photo-start

Yes, why not a photo-start
instead of a photo-finish ???
Well, here the photo was the inspiration,
it was the beginning of another wonderful STITCH CLUB workshop by
Sue Stone

I think it was Sue's fourth workshop already,
but she never stops to amaze me
with her thorough way of teaching !
She made three series of little works and added
plenty of ideas and "what-if's" !

Finding a suitable photo was my first step
but when I found one, all else followed suite :
our granddaughter at 4 showing her swimming goggles
(she will be 22 very soon !)

The first work in just stitch

The result after many many stitches

Then came the next piece with a lot of appliqué.

Ohhhhh . . . a puzzle of many different pieces of fabric

All the puzzle pieces in place and ready to stitch

Number two finished

The last one was trial and error :
wrong kind of fabric at first !!!

better choice for after unpicking the first try !

And number three finished

The very last step will be to frame them,
probably separately.
Each on measures about 16 x 17 cm.

faces

This week's Stitch Club

was a bit of a problem for me.

The style in which Ailish Henderson works

"is definitely not me"

too loose

Luckily I was still busy with a "travel book"

for Anne Kelly

that took most of the week :

to find stuff

(old pictures, bits of paper, bits of fabric)

glue all of it on the background,

let it dry,

add more embellishments and hand stitch,

and finally stitch with the machine.

BUT

as it is a present for a faraway friend (and in the mail right now) 

there are no pictures !

After my travel-book was finished

I had no other option

than to leave the Ailish's workshop alone or give it a try 

Some of the results that came through in the group

were just lovely, and that helped !

The third sketch

(after a first try and a second that I ruined with pen and paint)

Adding less paint (water colour) than the first time ...

The end result

and finally happy I gave it a go and kept going ! 

Lots of tiny snippets of thin fabric (including tulle and mesh) 

on face and hair

and the pencil lines stitched with one strand of floss

in different colours

Definitely NOT as loose as Ailish

but I love what it finally turned into ...

Another one (daughter) is ready for stitching

Thank you STITCH CLUB

for some really challenging workshops

that certainly added to my skills !