For The Want Of A Pin...

...the fabric was lost.  It's a long story.  Oh, okay then.

I thought I'd work on the new ME piece, this one:

So I trimmed it down (yes, I said I wouldn't, yes it's wonky and will need redone with the rotary cutter... sigh.  Take careful note of the long strip of rust dyed organza on the right of the image.  So far, so good.  I looked at it, and decided that, rather than using the metallic thread I had chosen, on its own, I would combine it with a plain grey thread.  And so I did.  Before I started stitching, though, I thought, I'll just pin this down.  There were three pins in my bowl, and given that I had cleaned the kitchen window sill, earlier that morning (don't ask), I didn't want to waste energy on going to get more.  So I Made Do.  Stupid woman.  Daring the first line of stitch, that strip of rust dyed organza fell off, and lay beside me on the sofa, pitifully.  Sod it, I thought, it can lie there til I'm ready.  

So, I looked at the first line of stitch, and thought...nope... In my head, it's ideal.  Sometimes, though, what you feel doesn't match up with what you know, and so it was in this case.  

For a start, it looks like a line of tacking...not the idea at all.  But also, it dominates those pale colours, which are, after all, the point of the piece.  Reader, I took it out, and replaced it with some white, that I think I must have acquired from Clare Hedges (there's a definite advantage to being friends with a weaver).  And at that point, I thought, where's that bit of organza?  Yes, you guessed it, vanished without trace.  So... I looked for it.  The list of places where it wasn't, was extensive, including the book I'd replaced in the coffee table drawer.  Not stuck to my sweater, which I'd had to remove (too warm...sodding ME...I have no control over my body temperature; usually I'm freezing, today, though, I'm too hot).  Not stuck to the throws on the sofa, or the cushions.  So I retraced my steps, back into the kitchen, via the downstairs loo.  No, and no.  I did, though, reassemble the stuff on the kitchen window sill.  So...nothing for it but to dismantle the sofa.  Back to the kitchen, to collect the hand held vacuum, to get rid of the crumbs and cat hair that had accumulated below the cushions... and a quick clean out of the litter tray..sigh.  

Reader, the damn thing has vanished.  So... I thought about replacing it with another bit of organza, but couldn't find any in the scrap box in the living room.  And given the amount of energy I'd used, I wasn't going to look in my workroom.  However, I did find a silk carrier rod... 

Which, actually, I prefer... only now it looks unbalanced against the other bit of organza...so a quick adjustment...

And that's what I'm going with.  If you look very carefully (I've enlarged the image to help a bit), you'll see stitch to the right of the silk carrier rod.  Unobtrusive, as it should be.  I think there will be less of it than I originally intended, and not just because I've now used every last bit of energy I had, and possibly some of tomorrow's, too.  A box of pins will feature on my side table in future...sigh.

Seeing Things

Pondering what to do with this piece of dye painted cloth, which I found in the wooden chest upstairs.  Not long before I moved, I did some dyeing with my friend Clare Hedges; she dyed some warps for her loom, I stuck to cloth.  She wrote about her day, and what she did with the warps,  here; I love the braid she made from them.

But I digress (so what's new, huh?). Like the photograph I showed you on Monday, it made my heart sing when I found it, a combination of the brightness of the colours and the movement in the piece.  I'm not sure about the orientation, though... this feels 'right', but landscape is not an orientation I usually use.  So there's this...

..which looks to me to be promising, too, but with a different feel to it altogether...it feels as if all the marks are trying to escape out of the right hand side of the cloth.  Turning it over, as we did above, somehow grounds the movement, almost literally.... it becomes an abstract landscape of sorts, in my head, at least, albeit with a lot of sky, while the top piece feels as if things are completely air borne.  I wonder how many of you can see what I see...or indeed if you see anything at all.  You can let me know; that's what the comments are for!

It's tempting to simply iron the cloth, and leave it as it is, as a painting.  I won't, though, because I think it needs texture, and leaving it flat just isn't going to work for me, whichever orientation I end up choosing.  That said, if I ever get a painting studio, this will be used as the basis for a painting or two on canvas, complete with texture.  So...stitch it is.  I think.  The other option, of course, is to cut it up and reassemble it... not really an option I want to take with this piece, because it feels like either way, it has a coherence, a meaning, that I don't particularly want to disrupt.  There is, I think, another similar piece in my stash, however, which would let me explore that particular avenue.  And if there isn't, I can always create one....eventually.  It's an avenue that would let me have lots of small pieces, or a couple of medium sized pieces, with the chopped up bits reassembled, either on their own or with other fabrics.  As squares or rectangles, they could become the heart of a log cabin type construction.  Really, the permutations are endless.

Which is why the post got the name it did.  I see things in this cloth.  I see meanings, and I see opportunities.  So far, I've described at least six different ways of approaching this cloth... as two different types of painting, two different types of stitched piece, as two or three different types of pieced work (okay make that at least seven).  Picasso said, 'Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working'.  I believe that the process I've just described, is more or less what he meant.  So the next time you 'just don't feel like working', or 'aren't in the mood for working', or however you describe procrastination to yourself, just go look at a piece of cloth, or a painting, or a photograph.  Challenge yourself to find as many options as possible in it.  And then...just do it.

With A Little Help From My Friends...

...I can get a remarkable amount done!  Don't know what I'd do without them.  Look what came in the post today... all the way from South Africa

My friend Jenny, known as Button Mad on Facebook,button maker extraordinaire,  read the post where I said I might use a button as a closure on my bag.  Go look on my site, she said, and choose a button for your bag, and I'll send it to you.  Wasn't that kind?  And the big one is the one I chose; she has sent me a couple extra...so I might have to make a jacket to go with them... Check out her blog for some great tutorials using buttons in ways you might not have thought of before.  And of course, their website, for remarkable buttons.

And this is what my chosen button looks like on the fabric;

Now, all I have to do is make the second part of the closure, and the handle.  Jenny's gift makes this bag even more special.

I thought I'd make a bag to go with the waistcoat I showed you in this post, the one for my Mother in Law.  I wanted an unusual handle, and this time, used braid that my friend Clare Hedges had made for a different bag.  Because I wanted something a bit firmer than a single braid, I have stitched two lots  together using a plum coloured thread.  That has proved to be very effective, and goes quite nicely with the unusual colours of the African fabric. I'm now contemplating getting her to make me a tassel or two for the sides of my bag...check out what she does here

Thanks, guys.  I couldn't have done it without you. 

Creating Constructed Fabric...

...for a handbag for my friend and collaborator, Clare Hedges.  It was meant to be a quick and simple exercise, using bits and pieces I had to hand, including some scrap threads she'd given me (it's handy, knowing a weaver...) between two layers of lutradur.   Wanting a bit of glitz, I stitched it with metallic threads...and that was my downfall...  For some reason, the thread kept breaking... changed tension...changed needles...broke needles... nyargh!!!

And then, two thirds through the process, I thought...err... metallic thread.  Heat gun.  Melting.  Not Going To Work.  So...I restitched it with grey rayon threads, thinking that, well, if the metallic threads melted, in places, the cloth would still hold together well... and so it proved (phew).

This is what I ended up with before melting...I stitched in a grid; you can see the metallic sparkling all over the cloth.  After melting, though, this is what it looked like;

Interesting, huh?  I had an irregular grid of cloth strips in there, and you can see it quite clearly.  Looking at the close up, though, there's not much in the way of metallic threads left... in fact, don't think there are any in this image...though if you look at it closely, you might find places where stitching stops and starts again, that's probably the metallic.  I'm really pleased with the cloth...would have been pleased with the bag...except that I managed to mix up the dates of the event Clare was going to, and didn't get it ready in time... day late, dollar short, as usual.  These things definitely come in threes... stitching problems, melting threads and missing a deadline...  Still, it will go very well with her new dress, the next time she wears it... sigh...

Collaboration...

is a wonderful thing.  How do you like this wee clutch bag?  I made the fancy fabric, my friend and collaborator Clare Hedgeshttp://www.traditionalpassementerie.co.uk/ made the bag (that's her, in her best cycling gear, modelling the bag).  Collaboration means that we do the bits we like best, and are good at.  We each play to our strengths...and that can only be good.  And the rule of synergy says that 1+1=3; in other words, our combined strengths are more, together, than they are as individual makers.  More of that lovely development I was talking about yesterday...http://artmixter.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/glitz-and-glamour.html.  And given that there are three of us in this equation, with Jill Arnold also in the mix, I wonder what 1+1+1 equals... six, I think... Hmmm...

Of course, synergy applies in all sorts of situations.  Online, I'm hoping that synergy will work in a BIG way for my new blog, Spunbond Sensations!  I planned the blog as a being interactive; so 1+1+lots.... must equal Even More....  Please do have a look, and don't be afraid to contribute.  I'm looking for questions for Wondering Wednesday, and for images for Photo Friday.... please do get in touch.  And of course, if you're looking for a clutch bag, you know where to come!