wordless wednesday

today felt like stitching

Suddenly came to me, that

today felt like stitching.

I collected some bits and pieces this morning,

then a book to read the last bit till the end,
and some other business after lunch ...

so late in the afternoon I finally could get started.

Three very thin layers to start with

and the pointy turquoise piece :

a star it would be.

Ofcourse I began with glueing the green

layers to the white base

(probably will never do it any different 

since learning that from Jude !)

It felt so good to stitch again

O yes, that black and white strip will be definately in there somewhere !

After dinner I continued till the daylight was fading  somewhat,

I don't like stitching with lamplight in summer.

Here's a friendly face

and the strip is so narrow

I could thread it through a needle and pull it through

to the front :

a star with a tail 

The project I was working on the last few days

has almost come to a standstill :

At this moment the ball of yarn is almost gone ...

and I'm NOT finished with the pattern !!!

So ...

what shall I do ?

Frog the last bit and make it smaller ?

Buy a new ball ?

Ask around if anyone has a bit of this colour left ?

?????

Don't know yet what to do

.....

(ha, that's funny, now that I see the pictures together :

similar colours !)

change in the garden

The heavy rains of some days ago are gone

and there is more sunshine again,

but the garden has changed.

The beautiful poppies are gone ofcourse,

but also the lots and lots of Allium roseum

are over now

no seeeds, but tiny tiny dark red brood balls,

each one a promise for a new plant

in the future ...

but ..... I have really enough of them 

so I cut or gently pull them out.

When I accidently also pull the white bulbs 

I cut them off and will keep them for a friend 

(so she can enjoy their abundance as well !)

But with these Alliums out, there's enough else left

enough so to take some flowers inside

(Rose, Nigella, Prunella, Phuopsis, Ornithogalum magnum) 

There is always something to do and to enjoy in a garden

*

Man is thinking about making a new stitch-and-burn mandala

a beautiful flower on its own

(keep you posted about the progress)

late and early

After all the beautiful sunshine days

you could say the weather today was 

disappointing.

In fact it rained alllllll day long.

What better way to use such a day

than to do someting that you should have done

a long time ago

Ha,  ofcourse there are a lot of such things ...

(like cleaning up the room I'm sitting in right now)

but in this case I mean

making this month's felting-exchange piece.

The theme was "parts" and "uniting"

The idea for it was long in my head,

but every time I wanted to get started

something else happened.

Four parts in dark lilac and three shades of turqoise,

at the side the colour of one part runs along the side of the next.

Four spikes in the same colours, put into opposite coloured parts.

Then I cut open the top layer.

I liked it this way, but ... as I have to send it in the mail 

I opted for this version.

HA ! then onto the next !

The theme for next month was a bit awkward :

"autumn colours"

(well, the exchange goes on for a whole year ....

and some people do love autumn best)

So, in the middle of the green spring : autumn !

First some different coloured spikes, then, they were covered with "autumn"

All felting by hand, otherwise the veins would have disappeared.

And then :

cutting into the surface of the veins 

to reveal the colours inside

;-)

Later in the afternoon

I sewed some seed beads and stitches 

on the "parts" one

Tomorrow both pieces will be in the mail

and I hope each one of the receivers likes her piece.

transient beauty

I'm always waiting for some special flowers 

to appear.

They're there one moment

...

and gone the next.

(well not thát quick of course ...

but in a manner of speaking short-lived)

Ta-daaaaah 

Papaver orientale

(a perennial plant)

Some years I wait and there's not a flower in sight

but this time :

three beauties together

(and more to come)

*

For my challenge with the embellisher

I made two more "lines"

"lifeline"

(without the string, the kite will fall down / die)

and

"washing line"

(I did the washing line another time 

because I wasn't satisfied with the first one)

Now waiting for Sara's next instruction, this weekend

;-)

more challenge

Although it's already the fourth week

of Sara's challenge

I didn't get around making any new pages.

That's often how it goes :

ideas need some time to stew.

All the "input" has to be turned around and around

in my head, even if I'm not thinking specifically

of making something.

My theme was clear to me 

and I have some little sketches with ideas

but what I'm actually making

can change 

...

One of the lines I thought about were roads,

railway lines, coast/shore line

so I had an old road map

of which I just snipped off a piece

 to somehow use in a page.

It just so happened to be a part of "Zeeland"

in the South West of our country.

All of a sudden it came to me what to write,

after I made the back 

with a blue piece of wool on the embellisher

and punched the map onto it :

In February 1953 

a violent storm together with spring tide

caused a major flooding in a big part of Holland

especially in Zeeland.

I was almost 6 yaers old and I remember very well, 

how far, even in Rotterdam, the water had risen. 

I also finished another page I had prepared earlier.

First I just made some thin lines in running stitch

before I started "writing" with the machine.

  I "wrote" the same words on a piece of  fabric

that I will use as backing of the page.

The fourth week's instruction was one big letter on a page,

like in a medieval manuscript ...

but in fact I did already 

a big "E" on a page.

(maybe I give it another go)

birthday boy

Last Sunday we had a birthday boy :

youngest grandson is two years old now !

Still a bit shy after his nap,

with mom's present 

already tight in his arms :

a bear to accompany his two little monkeys

("zij maakt het") 

We brought with us the other present

that his mom chose for him

which was delivered at our house

to keep it a secret.

It didn't take long before he knew

how to handle the bike 

;-)

One of the other presents :

paper and thick pencils.

It was a wonderful day!

(With the first present he didn't quite catch what to do with it,

but he quickly learned that there was something fun

inside the colourful paper !)

The next day the bear had his portrait taken,

so he can be a star on "Ravelry"

*

Today was probably the last hot day,

so I took some more pictures of the garden

(one of the last blue irises)