I like to have some hand stitching on the go at all times. I can’t just sit in the arm chair and watch the telly. This version of willow pattern was stitched in response to a conversation I had with a student when we were talking about having a complete dinner service given to us as a wedding present and how over the years it has got brocken and disappeared from the plate cupboard.

It was a real pig to get the plate truly circular but at least I can’t break this nod when washing it up. Lol

9 ladies from in and around Bedfordshire came together to learn how to put and impression of a view down on to fabric before filling it in with simple embroidery stitches, bringing it to life. We spent the first part of the morning getting comfy with the paint and then moved on to choosing thread colours and the joy of just sitting and sewing.

I’m off today to get the ladies comfy with applying colour washes to white cotton that suggest scenery.

Sat last night watching the telly and had fun with my basket of jumbled threads, picking out colours and using simple embroidery on a primitively painted fabric to create this country scene. You get quite a good result from simple stitchery

I spend such a lot of time on my sewing machine that every once in a while I like to keep my hand in with some good old hand stitching.
This project is to learn how to put a random suggestion of water colour or acrylic paint down on to fabric to suggest a background scene which will be embellished or further stitched with traditional hand embroidery to bring-it to life.
It’s quite liberating to have the freedom to splash Paint on to a surface when you only have a vague idea of what you want to achieve, having said that it does give you a fairly open scope to play and grow the picture as you sew.
I wasn’t sure how to go about it so I started with a plain white piece of fabric and lightly traced a basic window, bricks and a hanging basket in place. This gave me the areas I needed to consider for specific colours and the rest-of the area was then just a wash of these same colours.
I then spent a pleasant couple of evenings using simple stitches such as French knots, stem stitch, back stitch, straight stitch, chain stitch and several others to enhance area like the individual bricks, the hanging basket and adding a grassy border to bring the paint and the embroidery together.

Well I now have sore fingers from all the stitching I have been doing lately but I’m now a dab hand at applying shisha mirrors which was the main aim of the project. Finished the Elephant last night while catching up with all the program’s we had taped on sky. I love to sit and sew when I’ve got plenty of TV to keep me entertained and I’m nice and cozy while the winter weather rages outside. I get most of my hand stitching done during the winter months this way

I have just spent the last couple of days sewing like crazy, mainly because I have a virus and have completely lost my voice so what else can you do but sit quietly and sew. This is yet another workshop coming up and I am quite pleased with the outcome. I have used simple surface embroidery to outline the horse and add his patterning . My problem came when I had to sew the shisha mirrors in place. They are not easy to do and all instructions are diabolical. In the end I watched an Indian lady on You Tube and after no five practice I achieved. This is number one embroidery of three to make a triptych and the elephant and camel will be following over the next week of evening.