Snow Dyeing Update

This week I retrieved the bags of fabric from the garden where they had been since the snow storm. 

Having left them for a week I was fully expecting them to be very plain. However as the snow melted, the dyes mixed and produced some wonderful patterns.

Cobalt blue and marine violet.

lemon yellow and rust orange.

Cobalt blue and turquoise

Carmine red and marine violet.

The weather forecast for this weekend is possibly for more snow. If there is a good snowfall I may be found in the garden again, experimenting with some more colours.

Happy quilting

Bev

Journal Quilts, theme - Landscape

This year has seen the start of a few new projects.
 One being the Modern and Art Quilt group at Tudor Rose Patchwork. Each month we are exploring different techniques and producing a journal quilt. I mentioned this first in my New Year post. 

These are some of the journal quilts from the first session where we explored abstracting a landscape picture, free cutting and improv piecing.

Jon Massey - Colours of the Continent

Sue Ives - Fountain in snow

Gaye Capper - Pompeii

Ann Edwards - 

Kim Fitzgerald - Venice

Paula Tidman - Purple Heather on the Yorkshire Moors

Wendy Harkness - The Red House

 Wendy Harkness - Winter at Wood Farm

 You can keep up with our progress on Pinterest

Happy Quilting
Bev

Olympia Knitting and Stitching show

Today I had the privilege to help steward the Quilters Guild exhibition at the Spring Knitting and Stitching show at Olympia, London. 

  These are a few of the wonderful quilts from the exhibition commemorating WW1

Jacqui Coterill - Harbledown Great War Centenary Quilt

This wonderful quilt has been created from squares cut from military uniforms, interspersed with squares embroidered with the names of the men from Harbledown who fell during the Great War. The quilt has been embellished with  cap badges and buttons, medal ribbons and personal keepsakes such as silk handkerchiefs.

Irene MacWilliam - Shot at Dawn

Senga Bain - Returning Home

Judith Dexter - One Soldiers Story

and a wonderful group exhibition of journal quilts.

It was inspiring to see these beautiful quilts and to meet visitors to the exhibition and share their stories.

Bev 

Snow Business

The Beast from the East storm has brought snow and chaos to the country but after a walk I decided to make the most of the bad weather and experiment with snow dyeing. 

I soaked my fabric in a soda and salt solution, gave it a quick wring and crumpled into a plastic bag, then sprinkled procion dyes on the top. They will now stay in the garden until the snow thaws and I can see what effects have been produced. 

My dye combinations are 

Cobalt blue and marine violet.

Carmine red and marine violet.

Cobalt blue and turquoise

and lemon yellow and rust orange.

It will be exciting to see how they turn out.

The weather provided the excuse for several days of studio time and I used it to carry on with the New York Beauty blocks. These are developing over the year and I provide two pattern each month to the class at Tudor Rose Patchwork

Cherry made a lovely display of her New York Beauty blocks at the class this week. 

And Chris finished a cushion using a variation of Manx patchwork.

So now it is back to the studio to take more advantage of the Snow Time.

Happy Quilting

Bev

More of our Cambodian Adventure

We have been looking through our photos and didn't realise how many we had taken. It will take at least two photo books for us to fully document our journey. 

In Siem Riep, We had the opportunity of seeing a performance of Traditional dance and music.

The dances were very expressive and beautifully told their stories. 

From Siem Riep we travelled to Phnom Penn where we explored the Royal Palace 

This must be one of the most beautiful palace complexes I have seen. 

Every building is beautifully decorated with exquisite and intricate carvings

And the perimeter fence is also a work of art.

I will have plenty of inspiration for the coming year. 

Happy designing

Bev

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to all my textile friends.

My usual refrain is that I don't know where the time has gone and the beginning of this year is no different. It is already the 4th January and I am hoping that this year I will not be playing catch up so much. With last year beginning with cataract operations and ending with a tonsillectomy I felt as if I was always playing catch up. I have made a resolution that this year will be different. 

The new year is already bringing new projects and challenges. Tomorrow, the Friday Focus group will be starting a new project when we start focusing on New York Beauty blocks. There will be 24 blocks by the end of the year and so far I have designed 12 of them. I am going to work in two colour schemes to see how the blocks look with such different colours. 

This is the first block worked in Citrus colour scheme and again in the Stone colour scheme. 

The Stone colour scheme is very subtle, where as the Citrus one will be much more vibrant.

I am also looking forward to starting my new Modern & Art Quilt group this month. Each month we will be making a small "journal quilt" using different techniques.

These journal quilts are based on a photo of a trench at Ypres. I have completed them with quilting lines to look like barbed wire.

The Sevenberry marbles fabric in muted tones fits the feel of the pieces.

One of the pages from my sketch book 

Each month there should be one little journal quilt but this has sparked my imagination, already I am seeing a series and even a larger quilt on this theme.

I am excited to see what this year will bring.

Happy Quilting

Bev

A Cambodian Adventure - Temples

We have recently returned from a fabulous trip round Cambodia. It has been a huge adventure and we learnt such a lot about the country and its history, both ancient and more recent. 

Our first temple visit was at Banteay Chhmar. This moated temple complex is near the Community where we had our first Homestay in Cambodia. A wonderful experience of traditional Cambodian life. 

Before we left Banteay Chhmar, we visited the silk weavers and saw the beautiful scarves and silk products that they were making. They were so lovely I couldn't resist a small scarf as a reminder of the trip.

At Siem Riep we had a very early start to catch the sunrise at Angkor Wat. Unfortunately it was a cloudy morning but this did not alter the grandeur of this beautiful temple complex. 

We also met the local monkey troop which lives here.

At Ta Prohm temple ( my favourite ) the spung trees were growing through the walls and creating wonderful structures in their own right. This is where Tomb Raider was filmed.

Even though the spung is taking over, there are little glimpses of the temple between the roots.

The temple at Angkor Thom again was spectacular and everywhere you looked there were huge carved faces on each side of the pillars. There must have been hundreds of them. 

At  all the temples there were beautiful intricate bas relief carvings depicting  the battles and victories of the early Khmer Kings

I have such a lot of wonderful pictures to sort out and I am sure they will be a source of inspiration in my work in the next year. 

Bev