Roses and Delphiniums

will be on the next wallhanging. I just distributed some of the flowers on the background felt to get an impression:

I need lots more of green leaves, but I should have enough blue flowers already made. I will also make more roses, but this time the background is almost too good to cover it up completely because

Monika my daughter did some lovely freehand motion stitching on it, I love it! She used a beautiful multicoloured thread and the bottom looks almost like pebbles at a river

Somehow I want to have this partly visible. Well lots to think about and to try out.

Beside of this I am working on a crochet top for my daughter Andrea, which I'll try to finish until Christmas, might not work out completely, but it is on a good way. I love to crochet and I have still several tops left which I made, when I was a member of Origin. I will probably undo some of them again, if I cannot find anybody for it. I have given away lots of things already, but there are still 5 more boxes with tops and sox, knitted and felted scarves, vessels, slippers, fingerless mittens and and and..... Would be lovely at least to get something back for the material. Well, can't help and the old car is still here too and nobody wants it. It runs still very well and was valued quite high. I don't think that I will ever sell a car privately again, I will not sell a car again anyway. The new car Alex bougth will be our last car.

I am very pleased that my angels found a new home, they are now for sale at Hot Ginger, a local gallery, which I like very much. It is so inspiring and colourful there!

some more angels

I managed to finish some more angels today

Tomorrow I will go to some local galleries to find out, if somebody would take them on.

stitching on felt

After finally the darning foot for the sewing machine arrived, I tried out some free motion stitching on felt. I have never done it before so it was quite a challenge and it still looks very wobbly. After doing some samples yesterday

I couldn't resist to do something with a felted leave I made some weeks ago, many of those for the next wallhanging. And I am pleasantly surprised about the effect it makes!

It is still very wobbly and basic, but I like the texture it gives the felt. My mind is spinning with ideas now!!

A big thank you to my daughter Monika Kern for all the good advise for the stitching she gives me. I love her quilts and admire the patience she has to do all this beside of work and 3 boys and a big house and garden. Please check out her blog and you will understand how proud I am.

How to carry on?

Last weekend I went to a 3 day workshop with Lisa Klakulak. I am not allowed to show photos here, but in case somebody doesn't know her work, have a look here

It was a very different working for our Far North Felting group, some of the ladies are in their 70s and 80s and they hadn't seen a calculator for many years nor have they used it. We were working with so less wool (4g the first day!) and it had to be layed out so thin, that it could shrink 94%! I will not explain the whole process, I guess that would also be a breach of the promise. Anyway a lot of rolling was involved, one of our very experienced and well known felters said: What I'd rolled today I haven't rolled in 6 months! It was physically challenging! And for some of the members the understanding was very challenging too. 

Before we all left we could see and feel some of Lisa's work, one word: incredible! Amazing fabric! The time she must have spent on it!

The first day I had a moment where I thought, I'd better don't do any felting anymore, because what I am doing is all wrong and not good enough and I think most of the others had the same feeling.

Don't get me wrong, Lisa is a wonderful person, so patient with us oldies and also very patient with our kiwi jokes. It was wonderful to have her here!

But at the moment I feel a bit everything has turned upside-down. I look at my things and think, what the hell am I doing here? Though I had a big success yesterday - my spring wallhanging is now hanging in the Just Imagine Gallery in Russell, the owner liked it very much and it has a very nice and special place. It is not sold of course, but just to be there in this very exquisite gallery, I feel very good about. When I look back to the co-op where one of the members didn't acknowledge fibrework as art, it is a dramatic change to the positive.

But I look at the wallhanging and I find so many things not good enough now, things which could be done better, I almost feel I should start again, make it less rough!

Well this workshop made me think about my work a lot and where I want to go with, haven't fully figured it out yet. I certainly want to produce better quality and I have to find my own way, because to do it totally her way is just impossible for me.

Well I guess I can at least post a photo just of my samples I ended up with

I haven't done any stitching yet. I didn't take my sewing machine, but in the meantime the freemotion foot arrived and I will start soon. Maybe I can do some stitching on the background felt for the next wallhanging.

finished

The first wallhanging is now finally finished.

I fixed some too loose hanging petals and I sew cotton fabric as backing on, which makes it look tidier.
I quite like how it hangs at the moment with the light coming through the background, but eventually it will just hang at a wall.

it is fixed with velcro to a board and can be taken off

overhanging leaves at the sides and bottom

A blank canvas/felt now for the next one!

you can see that I cut wrong first and had to fix it,
but that will not show up once it is covered 

Beside of this we have already found early bird flights to Germany next year. It sounds very odd, I know, we just came back. But it was such a good deal! Now it is blocked for another week until we have to pay it. Still making my mind up if I can bear to go knowing that son and his partner are not very pleased about us coming again. And the need for housesitters again is not a very nice thought too, but:
looking forward to catch up with friends again, visiting some wonderfull exhibitions hopefully, not to forget our favourite beer gardens will outweigh everything else :)

almost finished

is the wallhanging now

I added kowhai flowers

and korus

detail of the kowhai flowers

detail of the clematis flowers and buds

some water drops

and the finished wallhanging

I still want to cover the back with fabric because the wool is very fluffy and fabric would makes it look tidier. And I might do the odd stitching to fix some too loose petals.

Clematis Spotting

This afternoon was such a nice sunshine, that we decided to go for our favourite Matauri Bay Scenic drive to hunt for some native clematis views. We didn't see big white patches as in years before, but we spotted some plants with smaller flowers. I was now looking up information about it  http://www.terrain.net.nz/friends-of-te-henui-group/new-plant-page/native-clematis.html  and learned that they were possibly female plants which have smaller flowers.

I discovered the first one near Te Ngaire Bay

and Alex remembered a big patch near Mahinepua

zoomed in

We saw quails on the way to and from Mahineapua beach

and lots of kingfishers

the 3rd one just flew away when I pushed the button

I always love this view on the way 

New were 5 emus nearby, I tried to take photos but they turned out all very blurry

It was raining when we came to Whangaroa, but the tide was out and we saw spoon bills and lots of herons and oyster catchers

On the way home we made a little detour to Puketi Forest - gravel road the first time with the new car!

Well thats how a black car looks after

primavera

Here are some shots from a first layout of the spring wallhanging.

it needs some more leaves, they are already in the making

clematis paniculata

including buds

and of course lilies

I have lots more of the clematis and the idea is, once I have established a 'bush' background have them  - attached to  vines - climbing up. The base is build by monstera leaves and the arum lilies, which flower so rich in spring, well more in winter, but they are still there. On the way down to the water near the Rewa Village grow lots of monsteras, they have flowers too at the moment.

Finally home

Every time we come home from a long trip overseas I say, I will not do that anymore. Not that I don't like to travel. But it is always so annoying to come home and find the house so changed. This time it is my room, which the housesitters turned over, where all my things are stored. It is quite a messy room, because I never have enough space, but I have some kind of strange order there and I know where my things are. I always prefer nobody touching this room and so I feel very upset. Things have obviously been removed and possibly stored outside under the carport, I found on top of the boxes leftovers of the plants which hang in the carport. Everything is just banged in very careless on top of each other. A nice example: my dyes which are partly dissolved stored are now under heaps of other things, well very easy that it falls over which might give an interesting colour result. I feel lost and don't know where to start and have no motivation to do so. I am sitting here surrounded by mould, very pleasant. How on earth can I finish the wallhangings?
Is it just me? I wouldn't dream to change peoples things around if I would housesit somewhere. My son-in-law said, well they probably needed the space for guests or so. So is this normal behaviour not to ask the owner first at least? It must be me, I am an dinosaur, an old grumpy women, who doesn't like to find her pillows mouldy and her art things touched.

and another rose

tried to make a 'nuno flower', I think organza would work better

dyed the silk in very pale pink and apricot
added some white and pink wool and a bit of magical work

working on roses

I made rose petals a long time ago. Now that I bought some pink dye at Wollknoll on Wednesday I finally dyed the petals today and started working on the roses.

pink dye powder dissolved in hot water with some vinegar
in the little bucket are the wet withe petals

I dipped only the outside into the dye

then placed it on cling film in several layers, all with
more plastic between and fixed it in the microwave

a second batch with slightly darker pink

also wrapped in cling film and fixed in the micro wave

then assembled in 3 or 4 layers stitched together with some golden seed beads

dark and light mixed

in every layer a cut and twisted

added some leaves

Almost finished, still needs some more shaping and fulling