Space Dyeing Heaven!

When we both had small children, my friend Moira and I used to set aside a day every year when we would find all the white cotton and silk fabrics  and threads and braids that we had stashed and we would spend a heavenly day space dyeing them into luscious colours. We used to buy neutral coloured things to keep for dyeing days. So if we ever saw silk velvet or linen threads or great cotton sewing yarns we would add them to our stash and keep them ready!


There is nothing quite as unpredictably exciting as throwing  dyes onto a pile of all kinds of threads and seeing them do their magic.  


Life has got so busy that we haven't done this for about 3 years but on Friday we finally both managed to find half  a day when we could  have one of our special sessions and we both had a really great time.


So here is how we started:  Two of the trays of undyed stash...

You can see that I dyed some things that were beautifully textured  but not exciting in colour at all!

This next photo is of the threads with the dyes spaced at intervals for the colours to merge together for a red based batch. And one of the green batch  merged in the dye bath.


Would you like to see the results??

There are crochet doileys, silk velvet, cotton scrim, Broderie Anglaise cotton, and some cotton braid.

These are the silk and cotton threads. The colours are so much brighter in real life and the sheen on the silks is wonderful..

Aren't they wonderful? I love the way the true colours are only really visible when they are dry and then you can see the colours blended through the fabrics and cotton and silk threads.


This is the perfect way to spend a day when you have lost your creative mojo or when you just need to be inspired with colour. I can't wait to sew with these and use them in stitch projects, fabric books and with felt...... I may spend quite a while just stroking them though! Heavenly!

Nuts for Needle Felting

I had a lovely time needle felting last weekend. I thought I needed some more samples to show how easy it is to achieve really fine detail with just a felting needle and some wool fibres in scrummy colours. Once I started I couldn't stop! I only did 2D ones because they have to fit in my class sample book. Here are the results of a day avoiding housework and other serious duties. 

Handmade Felt on a Summers Day

Now that it looks like the weather has finally got its act together I thought I would show you a picture of my Summer Meadow. 


If you look closely you can see that it has all kinds of gorgeous stuff in there. Different kinds of wool, silk fibres, hand dyed cotton muslin, and stitch.

The stitching, which is the final stage when you are making a panel like this, really adds so much detail and dimension to handmade felt that it doesn't feel quite finished to me till I have done some. But then I am a stitchy kind of a girl I suppose. 

On the Fabulous Felt Course we have a session on stitching and embellishing our felt with beading and ribbons and lovely stuff like that. Hand stitching is easy to learn and is such a nice way to pass the time!

Stitch and Cake!

Tonight I celebrated my Birthday with my truly gorgeous friends at our Stitch and Bitch group. 


I think I must talk a lot about all the things I love in my life and they must be very good listeners because I got the most wonderful presents. And the most beautiful and delicious cake! Don't you think that friends are the most wonderful precious people? 

Thank you girls for the best evening. Here is a photo of my cake! It tasted as good as it looked.

Yet more!

Oh, I forgot to show you the Handmade Felt ones! These were for a 'Felted and Embellished with Beads' internet swap. I got some gorgeous ones back!

More ATCs

I have been looking through my zillions of ATCs.I wanted  to find some to show a very small selection of the different kinds of materials that can be used to make these addictive  little things. Below, starting from the top, opening and closing ones, fabric arches with lace that have opening doors, metal that has been embossed and coloured, knitting and crochet, fabric and card with mini tools, embossed hand made paper, recycled jeans, a mini fabric quilt, and sewing with tiny buttons. 
So....anything goes. Let your imagination lead you and play with tiny pieces of art that measure just 2.5"x3.5".

I'm Felting too!

These photos show the original drawing that I did in my sketch book and the beginnings of the  felt picture which is inspired by my drawing.