little girl, little girl... where have you been?

 i've been to london...

london from primrose hill

 my favourite city in all the world

{not that i've been to very many but even if i had i know i would love london best}

i've had trouble transferring photos from ipad to my laptop - i think it will be a long slow go but for now i have a few from the very first days of my time in the uk

in advance of the embroidery workshop with karen ruane on saturday april 1st, three of us went on a little shopping expedition of all things creative in a few of london's most charming of shops

we started at shepherd's bookbinders...

shepherd's

walls and drawers and tables full of amazing papers

i practiced a lot of restraint here, and the khadi paper on the table in the image above being the most foolish of all - i bought just two sheets of it, wishing now i had bought twenty...

shepherd's

one of the most beautifully presented shops i've ever been in, chock-a-block full of inspiration, i came away with a few new tools and supplies which will hopefully help me to improve my book-binding skills and a few lovely sheets of paper to inspire

more shepherd's!

 we wandered through a vintage button shop, a specialty ribbon and trim store, "the cloth house" on berwick street, lace stores and several silk shops in soho

the cloth house

 the windows of the cloth house were entrancing with the little textiles strung across them on  clotheslines

the cloth house

new cloth, old cloth, new buttons, old buttons... lace

i had a budget and i stuck to it though goodness knows how

 

the cloth house

inspiration at every corner, in every shop, and the kindest people

the best day

that is, until the next day...

saturday was my embroidery class with karen ruane

nine of us gathered in a lovely space in covent garden for a day of stitching, tea, cake and chatter

i'd been waiting for that day for months; the chance to meet karen, see her amazing work in person, meet people i had come to know a little during our online courses - just be there

below is what i worked on during that most wonderful day

my project

 karen made workshop packs for us filled with several surfaces to stitch, tear, stitch, and tear some more

workshop kit

 she gave us graph papers and bits of lace and trims to play with as well

workshop kit

 the metallic lace in my work was a gift from sue, shopping tour guide extraordinaire

i don't have much to show for six hours of stitching but i have a very good reason that - tea, cake, chat, tea, cake chat... look through karen's ledgers, stitch a little and then tea and cake again

we called it the "london cake day"

 

i've pulled this out a few times since coming home, thinking i should work on it some more - today i decided it will stay as it is and i'll be able to look at it always and say "i made this in london"

latest work

hard to believe it's already a month since we left - the only consolation then is that it's one month less until i get to back again...

worth the wait

an old expression that - "worth the wait"

 to do with anticipation, just rewards, fulfilled longing... many reasons for it i suppose

today i have a few of my own...

saturday at 1:00 o'clock i finished sewing the final border on the christmas quilt

you can't imagine the relief i felt - what a long haul that was

i started that quilt back on march 11 - that's how long i'd been working on my last list of five things, and it took such a long time to get through

so many times, especially during the final week, my mind kept wandering to the next list... i even tempted myself a little, thinking perhaps i could begin the process of listing and choosing even though there was still a border or two 

but i didn't do it

there was a sweet feeling of truth in the wait, knowing that when i finally did sit down to do it it would be because i was free to, free to dream and plan, free to choose

one thing i'd been yearning to tinker with was a log cabin runner using both silks and cottons - no measuring, just random cuts  of random widths at even more random angles

it was the first on the list of twenty-five and the first chosen for the final five

i wrote it down as a runner but half-way through the first block i wanted it to be a bed quilt

i don't know if that's at all possible - i have plenty of the cotton fabrics, but many of the silks came in a small silk bundle from delectable mountain cloth and i have very limited amounts - we shall see

i gathered together all my bits and pieces ranging from grey to beige to deep chocolate brown, and then a little minty green

beautifully patterned silks

two are antique kimono silks from the "in the beginning" quilt shop in seattle {long since closed}

- they were bought for me by a friend from the yukon and i have been hoarding them for many, many years now, waiting for the right thing - they are absolutely perfect for this project - a light beige tweedy plaid and a deep, dark, chocolate brown with a fine gold stripe - every scrap and trimming is carefully set to the side

i'm not wasting a scrap!

the "deciding on the fabrics jumble" quickly gave way to a more orderly layout - decisions are easier made when all the choices are easily seen

chocolate and mint

{oddly enough - i do not like that flavour combination at all but lately i have been loving chocolate brown... after this combination i want to try my hand at chocolate and mauve - elegant, don't you think?}

the log cabin block is one of the first i ever did, and is still a favourite

but this business of randomly cutting and piecing with no rhyme or reason was spurred on by my latest research interest - the quilts of gee's bend

a fabulous story of women and what their quilts and quilt-making mean to them

using every precious scrap of cloth, almost all from worn out clothes, pieced together by themselves in a manner pleasing to them and then quilted as a group

when i first learned of these quilts several years ago, i wasn't much interested - i've always been a rather "precise" quilter and they were a little too "irregular" for me

but lately i'm finding myself fed up with the commercialism of quilting - the fabric manufacturer's have created an industry from that which was once borne of necessity and then a pleasant hobby

nowquilting is big business; they crank out dozens of fabric lines every month, complete with free patterns so the quilt shops can easily make kits, all packaged up with everything you need so you can easily buy it and then go home and without thinking a lot, easily make a quilt that will look exactly like hundreds of other quilts, all around the world... and next month they hope you'll be ready to do it all over again because they've cranked out yet more fabric and even more free and easy patterns... yuck

that's not what i want quilting to be for me

i've done many of my own quilt designs over the years but lately i've wanted to let go of the things i have thought to be true of quilting and explore a different way of going about it

a kind of making it up as i go kind of thing

and so i've started here, where i first began, with the log cabin block, re-visiting an old friend but learning a few new things about it as i go

the women of gee's bend didn't have fancy fabrics, nor even store-bought fabrics to make their quilts with but they made them beautiful with what they had available to them

and in that vein, i'll do the same

i'll work with what i have - silk to denote the richness their quilts have brought to the world, cotton, in reference to the beautiful, wonderful textile that has come to me through the literally back-breaking work of people around the world... cotton truly is the fabric of our lives...

i'll let the shapes come as they do, without pre-planning, nor trying to organize it in any way

i'll take my precious scraps and sew something that brings light and joy and colour and warmth to my world... i'll take my time, and i hope it will be worth waiting for

gather ye rosebuds...

that poem came to mind, not because of this first image, but for what comes after...

i'm afraid i might be a one-hit wonder

remember my banana painting?

it came out much better than expected - i guess maybe i thought i might be alright at painting and sketching - i've had a bit of a comeuppance i think...

blow to the ego and all that

these little rosebuds are comfort food - a little reassurance that it's possible for me to draw and paint something i like

 what gave me grief today was this -

 the very kind lady at the flower shop down the street gave me a lovely bag stuffed full of flower petals

to practice painting with

 when i was working on it i couldn't figure it out - now i think i was busy trying to capture every little detail, every single nuance of colour

i ended up with a very blended blob

i've sharpened these images but not messed with colour saturation or contrast - the one above is closer to how it really looks than the one above it - that one is very washed out

below shows the image after i added a little detail with my trusty brown pigma pen

i'm addicted to them - have one in each size, in brown

a few other colours in random sizes, but all the browns

it's kind of like my embroidery - i never ever use black, always brown-black

{same with my mascara!}

weird huh?

i'm much happier with it since adding the pen but still...

 

 i think i need to capture the essence of the colours rather than the literal???

i was already to put my paints away when i decided i needed a little reassurance

so i sketched a row of rosebuds

quickly drawn, the pen lightly scratching the page - a hint of colour

 

i adore them - it's like they want to take flight

rose-bugs?

 i looked at a few images online and decided to define the shapes a little more - it's time to go back to botany school - i remember calyx but that's about it

the little leafy tendril things that encase the rosebuds - they needed to be a little more pronounced 

 i sketched a larger one, made it blue and added some creamy yellow, realizing too late they would make green

ah well, i don't mind it after all

poetic license...

finally, i deepened the pink of the first rosebud, intending to add the dark just at the base but it spread quickly and enveloped almost the whole bud

i like it anyway

i actually like them quite a lot

and if i may forever tarry, i think i'll be quite content if i've a paintbrush in one hand and a pencil in the other

a beautiful life

a brave little fighter who fought the good fight...

over and over and over again

she stole our hearts twelve years ago - the only little girl cat we've ever had

a tiny little green-eyed feline with dainty white feet

we all tried so hard, marc, doug, claire,  the vet... this time, the third time, was not the charm

more than any other cat we've had, josie knew how to sleep the best

feet straight out in front

a princess at rest

we miss you girly-girl

 thank you to everyone for your suggestions, well wishes and wonderful thoughts... they were all so very much appreciated...

twenty-four years...

 i had to wait twenty-four years, but i finally got my way...

the story actually begins two years before that, on september 25 to be precise

when our son was born

fast forward to december 23 and i had finally run out of time to make the beautiful christmas stocking i had planned in my head

i rummaged and found a christmassy piece of pre-quilted fabric and in a few minutes i had run up a simple stocking on my sewing machine, knowing there would be a whole year ahead to make a better one

that second year flew by as quickly as the first and another christmas came and went; the same stocking was hung for doug, with the same thought as previously... a whole year ahead to make the new one...

and then came year three, and as i gathered fabrics and bits and pieces a furor arose that would rival any clashing and prancing of hoofs on the roof

seems he quite liked "his" stocking, and didn't want another

and i was stopped in my tracks by one of the greatest forces i've ever encountered... thwarted by a combination of a two-year old's alligator tears and a temper tantrum

this year i finally got my way though - the stocking was nowhere to be found, lost somewhere between home, condos, apartments and a van

the same old issue of not a lot time presented itself, but i work faster now, and the general idea had had many years to percolate... an appliqued old-world style santa was what i had always envisioned

i decided to use some of the aberfeldy tweed i bought in scotland this past october as the base fabric...

lovely sage green with threads of red and blue

the old-world santa is an adaptation of a cross-stitch pattern designed by shepherd's bush, purchased in california while visiting family

(oddly enough, the name stitched on the cross-stitch design is "robert", my brother, doug's uncle's name)

 three of the applique fabrics are scraps from favourites purchased in the yukon when we lived there, many years ago

and plenty of snow at the toe and the cuff, complete with embroidered snowflakes

 doug loved it, i love it, but laura is not even remotely tempted by it - seems she's also quite happy to keep using her very own, beloved, pre-quilted fabric stocking

 i am nothing if not consistent!

the things you notice...

the thing about traveling is the things you see

things you don't see in your own backyard

things that open your mind to new ideas, to new ways of thinking

the same old, same old, usual way of things goes out the proverbial window and you find yourself stopping in wonderment sometimes

yes, wonderment

wonderment is when you see something that makes you, well, wonder

i wonder about doorways...

 

the one above at st. edward's church in stow-on-the-wold made me wonder

when those two trees were planted, did anyone know how what a magical scene they were creating?

as i stood there, i waited, wishing for the door to slowly start moving, opening, to let me in

this is a door that inspired tolkein...

yes, he was there, and yes, it did influence him

this little doorway into the tree was stumbled upon whilst on our moor-walk in haworth

{yes, stumbled - I darn near fell off the path into the brambles as I tried to situate myself for the best possible angle}

there's a story in this little tree - i just haven't quite thought it all out yet

an ancient archway in carlisle

the most peaceful churchyard ever - if i lived in that part of yorkshire i would park myself on a bench there for at least one afternoon every week

 

the door at one of the passageways, leading from the churchyard into the city of carlisle

 a row of little doors in stirling, along the road to the castle

i'm not that tall but I would have had to duck to save my scalp on these doorways

 an original door to the city of york, the same hinges holding it in place as the day it was first hung

love the small door-within-a-door on the left - to see who was calling after the gates were shut...

salisbury cathedral's grand entrance

the door to the oldest inn in england

stow-on-the-wold

high in the swiss alps, on my very first trip to europe, i fell in love with the doors after seeing this in the forest

someone had taken a number of old doors and windows and by carefully placing them with existing trees, created the most amazing little tree houses

they were enchanting

 

and finally, this little doorway, found on isola bella on lake maggiore, switzerland

shorter than me, it was the first european door i ever photographed

i have hoped since then it will not be the last...

 

i suppose it's the nature of a curious individual, to wonder what's on the other side

or rather, do you think it's the nature of a door to provoke it?