Little Houses workshop

Oh where did February go? It ended with my first workshop of the year, a return to Folly Fabrics in Bampton, to hold a 'Little Houses' workshop. I was lodged for the night with the lovely shop owners and I took a jar of Joe's delicious blackcurrant jam as a little thank-you gift. So breakfast on the day was homemade bread and jam. And enough coffee to shake the cobwebs from my brain.

Then off to the shop, to set up. This is the calm before the storm.

 

It's always a full house at Folly Fabrics and I had a lovely mix of returners, some ladies who had seen my latest 'Mollie Makes' cover last year (and traveled a long way from 'down south' to attend)  and a blog friend, from 'Tales from the Weekday Home' - it was really fabulous to meet her in person at last.

While I was staying with Joe, I knocked up this little prototype, so that people had the option of making that or creating their own. Everyone got to work.

And that was it for four hours. Towards the end, the customary cake came out. Don't be deceived by it's innocent simplicity; this view hides the one inch thick filling of chocolate buttercream.

 

I can't remember a workshop where there wasn't a cosy mix of wool, cake and mugs of hot drinks.

Meanwhile, my friend the shop owner, had been quietly making her own delightful  little Scottish croft in the background. It's finished off beautifully. I have bit of a 'proud teacher' feeling about this, but it's mostly down to her own patience and persistence.

So, that was it for February. My next workshop is in Manchester, on the 30th April, with limited spaces, which are filling up; we have just four places left and bunnies to make. If you'd like to come, the booking form is here on the 'Make It  website.

Strawberries and bunnies

Ah, the slight awkwardness of work getting in the way of life and blogging. Work continues and not much else. Several days spent developing a new teaching, pattern and with that in mind,  I have organised a new workshop for them, which is to be held on the 30th April at 'Make It' in Manchester which is already booking up after two days and only a few spaces left. You can book directly through the site here. The bunnies and I will be pleased to see you.

What else? Oh, putting together my first basic needle felt kit, which I should have done ages ago, considering how many times I've been asked for them. I looked at similar starter kits and in some cases was appalled at how little wool was offered, for the price charged. So I have tried to include as much as was physically and economically possible in mine, as well as a sponge mat, pack of decent needles and a wooden holder. 

And at last, my February newsletter is out, with a free and simple pattern for making sweet little strawberries - these only take a small amount of wool, and a few hours (in my case) to make, depending on how wild you go with the decoration. There's also an article about a very odd and as yet unfinished piece of work...you can get the newsletter and pattern here - without even signing up. 

Apart from that, I appear to be surrounded by many small, unfinished things. Such is life.

Yet another hare

Nothing going on, except a lot of planning, designing and unfinished work - here's a little something I have actually completed, with amber chips on a bronze wire. Yes, it's yet another hare. Well, it is nearly Spring!

Memoriam

Three year ago, my darling Andy passed out of my life and out of so many others. Always missed, always loved, never forgotten. Wherever you are my love, I hope you're dancing.

Aunty Pat's portrait

Once upon a time, I was an art student, then I was an artist, and then an illustrator. Always in watercolour. However,  I've had a painting block for nearly four years and one of my things for this year is to pick up things I've neglected - mostly for unavoidable reasons.

Actually, my biggest painting block is with oils - it was my first love when I was a teenager and yet I've only been able to make myself paint one (still unfinished) oil in 25 years. Yes, over two decades. That's some block.

When I was taking photos for my first newsletter, I included a work in progress, Aunty Pat. And I was taken with the light in this picture, as it made a nice portrait. I hunted out some old brushes and paints and set to work before my stupid neurosis could take over. So my studio table was cleared and refilled and a little canvas started.

Here is where I made the first basic error - putting in a warm, creamy brown background, which in hindsight, would have been better as a cool grey or blue.  At the time though, it was enough just to be actually painting again and to my surprise, feeling quite happily at home with it.

It went quite well to begin with, until I looked at it later and realised the light was all wrong; in the photo, the light falls from the right, so I painted her that way. But the background is lit from the left. I had forgotten the most basic thing I'd been taught, 'always look for the light'. 

The next day, I set about correcting it and while it was now pedantically accurate, I had lost the freshness of the paint strokes. However, this was not about doing a perfect picture, it was an exercise to get me painting regularly again. 

In putting down a similar background colour and tone, I found it almost impossible to get Aunty Pat's furry (or rather, woolly)  head standing out as sharply as I wanted, without bringing in too much white. And then I added too much black (which I rarely used in the past and now I know why) to her foreground ear and it just looked messy and dead, colour wise.

But I persevered, and finished it. I don't like it. I know it's the thing nowadays to be terribly pleased with anything one has created, but I had an old fashioned art training, which taught me strict self criticism, in order to be able to improve. And at the end of the day, I broke my oil painting hoodoo. And that was what it was all about. 

I'm going to write this one off to experience and do it again. 

I did sign it though. 

I envy people who can just pick up a brush and sail away happily. For me, it has been like not being able to eat my favourite food: it is, as they say, complicated and may even sound odd. Nonetheless, my inability to 'just paint' has been very real and frustrating. Like being able to swim well, but not able to enter water and still wanting to swim.

I'm off to spend some kindly given Christmas money on some decent brushes, paints and a couple of canvases. I've got a lot of painting to catch up with. Twenty five years, to be precise. 

If you haven't signed up for my newsletter and would like to see the other photos of Aunty Pat, as well as read my tips for getting equal length limbs, you can find the archive here. (You're not obliged to sign up, just click the link for the January newsletter)

Board games by the fire

Taking a few days off over the holiday season meant some quality time plonked in front of the woodburner with some old board games. I introduced Joe to a childhood favourite,  'Coppit'. My 'vintage' version is, as you can see, a bit the worse for wear, but it is still a great game, even cut-throat - if a board game can said to be such a thing.

Once he got the hang of it (after one game), he won every game after. But I got repeated revenge with Scrabble and didn't gloat too much.

Another old favourite of mine is 'Tell Me' - I've had this game in various versions almost all my life. The two I have now are from the 50's and 60's. The same game, but with slight differences and not just in the box design.

It's a very basic concept; general knowledge questions are read out, the disc is spun and lands on a letter of the alphabet and the first person to call out a correct answer (or one which isn't disputed) wins the card. Winner is the person with the most cards. Although simple, the spinning disc brings in the element of randomness, so the answers are different every time.

The 1960s version is almost like the one I knew in the 70's, with fairly straightforward questions -    

    

'something in this room'  'name of a member of parliament' 'an advertising  slogan' (this one is not included in the 50's version; maybe a sign of the times?)

also 'a word used in radio' (very broad and up for debate) 'a means of communication' and a reflection of the growing prevalence of the one-eyed monster in the room, 'a television personality'.

The 50's version has many of the same questions, but also some odd, almost philosophical ones. We played both games, and this one threw up by far the most interesting discussions and verbal tussles. Here are some choice ones - 

'What would you  like to become?' - which could be anything from 'a better person', to 'a proper grown up' to 'a postman'.

'What or who annoys you most?' - again, a debatable subject, and dependent on the alphabet letter thrown up. And should the answer be silly or truthful? Should you say any answer so long as it fits the letter, or not answer because you honestly can't think of anything which annoys you beginning with 'X'?

'What or who do you love very much?' - same situation really, and we tended towards the silly and soppy.

'What frightens you?'  Do we really want to go here? If the letter was the right one for one's honest answer, it could throw up all kinds of deep confessions, but we decided to stick with anything monster-ish or spooky. 

'How do you feel at this moment?' Again, this one can lead onto quite interesting discussions and it's then that you realise how something as simple as a board game can be great conversation makers as well as entertainment.

'Something seen on a country ramble' didn't appear in the 1960's version - maybe it was deemed too old fashioned for the time. A bit 'Enid Blyton'.

'A word reading the same forwards or backwards' is very straightforward, but surprisingly tricky to think of at the time and led to a few drawn out silences as we racked our 21st century brains, more used to Google for the answer to anything.

 

An original owner of the 50's game had obviously decided  to put in their own questions - I have a feeling this may have been 'Dad' as the block lettering is very much like my father's and other men's writing of that time.  So we have something a little more modern

'A term used in inter-planetary space travel' - this was an ambiguous beast and some confusion reigned as to what kind of thing precisely fitted the question. I swung it with 'asteroid' but it didn't really feel right.

'Name of your favourite TV programme'  - again, a more updated question, so maybe this family had a TV of their own. If so, they may have been quite financially comfortable as not many households at that time had them.

The last two seem to have their own little back story. There is -

'A county cricketer, past or present'

 and then

'Not a cricketer but a famous sports person'  

I wonder if there was a cricket expert in the family, and the last altered question was put in to give the others a chance? We will never know, but I'm sure we had as much fun playing these old-fashioned games as previous generations have.  

 

Berrington, the 'Teddy Bear of Doom' went up for sale in my Etsy shop and someone loved him enough to buy him. I know he's gone to a fabulous home, though I had to help him with the packing. So it's been a good start to the new year for both of us and I send everyone best wishes for 2016. 

The swans fly

Joe and I are enjoying our second Christmas together. Yet again it's simply a quiet time; a time of being thankful that we have a roof over our heads, food, logs for the fire and most importantly, each other.  Whatever you do at this time of year - and especially if you are alone - we both send you the warmest of best wishes and hope for the future. Because there is always a better place, despite the long haul to get there.

The Teddy Bear of Doom

How can something so innocent looking cause so many headaches? And yet it did. Back in the spring, I decided to have a bash at making a needle felted teddy bear. Not my usual thing, but I wanted to see if I could. And it took months. Months of picking it up, putting it down, leaving it for weeks at a time and almost giving up. Bits were cut off, bits were stuck back on. It became known as 'The Teddy Bear of Doom'. But I persevered and eventually finished the darned thing. Then came the knitting.

I rarely knit. But I wanted to make a little vest for him. By now it was a 'him'. I used four needles, as I'm more comfortable with four (like socks, which I haven't made for 25 years). Bought a gorgeous ball of soft aqua wool. Cast on, using my own apparent common sense.

How hard could it be to knit a little vest, freehand? All weekend difficult, that's how much. I discarded my first attempt and began another.

So small. So fiddly. So infuriating. It wasn't going to beat me.

After many, many knitting hours, I had finished. Only to discover the big, glaring design flaw. I hadn't thought about the head opening. So it sat on his head like a mushroom cap. At which point, I gave up.

So I did what I should have done in the first place and needle felted him a vest. Took a couple of hours. Not a couple of days.

Then he was thread jointed.

 And so his head, arms and legs swivelled, like a proper teddy bear.

He is one of the largest things I've made, and sits snugly in the hand. I guestimated he took over 50 hours, but that was with a lot of tinkering and remaking. 

And he was, in the end, worthy of his own special tag - named after a tiny village in Shropshire, not a million miles away from where I live. 

The essential problem with him was that he was bigger than my natural making scale. I remembered an early  project from long ago, when I was commissioned to make a monkey. I had to abandon my first gigantic attempt, but the second, smaller one was just right. I blogged my shame and called it 'A Tale of Two Monkeys'. 

But recently, I got the urge to start another jointed figure. This time, non-teddy bear (not really 'me'), but a small fox. And this one is going exactly to plan. So far.