She started her spinning journey in Wales, to where she was evacuated in WWII. She was staying with my mother’s family in Ogmore Vale, South Wales and in those days everyone walked everywhere. Every time she came across bits of fleece from the local Welsh Mountain ewes attached to fences and brambles, she collected it and taught herself to spindle spin, using a stick and a potato.

Fast forward to the mid 1960s and she was living in Dorset (UK), a teacher, and in her ”spare” time a spinner, with eyes on getting a weaving loom.  She was an active member of the Dorset Guild of Weavers Spinners & Dyers which met in Dorchester, and also belonged to a local group of spinners meeting regularly in a nearby village.

In due time she acquired several looms, including one large floor loom, which was set up in her workshop.

By this time, Jean had prepared and spun fleece from various breeds of sheep, making scarves and “twit” hats (I think they are called “beanies” these days) from Jacob fleeces. She progressed through various types of tops purchased from Wingham Woolwork on several of their visits to the Guild bringing with them vast amounts of their stock.  These were a wonderland of opportunity to see and purchase all sorts of ready prepared and blends of fibres, not easily seen unless you lived in Yorkshire.  In those days fleece and fibre festivals were only a glint in wholesalers’ eyes!  I do remember that she spun and wove sufficient Welsh Black and silk tops into a length of fabric large enough for me to make her a skirt.

Eventually Jean turned to spinning silk tops with the idea of making sufficient fabric for a jacket.

skeins of spun silk - but not showing actual colour of natural silk
Some of the spun silk – I don’t know what’s happened to the colour – most odd

At about that time the idea of using music as a basis for fabric design was circulating amongst the weaving fraternity.  There were articles in the Journal – the magazine produced by the Association of Guilds of Weavers Spinners and Dyers – and also the American magazine Handwoven.  Jean decided that she would design the fabric for the jacket by making a threading draft and subsequently a draw down based on the hymn “Morning is Broken”.

I daresay that these days there will be umpteen video clips on YouTube with step by step instructions on how to do this.  It is a bit complicated to explain unless you’ve got a couple of hours – especially if you haven’t done much in the way of weaving on a loom with a minimum of 4 shafts.  Basically you assign each letter of the alphabet to each shaft in turn, having numbered the shafts 1-4.  The simplest “code” is AEIMQUY = shaft 1; BFINRVZ = shaft 2; CGKOSW = shaft 3; DFILPTX = shaft 4.

Then you translate your phrase or title into numbers accordingly.  However, just to make life more difficult, you can’t have the letters on the same shaft adjacent to each other (don’t ask) so you need to add a different shaft number between them. This gives the threading sequence on the loom for the warp threads.

To see what your phrase will look like when woven, you can draft it out on a piece of graph paper, making what is called a draw down.  This will have on it not just the threading sequence but also the lifting sequence of the shafts when you are actually weaving the fabric.

I don’t have the draw down which Jean made for her fabric, but I do have some which I made when we were playing around with other ideas and making name drafts.

I suppose it must be possible to look at a woven pattern and work out the words the pattern represents.  Perhaps this is one way that textiles may have been used to pass secret messages, though it’s not likely to be a quick way of getting information back to base!

Anyway, Jean designed her draft and draw down for Morning Has Broken and dressed her large floor loom so that the pattern would appear in bands throughout the fabric she wanted to weave.

Once the fabric had been removed from the loom and any loose ends woven in, Jean passed it to a friend who had offered to make up the jacket.  In the meantime, Jean used some of the left over yarn to make some lengths of kumihimo  braid.  From this braid I made some “Monkey Fist” buttons and braided fastenings sewn onto the jacket fronts.  Unfortunately the jacket, not having been lined, did not really hang properly or keep it’s shape. Jean asked me to take it apart and, using habotai silk as a lining, put it together again, which I did and included some hand made shoulder pads.

 

 

Making a weighted blanket.

Making a weighted blanket.

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Weighted blankets may often be helpful for anxiety, and the pressure of this type of  blanket may help to calm, and reduce stress. They can be, and are, used by both adults and children; they can be described as a comforting hug, and used as an aid to restful sleep.

These blankets have also been used to help calm children with a diagnosis of autism or a hyperactive disorder.

Five years ago my nephew and his wife adopted 3 children – siblings  (the youngest would not be born for another two months. They were unable to conceive, and IVF attempts had failed twice. So, they adopted the two siblings, and agreed to adopt the expected baby at birth. An instant family. The children have their challenges, and I was asked to make two weighted blankets for the two older children about 18 months after their adoption. The blankets are really helpful during stressful periods for the children, and they love them!

The third child now needs his own blanket – the older siblings are fed up sharing! I hope this post gives an idea of how I made the blanket – but you may already know how to make one? I did not make any notes first time round unfortunately, Youtube is, as always, a help.

It is most important that the blanket is not too heavy for the child, or adult. They need to be able to move underneath it, and the blanket must never be placed over the child’s head. It is recommended that the weighted blanket should be no more than 10% of the child’s weight, this includes the blanket weight before the beads are inserted. The beads are very small, and can be made from plastic, or micro glass. The glass variety are more expensive. This photo shows the size of the beads in comparison to a few grains of rice.

I used plastic beads for the blankets. The Youtube tutorials describe various methods of blanket making, but skip over the tricky bit of inserting the beads. I had kept a long cardboard tube on which some fabric was rolled, from some years ago. I was so happy to find the tube again. I had used it with the other blankets too. The use of the cardboard tube was definitely a lightbulb moment the first time i made these.

I had the blanket measurements, and the child’s weight, so I just had to calculate the channels and number of pockets needed, so that there would be an even distribution of the pellets all over the blanket. So, a regular quilt, but with two layers of batting, stitched together on three sides, inside out, and then turned the right side out. A further reinforcing line of stitching one inch from the edge removed the need for any binding. I did not use any special fabric, both top and back were repurposed cotton, and actually match the fabric of the first two.

I measured and stitched six channels down the length of the blanket, and measured again to decide on the size of the pockets.

The weighing scales, and small pots for holding the small portion of beads for each pocket were assembled. Once each group of beads was inserted, I made sure that they were shaken down to the bottom, and two rows of stitching to secure those pockets, and repeated this process to complete the blanket. The top edges were turned in, and stitched to secure. I weighed the blanket and I was happy that it was just over 10% of the body weight. A label with the name on completed the look.

Grand daughter No 2 is requesting similar for Christmas……….