lazy

I have been lazy recently writing here, but busy with all sorts of other things. Finally I finished yesterday the things to put in our 5th Art in the Garden on the weekend. The floating paua was more difficult than I thought. To felt around the shells was a bit tricky and finally I used some PVA to be sure that it doesn't fall off.

I will take better photos once it is hanging in the Garden. While I was working on this I got so frustrated by the behaving of the wool, that I suddenly realized, the wool would be so much better for a cobweb scarf and  I made a quick decision and did one and I am quite happy about the result. It will definitely get a small paua shell as a clasp or so and I will call it mermaid's wrap

In a spontanious moment I made another hanging for the exhibition, which I call just rainbow. Here it is drying in the shower

This afternoon we (all members of the coop) will meet for a little working bee. I am still waiting for my granddaughter right now. She decided to have a nice long sleep at home and daddy had time, so she will come later today. I will take her with  me to Origin. She can have fun with all the aunties and grannies there ;)

'Felters of the North' Day

We had some fun today trying out some techniques with novelty yarn and fabric pieces to make a scarf

stitches on felt

Here are my first examples of stitches on felt

This is a felted necklace I made some month ago. It is placed on my 'paua' wool

dye and felting day

First I dyed some carded gotland wool in 'paua' colours - shades of turquoise/teal/blue/green

I spilled some of the dye and so I used a silk scarf to wipe it

I bought last year some alpaca fleece quite cheap, they were already some years old and not treated at all. While looking through all my treasures I looked in this bag

and thought I might try it out today. I spun a bit just from the fleece

and then I decided to card some

The carding machine belongs to my daughter and I don't have much experience with it, but I was happy with the result

and so I made a quick decision, to felt a scarf

It felted really great and quickly and is now drying under the carport. I think I will add some pearls and do some embroidery once it is dry.

Yesterday was a day with my granddaughter Storm

felt united

Finally managed to take photos ... :)

Springtime

Now we are back in Kerikeri for 2 weeks, and I worked in the shop already 3 times. I like the new layout, it is so light and spacy.

We have a wonderful textile exhibition of Agnes Hauptli at the moment, she is such an amazing weaver!

Beside of all this inspiration, I still feel quite exhausted and a bit blocked, so I decided to do an online felting workshop with lots of challanges to get me going again.
And I am still reading India Flints book, already thinking about which kinds of plants I have in the garden which may be used for dyeing. I did a lot of plant dyeing in the 80s in Germany, mainly with all sorts of leaves. Now I will explore what my garden offers. We have so many impatiens, they grow like weed here and need ongoing removing. And then all the Nz natives! I guess inkweed is worth a try like the name says.  Unfortunately I don't have gumtrees, but here in Kerikeri are still some around, and I can collect fallen branches with leaves. Its sad to see a lot of the old shelter belts beeing removed including the orchards behind them to make space for new subdivision.