seeing spots...

...playing with colour and a little circular stamp yesterday - yes, each one of those spots was individually stamped - a strangely cathartic process but not one i'd wish to repeat on a daily basis. don't expect to see this for sale any time soon - i will save it for something extra special i think!

stripey

yesterday was perfect. i managed to print all day long, just for me. i'm using these pieces of my brushstrokes design in a new quilt. blissful.

happy accident

i unfolded this piece of cotton fabric i grabbed the other day to wipe up ink spills while i'm printing and found this rather pretty result. i like a nice piece of bonus fabric!

blossom

the boys planted some mixed meadow flower seeds early in the summer in pots outside the kitchen door, and when they blossomed, they were beautiful. i made some sketches and out of them grew this little design, to be printed up in many colours asap...

printed

i made a treasury for etsy the other day using really bright colours...i was really inspired by all those lovely limes and pinks and reds so i used some of my favourite blocks to make some printed cards packs for the shoppette. really simple, but they make me happy.

the ironing pile is growing...

...and instead of tackling it, i just posted these book pages in my shop. 9.30pm is far too late to do any chores so i'm going to watch the end of 'cold case' instead. tomorrow, tomorrow, i will do the ironing tomorrow. i'll have to, i've no clothes left to wear.

printed

hope you all had a good creative weekend. i wasn't particularly productive but i did use a little child-free time to fiddle about making this printed pouch. it actually looks a lot better in the pics than it does it real life; it's very lumpy and unglamourous, i made the brown linen side pieces too narrow; they really need to be wider like the first pouch i made. zip went it ok though! ;) suffice to say i shall not be producing these for sale anytime soon. how do people manage to make and sell them for around $6? it took me forever, and it's not even lined yet! what i am happy with, however, is the printed fabric. i used acrylic paint with a fabric paint binder, just cheapy products, and actually they work very well on linen. after i printed and heat set it, i gave it very rigorous wash and ironed it dry, and it was fine. it does change the handle of the fabric a little, but not horribly. so more experimenting i think!

sittin' in the sun, just me and my boy

' blue honesty'
' little person'
'red stalk'
'abstract'
'boat'

my mum (bless her cottons) took arth for a nice long walk to get him off to sleep yesterday, while frank (aged four) and i sat in the sun and did 'some work like mummy does'. it was excellent, and he was brilliant company. above are the results of both his and my work. how cool is his boat?

boo! i want some moo!

i really, really want some moo cards using the above images, but due to a weird glitch in somebody's system, i can't seem to get any further than personalising them. this has happened so many times, i just can't be bothered to try again. i'm not sure if i just haven't any patience today, but i swear if i start to position that little viewfinder once more on the same photo i'm gonna scream. perhaps tomorrow i will be calm enough to try again. i just want them to send out with my not on the high street goods to try and make myself a little more 'branded', and not in the sense of searing my backside with a red-hot poker.

interruptions

just as i settled down to start a serious amount of binding last night, (saturday night i just couldn't be bothered although i did have an enjoyable evening deciding on what colour silks to bind the paper quilts in whilst watching a million 'csi' type thingies on the box) i was interrupted by my email alert dodah going off and discovered i'd got an order for a wedding sampler and a baby's name plaque. isn't it weird how it never rains but it pours? so anyway that's what i've been up to. between working and getting stressed with the kids, (it's the first day of the holidays, how am i going to cope for 7 weeks?!) it's been an eventful day.

harry the happy horse

a vision in lilac for today's nahcotta piece, with a delightful drawing of a horse by me circa 1982. this is actually the last piece, so i've got a ton of binding to do. what a thrilling saturday evening i have to look forward to! :) (actually, at the risk of sounding like a tragic dullard, i wouldn't want it any other way.)

have a happy and restful weekend, y'all!

this girl is running away

a peppy new red paper quilt for nahcotta, i'm so loving making these. this one was quite tricky, (it nearly ended up in the dustbin more than once) but i persevered and i think i got there in the end. i'm on a roll now (although i bet i get stuck having typed that out loud) but i've got some difficult colours coming up. (difficult in that they're not colours i use often.) finger's crossed!

once upon a time i found a key

this is nahcotta number four - a little yellow offering of which i am quite pleased. yellow is not a colour i use often, so i went out of my comfort zone, and i'm so pleased i did. as with the other paper quilts in this series, it is based on a piece of writing from my 25 year old school books (clue in the title on what the story is about!) and i have a tiny vintage key with two rather handy holes in to stitch on after it's bound. hope your day is as happy and sunny as mine has been today, i'm feeling smug because not only have i quilted all the quilts so far, i've stuck a casserole in the oven and i've got two happy kids playing in the garden. life is good. (as i write this i can hear frank...no arthur, you do NOT hit! it's naughty. mummy, arth's hitting me...better go.)

get used to them, there's more to come

these are probably getting boring now, but i'm loving making them. again, this is unquilted and the pics of these are coming out rather poorly. i think it's the time of day i'm taking them, it's been hot, humid and grey today. anyhoo, this is called 'do your corrections' and has once again some of my school work as background, this time maths and my very, very awful work. every page on it had 'DO YOUR CORRECTIONS' scrawled across it, i swear i only got about three correct per page on average. 1985 was obviously not a good year for me and maths problems. if frank comes home with this sort of work in 6 years time, i'm gonna get him a pivate tutor. shame on you, mum and dad, why didn't i have a private tutor? oh, yeah, that's right i did. and i'm still crap at maths.

UPDATE: 18th july: the above pic is pretty poor, i have retaken it and it is available to look at here

one and two (or possibly two and three)

well hello there! i've been beavering away today, and have created the above collages for nahcotta. they are as of yet unquilted. the blue one is entitled "poorly mrs morley", this is because there is an example of my handwriting in an old school book as a 5 or 6 year old child used as part of the background saying: "today mrs morley is off sick and we are in mrs gibsons classroom, we must be good and quiet." (i can't help feeling that was something written on the blackboard for us to copy; i can't for the life of me imagine my 6 year old self being that pious.) the pink piece is called "spring bulbs need water to grow". in the background (very pale) is a beautiful (?) drawing from another of my old school books of snowdrops, daffodils and tulips. i still don't like the previous pink piece, don't know why, it just doesn't make me happy, so "spring flowers" will take it's place.

today i had to take my eldest son frank to have his starting-big-school injection. i had warned him that it would "feel like a sharp scratch" and may hurt just for a second, but i didn't actually tell him they stab you with a needle. until of course my mother (bless 'er) mentioned to him that they stick a needle in your arm and he turned to me and said: "a needle? don't be ridiculous grandma!?" and turned to me rolling his eyes as if to say, "crazy old bat, where d'you find her?" needless (oh, that was an unintentional pun!) to say he got a bit of a shock at precisely 3.45 this afternoon. but he was very brave and got a sticker with a drum on and a chocolate button. my kids are so easy to charm when it comes to stickers and chocolate buttons.

have a good evening/day/night/whatever, i'm off for a bag of crisps and a pimms! jeez, i'm a classy bird. chin chin!

UPDATE: 18th july: the above pics are pretty poor, i have retaken them and they are available to look at here

nahcotta number one

busy, busy, busy. reality struck me today and left me feeling queasy. art work wise i've been basking in the knowledge that nahcotta gallery wants little ol' me to participate in the enormous tiny art show ii, but i realised that i'd better get my skates on cos they want the goods by the beginning of september, and i want to send them by the end of august to be sure of them getting there on time. in between that i've got a wedding sampler to make, an abc one for my son's pre-school, my website to redesign, and my dreams of getting an etsy store up and running seem to be receding by the day. i seriously need to start making some money from this gig, i can barely pay the broadband bill as it is, and that simply would not do. while i work (see the above evidence, a piece for nahcotta, possibly to be called 'dates for examination'- not entirely convinced i'm pleased with it yet) anyway, as i was saying, while (or should that be 'whilst'?) i work i've been daydreaming about the lead singer of maroon 5 (don't even know his name) in a not altogether appropriate manner for a 32 year old happily married mother of two. ahem. back to work, methinks.

this is the last time, i promise!

i know you're probably sick of these, but i wanted to prove to myself that i can finish projects off! now it's done i have no idea what to do with it. too detailed for a lino print, but maybe i could do sections of it. any suggestions? if only i had a print gocco. *sigh* oh well.

in 'commercial' mode

it just occurred to me to post a few pics of the 'other' creative work i do. i sort of consider these as my day job (except it doesn't pay very much!) i create a range of framed pieces for the home; small box frames like the one pictured here for children's doors and bigger versions (i call them 'samplers') to celebrate births and weddings. i sell them through a site called notonthehighstreet.com and you can look at the other things i do here. i also have a website where i will be selling these and other stuff but it's currently being updated. i will do a post about it when it's up and running. i juggle between doing these and doing what i call my 'arty farty' work, generally the stuff i usually post about, my quilts and drawings and prints. i love doing both things and working to other people's specifications and deadlines is really good for me, it's a great lesson in time management!

the pics from top to bottom are: printing in progress for the backgrounds; i have millions of alphabet beads, but you can never have too many so if anyone knows of any good places to buy them in the uk, all info gratefully received; a door plaque framed and ready to go in the 'spring' colourway; a closeup of a door plaque in 'sunshine' colourway.

hope you enjoy a peek into part of my working day! (the other part is woefully dull; washing, ironing, hoovering, child caring, cooking, feeding, washing up, calorie counting, carting kids about, you get the picture.)

floral lino prints

hello all, hope you're doin' well. big happenings with my workspace; i have had a large redundant cabinet removed, but sadly everywhere is more of a mess cos of course i had to empty the darn thing. so it's all over the floor...you can imagine. but at least something proactive has happened, which is often half the battle. while all this excitement was going on, i made a couple of lino prints. i'm rather pleased with them. may use them for more journal/sketchbook making. will post results when i have a lovely clean, clear workroom! sometime next year then........ ;)

band-wagon jumping

well, what an eventful day yesterday. went to see thomas the tank engine at a steam railway place in norfolk. (took the boys; not my choice of a good day out) where they let us pay before announcing that thomas wasn't actually running. for goodness sake, it's only gotta work twice a year, how hard can that be? anyway, it peed down with rain so we went on the merry-go-round. big mistake. every year i say 'never again' and every year i forget how sick it makes me feel. i think it effected my youngest too, but in a delayed way........welcome to the house of vom. all night the poor monkey chucked up. so that was fun. anyway, when we got home from all the excitement of thomas, i spent the afternoon making some new print blocks. they turned out ok so i used some old book pages to try them out on. these two are the best. and yes, i know i'm not original using book pages so acknowledgements to many artists, in particular lisa congdon whose work i truly admire.