A new Sea page!

My page has arrived from Maya. It is so lovely, with such a lot of detail not immediately apparent.



There is a lot of hand stitching, with lots of beads simulating the movement of the sea. The stitches holding the fabric in place remind me of Kantha stitching. There are many pieces of foil, and silk making up the background, all adding to the texture.
The piece is edged in handworked blanket stitch. I wish my stitches could be so neat.



Adding to the detail, there are sequins added in to the back of the blanket stitch edging. What a lovely idea!



Here is Maya's letter, giving some idea of the techniques she has used.



Thanks so much Maya, I love my new page.

Arrival of Debi's page.

I am delighted to be able to say that my October page for Debi - Shabby Chic Vintage has finally arrived. Does anyone else feel nervous waiting for the arrival of their pages?

This is the back of my page. The two strips are vintage sari fabric. I got these years ago in an embroidery pack. The larger of the scraps can be seen as part of the front.

My letter details the items used to construct the page. For the first time, I made the whole page quite quickly. I had all the pieces I needed in my stash.

These are some of the beads from the bracelet I took to pieces. It was a really fussy thing which I would never have worn, but what a wonderful hoard, just right for this page.

Oh yes, the bouquet of flowers shown on the paper used for the letter is a photograph of flowers given to me some time ago. It was such an extraordinary collection of blooms......

The leaflets mentioned were these:

Yes, I am fortunate to have Knutsford just a few miles away from my home. Its an interesting place to visit too, with some fascinating architecture. Home for some years to the author Elizabeth Gaskell, and said to be the inspiration for "Cranford". Tatton is the large Hall and grounds alongside the small town of Knutsford.

The Sea has arrived!

Now, isn't this delightful. I was thrilled to receive a package through my letterbox this morning from Liz. This is my June page - a little late, but it was well worth waiting for...........

All those lovely details.



I just love the beaded blue coral. The textures are just gorgeous.



Just look at the stitching on the seahorse. It looks like there are such stories he, or she could tell of adventures amidst the coral.



The fabric for the back of the page itself just could not have been more perfect.

And the letter from Liz, tells of the techniques she has used.

Oh Liz, I do agree about being near the sea. It is a magical place, with all the smells and sounds. I live right in the centre of Cheshire, a county almost in the heart of the UK. But you are right, a journey time of around an hour and a half will bring me to the coast. I am so fortunate.

Thanks so much for my page. I look forward to day when I can put all my lovely pages together and make them into a book. I intend to exhibit the book when it has been made, but do not know where, or when, just yet.

Flowers from Gayle

This is a very bad pic of the wonderful page that Gayle has made for me. I know she sent us all scurrying to Google that word - Kanzashi, and I really think you'll have to look again and put those images with this one. I just couldn't get the 3D-ness of the page to register on my scanner, part of the page always came out of focus! Sorry, Gayle, not to do your work justice. Your comment in the attached letter 'it (the technique) takes more manual dexerity than I have' is just not true; yes I dare say there are experts in all fields but, let's face it, if we never tried anything just because we can't do it as well as the experts then our lives would be far poorer. I had a very good friend with whom I shared a passion for trying out new techniques and we never let our modesty in our own skills get in the way of sharing our attempts. A weaving instructor I once had used not to let us pull out any 'mistakes' ; he said those were what showed it was handmade. But, as you can see, Gayle has really pulled this one off and I got some vintage buttons as well plus a lovely back to the page as well. Thank you very much for sharing this find with us all, Gayle, I never knew about Kanzashi until now.

Slightly late Coastline

Sorry Chris, had a visitor and got a little bit behind. However you page is now finished, see a snippet here, but unfortunately I won't get to the post office until Tuesday and there's a strike on Wednesday..........................what can I say??? I hope the snippet whets your appetite and that you like the photo I took of the south coastline of Crete while we were away with our visitor. Regards Kath

Seashore

This is the page I sent at the end of March for Juliette, so I do hope that she won't mind my posting about it. I was so glad to hear that it had arrived.

The photo in the insert was taken on the island of Grand Turk in the Caribbean.

I included a description of the piece, which you can read about here. (Just click on the photo and it will enlarge.)

I had been lucky enough to travel to the Caribbean on a cruise earlier this year, and knew that this spot had to be used for Juliette's "Seashore page". The colours of the sea were truly amazing. Living in the UK, the sea always seems various shades of grey with some blues. This depends on the time of year, of course. In the region of the Caribbean, the colours were so intense, it really took my breath away. I took a number of photographs.

One shows the sand and a footprint left by the man I had seen sweeping the leaves from the beach a few hours earlier. I had woken very early just as dawn was rising and was able to watch activities to clean the beach ready for the passengers to disembark. It is truly surreal to see a huge cruise ship visit such a tiny island. It dwarfs everything around it. But life goes on as usual, calm and unhurried.

As I had mentioned to Juliette, I was reminded of a passage from a children's book much loved by my own daughters when they were younger. I was able to share the book with the classes I taught too. You can read it below. Margaret Mahy is a superb writer. I love her descriptions, they are so vivid. The photo is of a scan I made of the page in my battered, much read copy.

Should you wish to read it for yourselves, the ISBN number of my copy is this: 0-14-050624-1.

It is called "The man whose mother was a pirate."

Dreaming of diving in the sea - the photos

I really can't think of a better way to introduce the photos I promised in my post yesterday, than to show you the note sent by Johoanna.





The dreaming girl in the photograph looks so very sweet. Here are some details of the stitching around the photograph.

The printed fabric background really adds movement. There are many beads and small stitches alongside small shells. The textures are really interesting. Thanks so much to Johoanna.

The next photo is on the front of the card bearing the message from Johoanna, shown above. What a gorgeous green frog.

Juliette's page from Kath

A bit of a flat representation of cording and muslin waves
onto the seashore but you get the idea!

Flowers galore from Ann

Flowers, flowers and more flowers!

I asked for colourful and I've certainly got it this month from Ann!! Plus a page telling me her inspiration - bordered with flowers and in an envelope with a cute garden sticker on it! Thank you so much, I love sunflowers as a Leo and we grow them in our garden.

Juliette's page

Hi Juliette, I've just posted your page. Hope you don't mind if you get it early, we've so many strikes going on here in Greece now I thought better safe than sorry! Hope you enjoy whenever you receive it.

Flowers are travelling.

I have just returned from posting off my first page. This was "Flowers" for Kath. The detail above is a piece I was free machine embroidering for the page. Fursther photos will follow as soon as I know the page has arrived safely.

Starting

Just starting to think about Maya's leaves pages which is my January one. Have decided to use coloured fabric and different embroidery stitches and the shapes of different leaves. Hope it works! Here's some stuff I might use and also what I think is the start of the page, very crumpled as I just dumped it on the scanner!