Bramley's Seedling Apple

I have been really enjoying myself - playing with printing and stitching, after the workshop with Louise Nichols a few months ago.
This is my second attempt at embellished lino printing and what better subject to choose than the wonderful and versatile Bramley's Seedling apple. 

I used ordinary "system 3" acrylic paint mixed with Daler block printing medium so I had a wealth of choice colour-wise and each print tended to be a slightly different colour. These are examples of the lino prints in 3 colours.

and the resulting apples, which were printed in similar colours, after they had been embellished with fabric and stitch.

I put thin wadding on the back of each apple before I started stitching (by machine and hand) and then backed with more wadding after I had sewn them all together with the sashing and border. I actually included a little extra wadding behind the individual apples. 

I hope you can see some of the very simple stitches that I used - mostly straight stitch, french knots, cross stitch and couching.

I used Steam a Seam 2 to apply any fabric pieces. Each apple print measures approx 3½" x 5" and my finished wall hanging measures approx 9" x 18".

It is over 200 years since the original Bramley tree was grown from a pip, but sadly now it seems that the tree is dying. You can read all about the apple on the Bramley Apples website.

Happy stitching - Anita x

Hexagon Horror Story

I've been plodding on with my paper pieced hexagons most evenings and finally decided that I have enough to join them together. (or is it 'I have had enough!!') 

I still have the half-hexagon sides to fill in, but I will leave the top and bottom pointy. At present it measures 37" x 33" and I have plans to add some interesting fabric borders.
Here are four hexagons that I particularly like.

So where is the "Horror" of my hexagon story. Well, having sewn the big hexagons into rows and bemoaning the fact that it would take me many evenings to sew these together by hand, the man in my life (who knows absolutely nothing about sewing) said "I don't see why you can't sew these by machine!".......... I can't resist a challenge!
I decided to use this stitch on my machine as opposed to zigzag which I thought would make a very stiff and obvious line.

I used grey thread so it wouldn't show too much and a shortish stitch length and width. I sewed slowly, stopped frequently and turned the needle by hand at times - it was very stressful!! .... but quick nonetheless by comparison with the hand sewing. I don't think I would have attempted this if I had been making this for anyone other than myself! 

This pic compares the two different seams - hand and machine.

My two previous posts about this project are making donuts and hexagons update.

Happy Sewing - Anita x

Fruitful sewing at Flowerpatch

January is the month when all the blocks that have been made for Flowerpatch Quilter's yearly charity quilt, come together at our Thursday evening meeting. How exciting to finally see them in place ready for sewing and everyone is keen to get started and take part. Hand sewing commences right there and then.

This is the fabric that has inspired the colours of fabric chosen for the quilt, many of which have come from member's own stashes. This fabric is used in the outer border and elsewhere in the quilt.

This is the gorgeous centre piece of a wreath of fruit

and here we have a tantalising glimpse of some of the borders.

I love the colours and it's going to look wonderful. Monica B has done a brilliant job organising this and I can't quite believe how calm she was last Thursday!! Our Charity this year is Cornwall Blood Bikes.

I had taken along some of the sketches of local buildings that I had drawn (see my last post). This is for another project that we are doing in the next couple of months and many members chose a building to aid them in making a small A5 wall hanging. All will be revealed at a later date.

Liz B reminded us about this year's Chairman's Challenge which is titled "From Tree to Match", so plenty to inspire us and keep us busy.

The 9th February 2017 meeting will be an illustrated talk by Dy and Melody, about their "Quilt Trip to Prague".

What a great group to belong to - Anita x

From photo to line drawing

How I wish I could draw!
Drawing from life, even still life, seems an impossibility to me and even copying a photo proves difficult. Nothing ends up in the correct proportions and my efforts are always a disappoint to me.
But I have ways and means to get around this lack of talent and would like to share one way with you. I'm sure it's not the only way, and probably not the best way - but it works for me.

I have been wanting to do line drawings of some local buildings, to turn into small A5 size fabric pictures (approximately 6" x 8"). I have been out and about with my camera at the ready, and also scoured the internet for suitable pictures.

ORIGINAL PHOTO

I use photo editing to rotate the picture a little if necessary and to crop in the proportions that I want - in this case 3:4. Personally I use the free to download "Photoscape" photo editing.

CROPPED PHOTO

Then I open a word document and insert the cropped picture into it. I can change the page dimensions, margins and orientation; and format the size of the picture to be just right - in this case 15cm x 20cm. I use Microsoft Word, but for many years I used "Open Office" which is free to download and very good, too. I could also have done this online with Google Docs.

Printing next and luckily my printer will print a draft copy which is a faint image of the picture and uses very little ink. Otherwise I would alter the transparency of the picture before printing to achieve the same effect. Printing can be done in colour, but my printer is old and iffy so I resorted to black and white for some prints.

I really like this next bit as I sit in front of the computer with the cropped photo on the screen, and draw on top of the draft print, selecting the lines of the picture that I want for my fabric hanging. I use a black pen. I alter things as I go because buildings and windows might need straightening, or other bits moving about. I add quite a lot of detail as this can always be ignored later. You can see the faint print of my draft beneath the black lines.

DRAWING ON DRAFT PRINT

I usually make a tracing onto blank paper now. If I can't see my lines through the paper I use a light box or tape the print to a window with the blank sheet of paper on top, using mother nature's light.

TRACED COPY ON PAPER

Here are a couple of other examples:

Now I'm ready to play with fabric and, for the not-quite-finished example below, I used the same method as when making Flowerpatch's Little Harbours. 

I decided to try the Eagle House Hotel first because it looked so difficult, but it proved to be easier than expected. Nevertheless I always wish I had the time to do everything twice as I'm sure a second effort would turn out better! :)

Well, I hope I haven't made this sound too complicated - after the first time it's fairly quick, easy and satisfying.

Never a dull moment - Anita x