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  It's Ash Wednesday, which is a very solemn day in the church calendar.  So it seems odd that it's such a bright, sunny day.  We had the most glorious rosy pink sunrise this morning, but I couldn't capture the colour on camera.  It washed out the pink, but my trying to take the picture was accompanied by a beautiful dawn chorus of birdsong.  I'm going into Leeds today, for this month's Stitch Art meeting at the gallery.  I'll also attend Mass at the Cathedral.  Then I'll  spend the afternoon having people tell me I've a black smudge on my forehead.  Or I'll feel guilty as I've rubbed the ashes off to avoid people telling me I've a black smudge on my forehead....  Oh well, on to other matters.  I'm making progress with this page of my Ann Wood fabric book.  It's sashiko / boro insipred, and I'm liking the simplicity of it.  I think we're on day 48 now, so nearing halfway through the challenge.   I finished readin...

  It's late on Sunday afternoon and it's been the greyest of days since the colour grey was invented.  Honestly, not a speck of blue sky to be seen, and now it's getting dark.  So it's lights on and curtains closed.  I'm in need of some vivid colour, and this painting 'A Japanese Girl' by Jacob Kramer fits the bill nicely.  The zingy yellow and orange are stunning, aren't they?  I only saw this for the first time mid-week, when I tootled along to Leeds Art Gallery for the first StitchArt session of 2025.  We were looking at portraits this time, and were given a piece of cotton stretched over a hoop, a needle with a big fat eye and a box of embroidery thread to rifle through.  The idea was that we sew a portrait, of ourselves or someone else, and incorporate images that reflect the person's likes and interests.  The theme came about because of a new exhibition at the gallery, all dedicated to portraits.   First of all, my portrait of...

  Okay, I know this looks weird, but the creative urge can take you in all kinds of strange directions, can't it?  The prompt for day four of Abstractuary was 'Totem'.  I googled it and the meaning I went with is ' a person or thing regarded as being symbolic or representative of a particular quality or concept '.  That got me thinking about a wall hanging I made a while ago - and previously blogged about on here - based on textile art by Ulva Ugerup.  (Look her up if you've not heard of her.  She's fab.)  Ulva made a wonderful textile work called 'Angels of Wrath', and I used that as a basis for my own stitched piece.  So, for Abstractuary I thought I'd make a kind of stylized doll similar to my stitched angel of wrath.   She's got a black felt body, the front with red material appliqued on it, a felt oval for a face, and is stuffed with fabric scraps.  I used thin copper wire to make the crazy hair, and threaded beads and broken j...

If, like me, you're not familiar with the work of artist Rex Ray then here's a brief intro via the wonders of YouTube.   Why am I showing you this?  Because, if you stopped by yesterday's post you'll have seen info about Abstractuary.  The arty prompt for 2nd February was Rex Ray, and I took inspiration from his collages and tried making my own.   Hmmm ... me and collages don't get along.  I tried cutting out painted papers and glueing 'em down, then switched to colouring pencils and tried that.  But I always end up with stuff that looks like a primary school kid made it.  So instead I took up needle and thread.   It's not finished yet, but it's a fabric postcard-sized bit of stitching, and is meant to represent one of his paper collages.  I think I'll eventually make a fabric book based on this Abstractuary challenge, and this will form one of the pages.   Today's prompt is 'print' and as I haven't hauled out the gel...

  Goodbye January, the month that feels like it's stretched out to be extra-long, the month we have to plough through to get to February and real signs of Spring.  You may know, if you've wandered by this blog before, that I'm beavering away at Ann Wood's 100 day stitchbook challenge.   That's still going strong.  Three pages done and I've started page four.  But I've also stumbled across another monthly challenge, and this one originated with Tori Chatfield, a.k.a. Kool Kooky Kreatures.  You can find her on YouTube and Facebook, and she runs something called Abstractuary.  Tori's produced a list of prompts for each day in February, and the idea is that you produce something arty or crafty based on those prompts.  You can stitch or paint or collage or use whatever kind of materials you want. I won't commit to following these prompts every single day of Feb, but I'm certainly going to use several of them.  Tori's also produced a Pinterest...