Playing with paint

Playing with paint
abstract art

12 August 2014

Super Moon and More pages ready

Sunday night I woke in the middle of the night...the result of dreaming a snake was chasing me at the farm.....and when I looked out and saw how bright the moon was, I realised it was the time of the Super Moon.  This is when the moon is closest to earth over our area.   Although I did discover that the event was in fact last night ..trust me to get is wrong.

Wee hours of Sunday night
Monday night  













Both nights  could not resist going outside in my pj's to  take photos. The first one is very clear, and don't remember what setting that was on so second one was not as good.  The moon looked much closer in reality and it was amazing to see it so close.

I managed to finish off this page.  The theme has a story that I wanted to include in the book as this technique played a big part in my embroidery journey.  When I first learned embroidery in 1994 I became obsessed with crazy patchwork and created a number of bears, cushions etc.   The circular piece I used for the the head of the butterfly was one of a pair that was to be made into earrings....never happened.  The body was to be added to a shirt....never happened either..... so I resurrected them for a page in the book.

The seams are stitched in gold thread. Because of the busyness of the wings I did not want to overpower the body so the three images across the bottom of the collage are closeups of the 3 embellishments I did on the head and body.  The wings fabric was left over from making a clutch bag for a bride, and the fabric was left over from her wedding dress which she gave me to keep.

Over the weekend I managed another finish. It shows a method of couching.   The design was something I created when I took part in  Sharon Boggon's journal course , where we learned about colour and design.
I have called it Cactus Garden.  The I used bright pink 'rats tail' which I couched with herringbone stitch.  The beads were from my stash. I might add that the postcard is really straight on the piece, but dont seem to get straight photos.

The above page also has a story, and was created for a challenge also at the beginning of my embroidery journey.

 The theme was "joy" and applique was the technique to be used.  Well! the only applique I knew was commercial applique on shirts, I had never heard of Visofix, my library of embroidery techniques was non existent and I had no one I could ask.  So the above is the result.

The stitching is deplorable, but it was what it was at the time so is really significant in showing how far I have come from those early days.  I am enjoying getting all these old memories together.

I actually do still have the first bear I embroidered and display it proudly on a shelf.  But that can be a blog for another day.  The stitching is so ugly, but I love that little bear.

Till next time .....




9 comments:

  1. you have certainly caught the moon there Shirley. Lovely that you are sharing your stitching journey, and how god that your are making these treasures into a book. Good to know that the snake chase was only in your dreams

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  2. Missed that super moon, must have been snoozing. Nice to see those repurposed embroideries get a new exciting life.

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  3. What fun to see your pieces! There is always something to learn and to keep learning is good for our heart, minds and souls. Thanks for being an inspiration to me.

    FlowerLady

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  4. What a nice way to record your stitching journey. I find it so difficult to photograph the moon.
    Deb

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  5. Your pieces are beautiful and what makes them more beautiful is you have a story on the back of each of them.
    I think the most precious pieces of work are the ones which you do at the start of your artist career as they show your raw talent.

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  6. It's wonderful that you could resurrect your once-to-be earring into another piece.

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  7. It is lovely to see work form the past. You're right that our stitching and methods have developed since then but I can't see anything wrong at all with your pages. I really like them all.

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  8. pretty!
    i missed the moon, but as everyone's been posting photos i had a look at least.

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  9. Shirley, it's good to see your early stitchings. Your Joy just pops off the page. The colours are great! I like your Butterfly and Cactus Garden, too. It's interesting to read what propels one to perfect their stitching techniques. I think of it as a lovely journey. Thanks for inviting me along!

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