More Sheds

Had a lovely day printing again on Thursday afternoon.  Viscosity inked one of my collagraphs and managed to improve my efforts on the second print.

Yorkshire Journal Returns

This week I received my Yorkshire Travelling Journal back completed with work from all my lovely friends up in Yorkshire.  It is always such a surprise when the package arrives and you get to see all the fantastic pieces of work created by everyone.

This was my 'artwork' page and it has a little hole cut into it which reveals a picture from the previous page.  The shed also unfolds and has seasonal writing inside it.

The finished piece of stitching had to be a work of love.  I stitched together lots of tiny hexagons and then overlayed them with sheer fabric, stitched by hand and machine over the top. I think there might even be a little bit of white paint on there for the smoke from the bonfire.  It is a long time since last February when I made it and I have done several other groups of pages since then for the other YTJ's.

Coracle Shed

Like lots of people I love sheds - the colour, texture, smell, the stories they could tell.  I found this one at Ironbridge and it had been used to make coracles.

Another Bank Holiday

Garage Shelf

We have been away for a couple of nights - yet again - this time to a wedding in Buckinghamshire which gave us time to take in a National Trust property too. It was the home of William Morris who created the Morris car.

It was extremely interesting and is set in a time warp as the house has been left as it was when he died.

Lovely shed

Just One More Hut

I promise this is the last hut photograph for a while.  If you have not guessed I have not got anything recent to put on my Blog as I am working on something for the next Journal entry which I want to keep secret for the time being. Unfortunately it is taking me much longer to stitch than I expected.

Beach Huts

Seems I am not the only one participating in the Yorkshire Travelling Journal who likes sheds ....

These two pages are from last year's completed Journals.

Another Shed

DH and I have had a couple of nights away in Devon so that we could visit his Aunt who is in her 90's. We took in Wells Cathedral on the way down and RHS Rosemoor on the way back where I found this delightful shed in the vegetable and fruit garden.  It may appear in my Travelling Journal before too long I think.

Looking to Brighter Times

Last year I came across this picture of allotments in the snow and ice somewhere and was really inspired.  Perhaps it was the colour or more likely the atmosphere the image projected.  I added some poetry and then did my artwork ...

Next came the stitched piece ....

I am currently struggling on with the pages for the January 2016 handover of the Yorkshire Travelling Journal and quite excited, because the next one I will receive will be my own which will be full of a whole year of other people's work as well as my own pieces.

More Allotments

As I have had an horrendous cold since I came back from Missenden Abbey I have not been up to doing much so I have fished out a couple of images from the Yorkshire Travelling Journal for 2014 to delight you.

My Big Allotment Challenge

Last year I was trying to follow a theme of 'Allotments' for the Yorkshire Travelling Journals.  You must bear in mind that I do not actually have an allotment but do love looking at them. You get the lovely neat, regimented ones and then there are those that are neglected, full of weeds and junk. The jumble of sheds assembled from all sorts of bits and bobs are a feast to the eyes, all higgledy piggledy utilising such ingenuity to create them.  Then there is the flash view when passing by on a train journey, with an allotmenteer here and there busy tending their plot.

The picture above and below was my work for May 2014 and was based on companion planting, with nasturtiums to attract the blackfly away from your broadbeans. It is in my friend "E's" YTJ and I think she liked it. I managed to find an information sheet available following the austerity of the war.

This next one was for June I think.  I did a drawing from a photograph of another friend's shed, machine stitched it and then found a suitable poem on the internet.  Again I think "M" liked the entry in her YTJ. I bet it made her smile.

Yorkshire Travelling Journal

I have been busy working on a wrap around cover for my new Yorkshire Travelling Journal. A project that I participate in with my friends from 'Up North'.  My old one, which has been completed by all over the past two years, is due for return to me shortly, all now fat and full, therefore I can show you some of the entries ... starting with mine ...

Just recognised the sketch on the right hand side.  It is from some photographs I took at the allotments next to the railway line in Knaresborough some years ago!

I feel like life is passing me by at the moment and I am not achieving much, so it is nice to look back over my entries in the Yorkshire Travelling Journals over the past two years and see that I have actually made some nice things that I can be proud of.  I also have some lovely like-minded friends who take part in this project for which this past year has been particularly challenging for several of them without the added pressure of making entries for the journals every six weeks. Well done all of you and here's to another year.

For my birthday earlier this month I had a pattern for a thing called a 'Quilt-o-Fax' which is a wrap round holdall for your 'quilty stitchy' stuff.  I have been stitching this off and on for the past week and it has not been the easiest thing I have ever made but is almost finished now.