rubykittyruby

Bright sunny days and light evenings, tulips and daffs flowering along with anemones, grape hyacinths and forget-me-nots.  What's not to like about this time of year?  Of course, the date the clock's go forward by an hour is strange as you feel oddly discombobulated for the entire day.  The same goes for when the clocks go back in the autumn.  Time's shifted when it's normally so dependable, and your internal body clock needs a while to adjust.   In between gardening and allotmenting I've completed another page for my Ann Wood stitchbook, and that - if my maths is correct - means I've only 6 more pages to sew before I'm all done 'n' dusted.   I also began making another fabric book, this one nothing to do with the stitchbook challenge.  I have a rectangle of sample fabric that's ideal for a cover, being a sturdier upholstery material, and sewed a scrap of Indian embroidery on to it.  Plus added a sari-silk ribbon as a closure. ...

  It's Friday afternoon and I'm sat on the sofa, full of chocolate and tea, ready for another rambling blog post about what I've been up to.  Mainly eating chocolate and drinking tea, to be fair.... actually, I have been reasonably busy, in between bouts of whingeing about the cold weather.  The above page is another finished one for my Ann Wood 100 days stitchbook challenge.  This embroidery is probably the most traditional kind of design I've done so far, and reminds me of those embroidered tablecloths and tray cloths you find in charity shops.   This is my next page that's just been started.  I'm using a piece of calico that's been coloured and stenciled with acrylic paint.  The paint makes the material rather stiffer to push a needle through, but it's manageable.   Apart from that, I've been revisiting some YouTube videos I first watched several months ago.  They're by Shana who goes under the channel name of Shanouki Art - link...

I'm still immersed in trying to uncover my family tree, but in between I've been catching up on 'The Archers' (George - what a nasty piece of work he's turning into) and re-watching the grim but compelling Scandi Noir series 'Wisting' on the BBC iplayer.  I've also been making a couple of art journals, using papers I'd painted and stenciled ages ago but that'd sat around waiting for me to do something with them.  There are certain crafty activities that're immensely pleasing and that definitely includes putting simple books together.  Compiling signatures, using a bone folder to make sharp creases in the paper, choosing fabric or a printed paper for the covers.  If I can get my act together I want to make three as Christmas presents, but with December just around the corner I really need to get a wiggle on.   I'm also sewing another Jude Hill inspired piece of slow stitching.  A moon in a starry sky.  It's going to be a little wall ha...

  On Saturday it was off to Leeds Art Gallery again, this time for the first class of a four-week course making textile art journals.  It's something I booked months ago, hesitating for ages before committing to it as there're other things I could've done with the money.  But I'd been to a class by the teacher before - embroiderer Hayley Mills-Styles - and knew I'd enjoy it.   It's being held in the Drawing Room, a multi-purpose arty space, where we're surrounded by lots of lovely scrap fabrics, sorted by colour in all those brown bags.  Plus yarn in tempting colours.  All available to make the most of.   Through the glass doors is the Sewing Room where the machines are kept and we can use as needed.   I'm hoping that later on in the course I'll have a chance to do freehand embroidery on one of them.   Note all the stitchy examples of textile work pinned up on the wall.  I love looking at what others have done. ...

  I'll begin with photos of gravestones.  Yup, gravestones.  Why?  Just 'cause I was taking a shortcut through a cemetery this morning and these old stones are so beautifully made.  All the little glimpses of past lives you get as you wander by.   The grass was being mown, and the scent rising up from it was lovely.  Apparently grass releases the scent as a stress reaction to being cut.  According to the all-knowing Google, the scent's made up of chemicals called GLVs (green leaf volatiles), a mixture of oxygenated hydrocarbons.  The things you learn from a casual internet search.   My photos aren't the best, are they?  I mean, you can see my trainers in this one!  I'll have to go back when I've more time and take some decent shots.  But this inscription's interesting as Ann Robinson, the blacksmith's wife, lived until a ripe old age.  82 was pretty good going in the 1800s, wasn't it?   During my w...

Another cold, bright day, and I spent the morning indoors, reluctantly dragging a vacuum cleaner around before getting down to the nicer task of adding wadding to the back of this patchwork.  Backing fabric's now tacked on, and it's ready to be stitched.  I also squeezed in some reading.   I'm currently immersed in 'Transcription' by ever-excellent Kate Atkinson, who can be relied upon for a well-written book.  The book I recently finished - hmm, not so good.  I'd fancied a lightweight cosy crime, something easy, quick to read, and picked 'A Pen dipped in Poison' by J.M. Hall.  Oh my, I've never come across a story in which so many people sigh.  Characters sighing all over the place!  There's a fair amount of frowning too, and one character is constantly depicted as stirring a cup of coffee, supposedly to indicate thoughtfulness.  Seriously, if I was in a coffee shop with her I'd be snatching that spoon out of her hand and yelling 'For g...