September 2019

Our group had twelve attendees this month, including another new member, a visitor from Canberra, and a young family member of Wendy's. Susan and Donna also joined us via Zoom.

Show and tell this month begins with Marina who is undertaking the Creative Correspondence Course ( CCC) through the Embroiderers Guild NSW. One of the exercises was to explore Chain stitch

The clutch purse above is Marina's finished exercise, worked in various forms of chain stitch.

Marina  saw this stitchery and decided it was just her,  so she bought it and stitched it. She has  made it into a bag to take her projects to classes and groups. The words say:
‘I cannot count my day complete ‘til needle thread and fabric meet.’

Sheila found woven picot stitch from last month addictive. She stitched on a natural dyed raw silk fabric using her hand dyed threads. She will continue filling in around the lighter areas and then decide what to do next. 

Jenny had been working on a piece of Ukrainian Whitework, but in colour. A counted thread lover, Jenny was inspired by her friend Robyn's piece of coloured Ukrainian Whitework from a few years back. The piece is being worked on blue even weave linen in a variety of threads including Anchor Perle 8 variegated and DMC stranded.

Sheila has finished her entry for The Embroiderers' Guild of NSW Margaret Oppen competition. The works will be displayed in October at Gallery76.  She has also completed her Quilt NSW entry for the annual suitcase challenge. Only the back can be revealed  at this stage, and is shown above. She used the design on the back to quilt the work. 

Sheila has also been making butterflies for our exhibition in May of next year.  The first butterfly has stitching on a coloured paper towel.  The paper towel has been mounted onto iron-on interface for stability when stitching.  The second butterfly is machine applique using the positive and negative image.  More butterflies are in the planning stages.

Sheila's daily practice for September was to create a collagraph each day printing with a gelli plate. She incorporated Birgit Koopsen's Instagram challenge  prompts into the activity from day 3 onwards.  Interpreting the prompts in a way to incorporate the collagraph has pushed her creativity into new territories.

Sheila's work can be found at:

https://www.instagram.com/thingstitcher/

Gerri has revamped an old bag which she loves with some butterflies to brighten it up.

Annette H has finally finished one of seven cot panels bought by her  mother before her death. The idea was  so she could  hand quilt them and give them to her grandchildren when they had a baby. Annette and her sisters  have worked on them when the occasion arose and Annette has finished this  last one for her new grandson . 

Although Annette Y was unable to join us in our meeting, she has been working hard on her Introduction to Embroidery course. The above four photos show her final applique pieces that were submitted for assessment.  They demonstrate the techniques broderie perse, mola, needle-turn and the last has over stitched raw edge pieces.

Project 3 from Marin's CCC was her own choice. The task was to design the lid of a box. Romanian, Cretan, fly, and running stitches have been used.

Project 5 from Marina's CCC was 'Waves'. Marina used couching for the task which was to make a design depicting waves. Her  inspiration came from seeing a surfer surfing through a tunnel. After many attempts, this was her favourite 

Project 1 from Marina's CCC was leaves in running stitch. The task was to  walk around a park and pick leaves, draw them then make a design using a leaf or leaves. Marina's is gum leaves, which have been  stitched in green, and the lines in between depict different gum tree barks.

The activity for the meeting was picking a stitch name at random from a box then stitching it. Marina is  continuing to pick stitch names and when finished, will make it into a little purse.

Project 2 from Marina's CCC was the sun. 
The task was  look at pictures of the sun and design a depiction.  Marina's is the sun in the centre  with warm colours on one side warming half the earth and cool colours on the other side cooling the other side of the earth. Fly stitch has been used.

The beginning of the butterfly adventure by Annette H. Butterflies start life as an egg, then become a caterpillar. This piece started life in our simple exercise class on circles that Jenny gave us. Her scribbles translated beautifully into a caterpillar of a non specific type. So far it is felt shapes on cotton fabric that will be embossed with stitch.

From the back of Annette H's cupboard, a  UFO in Mountmellick work which she will try to finish. Worked on cotton fabric in Perle 5 thread, the piece has a buttonhole edge rather than the traditional knitted edge.

Annette H's  chosen stitch for the day was feather stitch. She  tried it using 3 different threads,  then tried Cretan stitch after reading about it in an old 1967 copy of the Record.

Susan has been exploring crochet, to expand her skills. She is  trying medallions from Nicky Epstein's Crochet on the Edge,  having fun with the textures and other techniques. 

 Susan also tried some 'inchies challenge' after Sheila's practice last month.

  One of Susan's drawings from her regular Tuesday Drawing group in Bathurst. 

Jenny is on another learning curve, trying out a new bobbin lace edge design. It is design No7 from Pamela Nottingham's book 'Bedfordshire Lacemaking.

Gerri has been busy making teddies, towels and owls for a stall that supports cancer care patients.

It is wonderful to watch our new members grow in their stitching, and fabulous to see how our monthly exercises can take us in new directions, both up and out. As our numbers grow, our skills grow, and so does our creativity. So come back next month to see our creativity in action, and see which direction it will take us.

April 2019

It was Easter Saturday, and we had nine attendees to  our group meeting, a great turnout for an Easter weekend. We also welcomed another possible new member in Lisa. 

Show and tell brought out a range of skills from our members.

 Jenny had appliqued her embroidered doily to a pieced background and turned it onto a tote bag. The doily had been given to her un-worked some years ago, the stitching done about ten years ago, and the crochet edge earlier this year. Jenny had raided her stash of fabrics to find the perfect colours, pieced strips together and added the doily. Shadow machine quilting holds the doily in place, and ditch stitching between the background strips holds it all to a backing fabric.

Gerri's landscape has been completed with fabric, fussy cutting and glue. It is her first attempt using the sewing machine to create. Seagulls have yet to be added.

Above is a  cot panel Annette is hand quilting for an expected baby in June. Her mother purchased cot panels for her grandchildren, and her intention was to hand quilt each one when expected great grand-children were coming. Some were completed and given before she died. Annette's  sister completed two after their mother passed, and Annette is  now completing one for her son and daughter in law.

 Sheila recently traveled with her quilt group to the small community of Picton to visit the local patchwork shop.  Lunch followed at the pub where Sheila collected a number of black paper coasters.  She has had fun doodling designs on them.  She might turn them over and doodle on the white side with a back pen next.

Jenny has been using up tiny scraps of even weave linen making small squares of Hardanger. Most of the filling stitches were new to Jenny, and after working quite a few in white, she thought, why not some colour? Jenny is still thinking what to do with them.

Leslie is continuing with the  "Counted Thread" - part of the Introduction to Embroidery Course - Year 2 she is undertaking. This sample above is a Hardanger design, which she  might make into something one day.

The above black-work sample is also part of Leslie's course. The stitching of the tree at the bottom is identical on the front and back of the fabric 

More completed canvas work embroidery for a second cushion by Susan. Last month's for a grey fabric chair, and this one for a burnt orange chair. Again, it was using up various Appleton's wools, in variations of rice stitch using up to six different colours for each completed stitch. There are about 16 different colours and shades used. The stitch is not a complicated one, covers canvas quite quickly, and many different patterns can be created depending on the colours chosen, and how they are used. Susan still has lots more yarn to use up, so is thinking of what next to do in canvas work. It's such fun!

Sheila's daily practice for the month of April is stitch collage, and she has decided to work an alphabet.  Using her hand dyed scraps of lace, ribbon, braids, trim and threads as well as scraps of commercial silk, she has created a letter of the alphabet each day of the month.  Sheila is undecided if the letters will be joined into a quilt or if they will be turned into a book of some sort.

More samples of Leslie's from her course . the one above is pattern darning.

Leslie's samples of cross stitch and Assisi from her course, and she has charted her own designs.

Baby knitting by Annette. A Kimono crossover baby jacket still needing buttons. 

Knitted with 3 ply Bendigo washable wool. This has been a favourite new born baby jacket with her own family's new mums.

Jenny has been progressing with her knitting. She has completed the back, one front, and started the second front of her new cardigan. Using a basic cardigan pattern from  the Paton's 'Classic Knits for Women - Book 1245', and a lace pattern from 'The Harmony Guide To knitting Stitches' , Jenny has created a border pattern to decorate her new cardigan. It is being worked in 8ply cotton from Bendigo Woollen Mills .

Susan had finished her  crochet scarf. The scarf is crocheted in Heirloom brand 8 ply  cotton. The pattern is her own, parts culled from several different books. The body of the scarf, in bright green, is a diagonal shell stitch, used 'extended' DC. This was then bordered in a light green  with DC stitches. The long sides were finished with a picot edging, and the short sides with a fringe-like edging created from chains and SCs, from Edie Eckman's 'Crochet Borders Around the Corner'.  It was supposed to be using up yarn, but Susan had to get extra for the borders, as she didn't have enough of the bright green. Now She will have to think of something to do with the less than 1 ball of cotton left.

Suganthi had been attending Lyall Willis's inktense classes on the 2nd Tuesday of the month at the Embroiderers Guild. She had been wondering how she might embroider/work on a butterfly, Lyall's class was the inspiration. Suganthi took this image   from the internet, which said the image can be used for free for personal use.

The image was then  copied  and coloured  using inktense pencils, then painted over with fabric medium - notice how very bright/intense  the painted colours are!

Suganti then  used split back-stitch in gold thread to outline.

Our activity on for the day  included "mock herringbone" stitch and also mixing threads in the needle. Both of these techniques are used by UK Textile Artist - Sue Stone - to create pattern and texture in her artworks. Above are our stitching results after a short period of time.

A great day was had by all as our little group grows with new creative members. The day went way too fast, as we all tried to catch up with what everyone had been doing.