woensdag 29 december 2010

last month ( ..... uh, no ! )

In the consternation of describing yesterday's felting failure I totally 
forgot to show my finished December journal quilt

starry, starry night / wintersolstice


winter and summer next to each other


the whole stack together

uh ..... NO
August is still missing !

So, after finishing a belated pair of (christmas present) socks for my daughter,


and a helping hand with another pair that she is knitting herself,


and a felting failure ...

I finally brought together the greens I want to use for August
and started ripping strips for (again) a woven background.


(I didn't have to rip up shirts and boxers like some people do
although the result turned out beautifully,
 look here)

;-)

dinsdag 28 december 2010

a bargain ???

With the December journal quilt finished
I have some time again for other things.

Today I was working very hard on a present for someone.

In October on the "Handwerkbeurs" (Needle Crafts Fair) we bought
some lovely red dyed wool for felting.
We bought it from Francis and Bart, two Belgian guys
who have the most funny supplies
for needlework, knitting, weaving, etc.
that you will not find lightly anywhere else.
(And they are funny guys)
The wool was not that expensive either ...

Daughter used the wool in a wonderful round meditation rug
like a big mandala
with a base of white needle felt and some other colours as well.
It went okay, but the red wool was "bleeding" enormously,
but that stopped after a LOT of rinsing !

(Later she had trouble with some bowl she was making
of the same red wool)

So today I started with a shawl of a nice sheer cotton / linen fabric
and laid the red wool on the back side

added water and soap and started by hand, then I rolled it up
in bubble wrap and started rolling ...
and rolling ... 
and rolling ...
........
but after quite some time of rolling ...
........
it still was NOT felting !!!!

So :
that bargain we thought we had
wasn't a bargain after all !
If there's anyone out there who bought the sáme wool then :
DON'T TRY FELTING !!!
for some reason it won't work !

dinsdag 21 december 2010

working on December

With the "Teeth cloth" finished I can go on now with
the December journal quilt.

a small woven star
(woven into the blue woven background)


and stitched !


The big star in the middle got some "magic thread" and .....

a face

 When the face was there I suddenly realized that it looked more like a sun !

Like the "summer solstice sun" in the June quilt !
So this one will be the "winter solstice sun" 
By the way : our sun is just an "ordinary" star
like so many, many, many others ...

(Manya also made a lovely star, with a story !!!)

maandag 20 december 2010

card

By now the christmas / new year cards that we sent this year
will have been delivered I guess
so :
here it is for all my blogging friends

I have to explain a little bit

in Dutch the words for "fairy" and "eleven" are the same :
elf !

Happy holidays and an enchanted magical 2011 !!!

zaterdag 18 december 2010

for Penny

Penny in Canada showed a fantastic looking Blue Jay
we don't have that bird here
but we have a
"Vlaamse Gaai" 

I do think that's the same kind of bird
which is mostly found in woodlands.
We don't have much woods here in the west of our small country
but fortunately these birds visit us in wintertime in our garden.
Man is making all the birds very happy by providing
delicious food for them!
Thus we are rewarded by many feathered visitors.



vrijdag 17 december 2010

Ta Daaa !

Well .... it was more like pfffffft ... than ta daaaa this morning
but I made it in time !
Though my hands were shaking doing the last stitches
and the thread got entangled time and again
and I had no time to do the name on the back in stitches
so I just wrote it in pen
pfffffft

"show me your teeth"

Lots of teeth, not only in the horse's mouth, but also on top and bottom
many different tiny scraps and many stitches for all the patients
drops of blood
a bit of sunshine
( for another six months without the dentist
ánd for a healthy pair of teeth )

For the backing I had two pieces of red fabric
I opted for the blood-red with white dots,
 the opposite of the white strip with the red dots on the front,
for the obvious reason ...

and this morning :

snowflakes were falling !!!

( thát's why it had to be the red with the white dots backing )
;-)

( Willem said he liked it, that it was special ...
... that's what hé was as a dentist ! )

donderdag 16 december 2010

old beast .... new beast

I started my December journal quilt with a woven background
all in dark blues : the night sky ...

Then I started with the biggest star,
the one that will have 
a spiral heart 
but :
not now!

This is my latest project that HAS to be finished tomorrow :
an old "beast" of Jude's Patchwork Beasts Class 
which I followed this summer.
I made two similar pieces in pale yellow and white
but I didn't know very well how to continue
so they were still lieing about
waiting for Inspiration ! 

A very vague idea for a present was all that was needed.
Some days ago I finally started : about time !!!
(but sometimes pressure works great for me)

A lot of TEETH were needed !
For this will be a present for our dentist, who is retiring from practice.
( I don't like to go to the dentist : there's always some kind of trouble
but ...
HE took away my greatest fear for dentists looooong ago ! )


At first I thought it would be a dog ....
... but then it turned out to be a horse !
You see ? Even the magic thread is already in place !!!

There is still a LOT of stitching to be done
so :
I BETTER GET ON WITH IT !

vrijdag 10 december 2010

keep on going

YES !
She likes her skarf very much, just the right colours.
This afternoon we had her party and later a lovely
dinner with children, friends and family.
She was wearing a wonderful jacket in those purply colours
(could not have chosen better !!)


This is the mandala I made last Wednesday.
We are working about "animals of power"
The Owl


And I started making the Christmas / New Year cards
for this year. Some years I just buy them, some years I make
them myself. Last year I used the stamps I made when I broke
my wrist in May (that was the only thing I could do instead of
sitting still for four weeks in a plaster bandage)
This time I wás thinking about felting but ......
I made another stamp.
(out of pencil-eraser : nice soft to cut,
and just the right size !!!)
Not finished, but I didn't have another block ... so I will buy that tomorrow
( when I'm off to the knitting group, for the last time this year )

woensdag 8 december 2010

another present

My sister-in-law turned seventy in September
but then they were not home, this Friday we will visit them.
Finding a present was a tough one, I made already
several things for her, so ......what now ?
Last night in bed I suddenly knew !
Colours she will like I think, and long pieces of bubble wrap


 ... lots and lots of ringlets layed out on silk chiffon ...


After wetting it all I had to make sure the inside of the circles was
free of stray fibers ( sorry : bad colours in this picture )

After rinsing and rolling in a towel it was ready for the picture

I hope she likes it

( and they don't follow my blog (yet) so I am safe showing it now ! )

Tonight our drawing group had the last Mandala night for this year
in Februari will be the next one.
.... no time for pictures yet : ... later

zaterdag 4 december 2010

what a present !

I have to tell you :
today we celibrated  (one day early) "Sinterklaas" !
Although the tradition is that the children get presents,
grown-ups get presents too ....

I got the book "Eco colour"
by India Flint !!!

That will be a lot of reading, translating and ... dyeing !

(Then I read that T gathered lots and lots of leaves
from the ironbarktree ... for dyeing ! Just a pity that
Australia is soooooo far away from Holland ... )

woensdag 1 december 2010

in - betweens

Here are some of my in-betweens for this moment
A large part of Europe is caught up in a cold spell of winter
so I'm knitting a new pair of socks.
Because I had nothing "on the needles" for the Stitch'n Bitch club
on Saturday, and I gave away a pair (that were slightly too big)
to a visiting friend with cold feet yesterday.
When it's freezing weather like this 3/4 of our population
is hoping that the freezing period lasts long enough to make the ice
strong on all the small and big canals and lakes we have:
ice skating is a national sport !!!

I learned that Sara badly needed to knit a vest because
many houses in Spain don't have heating !

And for the newborn daughter of a nephew I made a small drawing
( I dread the moment my Karisma box of coloured pencils will be over and out
I still have some replacement, but after that ....nothing : out of production ! )


And because it is December 1 :
special awareness day for aids

( Can you imagine that many young people today are not having safe sex because
they rather take pills afterwards, when they are hiv infected ?
... incredable when you see the results of this disease in Africa )