summer solstice

 Happy Summer Solstice !

Not yet finished.
For that will surely take a lot more time
and a better copy of the Stonehenge ground plan,
one with the fallen stones and the lintels on it.

What a lovely combination with the sunflowers !!!
(that I received yesterday)

One of our house guests for a few days was interested.

Normally they love to sit in my work-chair 

just an idea . . .

An idea popped into my head
when I was thinking about the inside of my sun piece.
I tried threads, a strip of old lace
but I wasn't sure about any of it.
And then I thought : why not
STONEHENGE

After some searching
I found the plan of the stones
that form the imposing monument of Stonehenge
Nothing better to fill in the heart of my solstice piece !

Sadly our (rather new grrrr) printer is not behaving well,
so only the big standing stones
(that were coloured black) were on my copy.
These are the ones I stitched so far
. . . . .
I will have to find a way to transfer
all the fallen stones (gray) on my cloth as well !

(it is really summer here : a heatwave and also
a major thunderstorm yesterday !!!)

wordless Wednesday

 

such sweet memories !!!

Today we had a lovely
"long-time-no-see" friend with her daughter
visiting us !

Sixty eight years ago I first met Karin.
We were both having our summer-camping-holiday in Austria :
we were from The Netherlands (Rotterdam)
and they came from Germany (Nürnberg)
We were both single girls away with our parents
(my much older brother never went with us)
Not speaking the language
is no big problem for children :
we played, we talked with our hands
or asked the grown ups to translate for us.
We had a click were very happy together.

On our way back home we stopped by their place
and that was the start of a loooong friendship
and many many letters
after I started German in the second year
in secondary school.

In August 2020 the Stitch Club workshop by Anne Kelly
was about making a leporello booklet
and I decided to make one about my long friendship with Karin.
I unearthed ephemera that I didn't know I still had
and had such great fun making the booklet !!!

My dearest Karin and daughter Jana
(who, with her brother, made this trip possible)

THANK  YOU  SO  MUCH

for this lovely visit !!!

I hope we can still repeat it in the future !

wordless Wednesday

 

a textile day !

Yesterday daughter and I visited the
"Textiel Festival"
in Amersfoort.



It was the last day of four days stuffed to the brim :
with the presence of all the major textile associations,
workshops, lectures, the results of a competition,
exhibitions through the (lovely old) city,
an Arts & Crafts market and
about 800 "hoops" ("Rondje Textiel")
filled with any textile technique
you can think of !!!

It was a sunny and (too) warm day
so we picked the things we liked most to visit.
I'm sorry to say we just missed "The Red Dress"
because we had to wait too long for a time-slot
but we're happy to have seen the "Colorminds"
and the three "LAK" ladies.
(and of course we came home with some goodies !)

It was a wonderful day !!!
A big THANK  YOU  to the organisation
and all the volunteers who made this possible !

Thank you !

 After a quiet Sunday
a very busy Monday and again a quiet day today
I have time to tell you that we had a lovely Saturday
at the GRIETMARKT !

(ready for the start)

Sunshine, a sweet friend assisting me,
a happy friend in the next stall who had her first try,
lots of nice people to talk to about felting, stitching and painting
and some sales !
We went home satisfied.

A big
THANK  YOU
to the team who organized the market
and my customers !!!

wordless Wednesday

 

ART MARKET Amerongen

Only a few more days from now
on Saturday
Mai 9
 

I will be at the

GRIET  MARKT

again !

If you are anywhere near,
please come to Amerongen to this wonderful market
with lots of organic products, design and art
to choose from.
And . . . there will be music too !

In addition to my gouache paintings I am also bringing
textile panels with birds, with flowers and with abstract stitching,
and lots of felt objects.

 

Textile jewelry : like the new necklace here,

small felted bags, fish, finger puppets and insects.

It would be lovely to see you there !!!

birthday and painting

Yesterday
I had a lovely birthday with friends
and there will be more celebrating this Sunday :
a dinner party for a special round-figure birthday !

80


Right now the garden is looking lush with blooming trees and new greenery
(haha, birthday beauty for me !)

Just some days ago I started a new gouache painting.
After the initial idea sketch I made a bigger one 
with more elaborate details,
one ready to move onto the heavy water colour paper.
(I often use a grid for that)

I work in layers, starting with the background.
Earlier on I made the whole background in one colour
but with gouache, unlike acrylic paint,
the pigment dissolves again when the next wet layer is added
(colours start mixing !)
So now I changed that and leave certain parts open.

This far I finished today.

 

a fresh start

April started with sunshine and a few showers
but rather cold and windy
so a perfect time to start a new painting.
I always make several small sketches
of ideas that come into my head
for the narrative gouache paintings I love to make.

People sometimes ask
if I shouldn't make illustrations for (children's) books
but then I always tell them
there is already a little story in it . . .

"helping a friend"

I love the visiting birds in our garden
so here's another painting with a great tit in it.
(I made one with them before and it was sold)

Because the Amelanchier (Juneberry) in the garden is in bloom
I thought it was just right to add that one too.
The fun part is, that this (still) small tree
was sown by some bird a few years back !!!

I start with the background when the sketch is on the paper
(300grams watercolour)

There are more sketches
but, tomorrow we have daughter and the children
looking for Easter eggs in the garden
(and it doesn't matter they don't have the egg-hunting age anymore !)

snippets

The long "Tabula Rasa" strip
that I started in Januari
is lying around most of the time
but near by
in case I want to add some snippets
or make a few stitches.

Because with the start of spring near
and the garden changing each day a bit more to green
I decided to move that colour
for this month.

There are clumps of yellow
of the small "tête-à-tête" daffodils
but the rambler rose is already showing many green leaves !

I leave this for a bit :
other (red) things to do !

again red

March already
and the weather is really spring-like.
Snowdrops, aconites and crocuses are gone
but bunches of small daffodils
and wood anemones are taking over.

The lava-piece is growing slowly.

The center section will be the flowing lava
so there will be lots more dark stitching
on the top and bottom
(20 x 50 cm)

Of course there are some lovely
Kaffe Fasset bits in this piece !

("Roman glass" and "Paperweight")

There will be another RED piece in the making in a hoop
that has to be finished by the end of the month !

("Playing with red")

And even more red :

for earrings

red

RED
I love that colour
(I even have 4 pairs of red shoes !)
But this time I made a base for stitching in red.
(50 x 20cm)

There are all kinds of snippets in it
that have special memories for me, I like that.

Of course the next step is always
basting everything invisibly down, the way Jude Hill taught us.
So every bit is really secure before any real stitching starts.

I don't have a clear idea of where this is all going
but I saw a marvelous video somewhere
of lava streaming from a volcano.
HOT

I let it rest a bit for now
(and work on something else)