A Perfect Misunderstanding

As part of my course work I have to do some naturally dyed fabric samples using plants and leaves as opposed to chemical dyes. Not having enough resources at home I headed for the library. As I could find nothing suitable on the shelves I approached the counter to enquire if they could get me in a book about natural dyeing.

Well Lisa typed in the search area to look for titles and turning to me with a somber face said....."we don't appear to have any books of that nature.......................have you tried talking to the Dr?"

At this point it dawned on me that she had typed 'natural dying' ( the 'e' makes a big difference!)
Needless to say we both ended up in hysterics once I had explained that I wanted to colour fabric rather than lay down and meet my maker!

So here are the first few pages of my samples book, none of these needed a mordent. I have to order some alum in order to continue with this experiment so more will follow later.

Garden Treasure

I'm very excited as today, by chance, I found this beautiful piece of wood in the garden. It had come out of a bag of bark chippings. It almost looks burnt around the edges and is peeling apart in layers, each one slightly different in appearance. I'm off to find my sketch book now as this is a perfect find for a little project I want to do later in the year!

The piece above is my favourite.

Waste Not Want Not!

A little while ago a friend and I decided to have a go at making a small wall hanging using the Alicia Merrett method of curved piecing. So rather than delve into my stash of 'good' fabric' I decided that this was the ideal project to use up all the scrap pieces of fabric that are too small to be used in anything but a scrap quilt but were perfect for trying a new technique.

This is the almost finished piece that has been quite heavily quilted. I had added a bit of felt applique to one section with the intention of adding more. However, I decided in the end that I didn't really like the appliqued piece and would remove it at some point. Also, because I had used up scraps of fabric the colours were very hit and miss and it didn't all tie in together.

Over dying the whole piece seemed the best way to bring all the different fabrics together. I chose a red dye, popped the whole lot in the washing machine and crossed my fingers! Actually,I was quite excited to see how it would come out.


Over dying dulled the brightest colours and tied it all together a bit more coherently. However, it did nothing for the felt applique and turned the green stem into a dull dirty brown making it look worse than ever before. My solution to this was to cut the whole thing up!

I cut it into 4 pieces following the seam lines already present. I discarded the piece with the applique on it as I really didn't like it. I turned the centre piece round, rearranged the other pieces and re cut the edges to match each other. They were then bound and the binding was pulled round to the back before being stitched down so as it was not visible. I was then left with a large area of blank fabric that needed to be filled with something!


I cut a tree stencil that would overlap two of the pieces and used fabric pastels to fill it in. Once it had been ironed to set the colour I then stitched a broken running stitch round the edges of the tree and stitched in the 'knots' with a little more detail.

I think, for the minute it is finished, but you never know. Maybe I'll come back to it and tweak it some more!

Birds Birds Birds

Had fun making these birds from felt that had been painted with gold acrylic and embellished with stitching. Some of the beads are had made paper beads and the tassel is felt, ribbon, cord with lots of 'found' treasure attached, keys, shells, charms etc.

'Tis the season to be jolly.......

A little wall hanging for the Christmas Season......

Golden Years Remembered

Last November my lovely Mum & Dad celebrated their 50th Wedding Anniversary, something which, a few years ago we didn't think they would achieve as my dad was seriously ill. My sister and I gathered family and friends together for a surprise party to celebrate the occasion.

Since then I have been working on a book, filled with pictures of the evening and a poem that my sister and I wrote for mum & dad. Something that they can pick up and put down to remind them of the fantastic evening we all had!

Front cover of the book. This is mount board covered with hand made paper.

The inner pages were made using silk in various shades of gold and cream. Each Photo was mounted onto a tag made of decorative card with ribbon down the middle The picture was then mounted onto the ribbon. Each photo tag sits in its own little pocket made of parchment paper and edged with tea dyed rick-rack.

Each photo has a ribbon running from it to the top corner and is linked to the next one by a heart charm.

The poem is on deckle edged card which has a gold edge. The poem was read out on the evening and culminates in the toast to mum & dad, there was not a dry eye in the house!

It was an evening of love and laughter and Mum & Dad were 'toasted' with much cheering and handclapping. A memorable evening for everyone!

A Little Somthing for a Friend

Here is a little 'something' I made for a friends birthday. She always has loads of bits of paper around that the writes her shopping lists, to do lists etc on so I decided to make a her a book with laminated pages. That way she can keep her lists all in one place!


The cover was made by stamping a leaf and flower design onto some pale lilac fabric using fabric paints. It was then layered up and I quilted round the flowers and leaves and added some shadow quilted flowers.


The inner pages were made by laminating pretty notepaper, so are wipe clean. The pages were sewn onto fabric windows....very tricky as the laminated paper is very slippy!

There are four laminated pages in total.



The cover of the book with the finished stitching.



The inside of the front cover.

Lastly I made a tie with some very thin dusky pink and grey ribbon with added beads.

Happy Birthday My Friend x