Speaking of Trees...

...and I love trees.. here is my version of a celtic quilted Christmas tree adapted from a da Vinci design. I started with a white on black design 2cm high...and finished up adapting it to this. I created a simpler version of this design for an "Introduction to Celtic Quilting" class.

Curly trees

I love trees. The stark leafless winter, the burgeoning spring, the dappled light of summer, the warmly colouful autumn; trees in every season. I doodle them, sketch them, paint, quilt and felt them. I especially love to draw these 'curly trees'. I love the way they evolve under the pen.



And then someone suggested I try to recreate my trees in another medium... I tried cutting the forms in light aluminium but couldn't get the light whispy look I was after. Then I tried with some florist wire wrapped in cord. This seems to be very effective as it allows for a thickening at the lower end and then the gradual thinning of the branches.

Life drawing

Following on from my doodle yesterday I thought I'd post some sketching today. This is a life drawing I did about 6 months ago. There is something so amazing about watching the female body do what it was designed to do. (With all respect for those women who choose not to, or who are not able to, have a child.)

" Celebrating Life"

Paisley inspired design

The little quilt I made for my personal shrine (see my previous blog post) is made from a piece of material I printed. The design for the printing stamp came from a doodle that developed into a larger work.


I'm currently playing with this and cutting the drawing into sections to see how the elements work alone. The arrow at the bottom looks a little like a christmas tree to me...and I'm big on christmas trees! I'd like to try to recreate some of these designs in free-machine embroidery either on a backing or as a lace form.

Personal Shrine - mini quilt

I've begun work on some mock-ups for some personal shrines that I want to create. They've been in the brain space for a while and have now made it to the 'sketching-ideas', 'making-notes, and 'test--creation-markIII)' stage. This is very advance for me...some ideas never make it off the thought-board.

This current test-creation is for a small personal shrine with a number of inner boxes and display shelves. Each little box and shelf is dedicated to an area of my life that is precious to me in some way. Fibreart/creativity/quilting/beading are all in this category...so first creation for the mini shrine is a miniature quilt.

The quilt is created from some fabric that I snow dyed winter before last. It was then printed with a personal design that I created. I used som- felt that I was given by a patchworking friend as the wadding.

Mini-quilt; paisley printed, snow-dyed cotton

Giving...

This is a fibre art piece I've been working on for some time. I was inspired by the work of Susan Sorrell (http://www.creativechick.com) and took an online class with her. I made a series of little collages but couldn't decide what to do with them or how to mount them. Finally decided to add a few other techniques I enjoy. I covered a canvas with layers of fabric and took to them, layer by layer, with a heat gun; then bound the whole with a golden thread, to reinforce the giving/gift idea.

The background fabric of the collage was snow-painted, stamped, and free-machined. Various images and a word from magazines added, then the piece was embellished with embroidery and beading.

Edinburgh Inspiration

Took my daughter to Edinburgh for a long weekend to visit a friend of her's who recently moved there. We flew by the dreaded easyjet ... and the snack menu now includes...

"Snakes on a Plane"

I took some time to go sightseeing and looking for those inspirational shots you have to snap. The skyline is full of amazing spires. This one close to my B and B really caught my eye.

And then there was the gorgeous green across the road...

I have more of these to come but there's a bit of work to do editting first.