Tif Challenge My Workspace

The Tif Challenge which Sharon set this month was to think about My Workspace. Some times I would rather not, lol.
It's just too small!!! I spend half of my time tidying, moving things around to make more room. It may look organised from this first picture but no, there is just far too much in one room.

The problem is that when I want to use something I normally have to shift something out of the way. You see this room is only about 7ft x 8ft and there is a cupboard taking up most of the space.

Yes, I have my lap top and two machines on one desk.


This is the opposite side of the room with the desk under the window. This is supposed to be my drawing desk, huh... hardly! Note the felt pieces laying in a tray at the back. So, does anyone out there have a magic word that makes a space extend??? If you do please let me know. Thanks Tricia

Tif Challenge July: Half Way Mark and other things.

Well, it's the first of August I finished this challenge last night. I didn't blog about it before hand as I wasn't sure until the last minute whether the idea would work.

It was really an experimental piece of sorts because I tried different techniques to those I have tried in the past. All in all as a piece of work I don't particularly like it but it says what I wanted it to say, well I hope it does.

Half Way Mark to me made me think back to the hot summer exam days. Sitting in a hot classroom in silence watching the clock tick by trying desperately to finish my exam paper before the time was up. I would always be thinking whether I had reached the half way mark of the exam. Half way through the time and was I half way through the paper yet.

Well, as it was Summer I wanted to try an image of my sunflower in the garden, this was to represent the time of the exams. The Sunflower seemed the perfect vehicle to represent the feelings that I had at that time, just wanting to escape from the exams into the holidays, so this in a subtle way became my clock.

You can just about see the hands on the sunflower, I didn't want the image to be any stronger than this because the feelings of being trapped inside a classroom at that time of the year were very strong but the summer holidays blotted it all out afterwards and I was able to forget, so that's why the hands of the clock are so subtle. I hope the meaning is understood.

HAY MAKING.

Well, the last few days the farmers have been haymaking, infact as I am writing this I can hear the bailing going on. A little while ago this field looked so different, tall golden grass shimmered in the sun. Now it lays flat in this picture.

Sometimes I feel a little sad at the end of a summer day, I also feel somewhat disappointed that I can't see fully the wonderful sunsets because we have so many trees around here but then I wouldn't be able to take such lovely pictures of the light streaming through the trees at the end of the day. I love these two pictures because of the atmosphere that is created by the broken light.

Both of these views are taken from the back of my garden, I am so lucky to live here.

SCOURING THE FLEECE.

I's funny thinking about the two pictures above. Now that the hay is bailed, the sheep will soon be returning into the field behind our house. Another reason why I am so very lucky is that I have got to know the local farmer and he lets me have a few fleece (from the sheep I see behind my garden) for a very reasonable sum. Now the hard part, I am half way (that's funny those words again) through the scouring. I have five left to do. I was able to have five black and five white. I only have the white left to scour now. Here is the last of the black soaking in my giant washing up bowl which I bought many years ago just for this purpose. It soaks overnight and then I rinse it in the morning, before letting it drip in, guess what?

The old dog cage I have. This works just brilliantly because not only does it support the weight, which you must do when the fleece is wet as it damages the fibres if they are stretched, but it also stops the wind from blowing it about and it contains it, and stops my pets from thinking they have a new bed. As you can see my cat is taking quite an interest. I think that they like the smell. My cats are always trying to get into my workroom which is out of bounds to them because being siamese they can be the naughtiest cats you can imagine, they will shred my fibres all over the place given half the chance.

This fleece doesn't look much at the moment but once it is carded it will be lovely, it's so very soft and I will have great fun blending it on my drum carder. Oh well, must get on with some work. BFN Tricia

Tif Challenge June: Stories

I want one.
Well, you can't do for one and not the other, it was always the same when my daughter was growing up, now she is grown up she isn't jealous of her brother anymore but my grand daughter had a bag from me last month for doing so well in her gymnastic's competition and when she saw it my daughter said those three little words. "I want one"
Of course it had to have her name on it too, just like my grand daughter's. Well, I did have some fun with it. I used my new toy; the embellisher. Well, I didn't have a pattern, I started with an idea of making it somehow geometric. I began with squares with the idea of a patchwork.
I used some lovely linen which I bought at a fabric sale recently, on this I embellished some silk from behind. The effect I wanted and managed became very soft and furry a little like faux suede. One of the silks is an orange shot silk and I noticed by embellishing this a lot the colours of the orange almost seperate as they are weft and warp after all. the other silk was an old hand painted silk scarf. the effect was amazing, it was like creating a new fabric.
Here is a close up of the silk scarf needle punching that I did from behind. I embroidered her name and the surround of this oblong in my own hand spun silks
I used curtain rings and a cut down chop stick for the clasp as I liked the wood with the linen. I also used the wooden curtain rings to attach the strap.

There is a story behind this bag. I have always been interested in symbols and symbolism. I think sometimes I almost think in symbols. As I was making this bag I was thinking how difficult it is when you live so far away from family. My daughter lives up one end of the country and we now live at the other end. I know at times she would like her Mum and Dad to be near by, when things go wrong it would be nice to be able to help each other.

Well, this made me think of how I felt when my own Mum passed away. I was trying to come to terms with feeling very lost, we had been so very close for many years. This feeling of being lost I remember articulating in one sentence, I can remember saying to someone, "it's as though I have lost my compass and I have no point of reference anymore."

I felt I put something very special into the design of this bag because the circle and lines around the circle symbolise the points of the compass but I have also placed some of them to one side. It's like saying we may not be near by but we are still here. We live our seperate lives but we are still part of the same family. All the squares in the bag fit together and this symbolises a kind of unity even if we are apart for much of the time. I am going to tell my daughter to read this when she receives the bag as I am sure it will hold a lot of meaning to her too.

Well, I may be late with my June Tif Challenge but better late than never.