I'm Still Here

It has been a while hasn't it. The camera problem is still... well a problem. Mostly because just after the camera broke, the washing machine broke and died. That had to be a priority to replace. So the camera has had to wait. I took a couple of little projects to work though, and photographed them so that I would have something to show.

This is my February journal. It's called Long Hot Summer. The technique for Feb was collage or layering with scraps. I had no ideas for this, so I decided to just "play". I made a background sewing strips of black and dark blue marbles and batiks and I sliced and resewed these. Onto that I ironed lots of leftovers from applique projects - those shapes that are left with steam-a-seam on after you cut out your applique pieces. I just kept sticking and ironing these on until I had a colourful busy piece. At this point I was back to square one - no ideas about what to do next - so I left if lying on my desk for a few days. One evening when I strolled into the quiltery a spiral design of the background black caught my eye, so I started to work with that. I cut felt pieces to give texture to the black, beaded, couched, stitched (hand stitched even!!!) with lovely hand dyed threads that have been lurking in my drawer ever since I fell in love with them at a show... and eventually along came *Long Hot Summer* The centre spiral is copper wire with orange beads that move around (DH says it's like a round abacus).

I had lots of fun with this and I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I used lots of scraps - the fabric, the felt, the yarn around the edge - so the technique is covered. It has some good texture and dimension (though it might not show in the pic cos it's not great quality), which is a step up from my usual attempts at arty projects which tend to be quite flat.

The weekend looks like being very relaxing... the borders of the Jelly Roll quilt beckon and the garden needs some weeding.

Cheers