happy christmas from mrs molebags

how to cheat at patchwork

I have been thinking about making a quilt from Mr P's old shirts, and other bits of blue from my pile of charity shop finds, but it needed a few bright bits to make it sing.

Then a kind friend visited the National Quilt Museum in America and brought me back these lovely zingy batiks.

Somewhere on the marvellous internet I've seen this method of quickly making a quilt with small squares, so I thought I'd try it.

I cut my squares to 2.5 inches, as the batiks were 5 inch squares (although if you were more nimble fingered than me you could make them smaller), and then carefully ironed them side by side on to a piece of very lightweight interfacing.

So now the little dears can't move about!

Then I folded along the joins, and sewed along them using my trusty quarter-inch foot...

Here's how the back looks when its all sewn together...

A quick press, and then I sewed it all together the other way...

Et voila! Very fast, and all lined up, which might be a first for me! This is a 12 inch square, so I need to make a few more to have a respectable sized quilt. I don't think the interfacing will make a difference to the feel of the quilt once its all sandwiched and quilted, as its the lightest-weight one I could get. I'm aiming for a lap-quilt kind of size, and then I'll wash it to see how it feels after that.

Or I could just leave it hanging in the window to make the grey weather seem more bearable...

windowsill wednesday

windowsill wednesday

creative thinking blog hop

Thank you Marigold from http://marigoldjam.blogspot.co.uk/ for passing on this creative thinking blog hop to me, which has made me reflect on my creative process. Better late than never, here are my thoughts:

What am I working on?

Since I left the Day Job in June I have been like a child in a sweetshop, working on too many things at once. I get to the end of each day and wonder where its gone.

I recently returned to a regular life drawing group after a long gap, and realised how much I had missed the discipline and quiet concentration of it. The drawings are making their way into my sewn work, via the sewing machine, and I am incorporating this technique into making small quilts, and quilts which use old family photographs, a kind of heirloom-within-an-heirloom.

I'm using the same technique to make small brooches too- naked (or more modest) ladies (or men) for your lapel.

Of course I'm easily distracted, and I've recently been making small freehand log cabin blocks from tiny scraps, as if I didn't already have umpteen hexagons made from scraps still to make into a quilt! Still, winter is the time for sewing hexagons together whilst sitting down in the evenings..

And on a side note, its interesting to look at these in black and white to see how different they look if you arrange them differently. See? Easily distracted..

I'm also still trying to make a drawing a day, some days more successfully than others..

How does my work differ from others in this genre?

Everybody's creative work is personal by definition- it comes straight from the heart. I suppose my work reflects my personality: not too many straight lines, and the happy embracing of serendipity. If something looks 'right', in it goes. I don't pay too much attention to how things 'should' be done, although I think its important to learn the rules before you can play fast and loose with them.

Why do I create what I do?

I have always drawn, as far back as I remember, and I am completely content if I have pencil and paper in my hand. 

My Mum taught my sister and me to sew when we were young, and she made all her own clothes and clothes for us, so it was part of my upbringing to make things. I guess the first patchwork thing I ever made was the patchwork jacket I sewed in the 70's out of a mixture of satin, velvet and other scraps. I wish I still had it!

How does my creative process work?

I have a (tiny) space where I am surrounded by inspiring clutter- I pin things up on the wall and generally make a mess. Sometimes an idea even comes from two bits of fabric which have randomly been put side by side.

Specifically at the moment I am looking at the Bayeux tapestry, redwork, old family photos, kantha quilting, and people with tattoos...

Some thoughts on other inspiring things:

Of course the internet is a wonderful resource, and I 'waste' a lot of time following a trail of thoughts and images through blogs or on pinterest.

I like to get to London for exhibitions- I'm looking forward to seeing Grayson Perry's latest works at the Portrait Gallery soon.

I always carry a camera, and use it as another kind of sketchbook.

And always colour! (never beige) and just looking at things.

...and all these get distilled into the things I make, by a kind of osmosis!

Thank you, Marigold- this really made me think. Maybe Jenny from Handmade Happiness: http://jenny-handmadehappiness.blogspot.co.uk/ would like to pick it up? I'm sure you would have some interesting insights, Jenny.

p.s. the robots from my last post became this bag for a friend- I found the fabric and couldn't resist it for somebody who has a clockwork robots salt and pepper set!

windowsill wednesday

The robots are coming!

the colours of Nice

Last month we had a wonderful few days in Nice. It seems a world away now that its raining and grim, but it was hot and full of beautiful colour and so inspiring.

yellow

We found a small hotel right in the old town, and we could walk everywhere from there. We nearly walked our feet off, and came home with lots of pictures.

The colours are definitely brighter and more saturated in that southern light, and I always think its worth remembering to look up- I love this man looking out of his blue window in a yellow wall, and this lovely art deco tile fascia which was above a restaurant. 

orange

The best place to be at the Museum of Modern Art is on the roof- from there you can see the whole of the city spread out below, contrasting with the grey steel curves and singing lines of colour.

..and the best part inside the museum is the spiral staircase which looks like a Sonia Delaunay painting..

red

What a pleasure to see the beautiful ripe fruit and vegetables in the market, something that is so important to the French (eat your 'coeurs' out, British supermarkets), and what a pleasure to be able to stroll around the little streets of the old town, and to eat outside in the evenings in the warm velvety dark.

terracotta

The Matisse Museum is in this gorgeous colourful villa, set in an olive grove in front of what was once the Hotel Regina where he spent his last years. It was here that he produced the cut-out pictures we saw earlier this year at Tate Modern.

We were thrilled to see lots of lithographs, paintings and drawings we had never seen in such a sympathetic setting, and to visit the church just close by where he is buried.

This athletic young man was part of a path which featured lots of different Greek Gods.. 

azure
The azure sea of the Cote d'Azur...

I am hoping to keep these colours in my mind's eye until we can visit again...

windowsill wednesday

I keep thinking I've picked the last of the sweet peas, but this year they're going on and on. 

drawing and making

I am really trying to keep up with the 'one drawing a day'. Its a kind of five minutes of meditation, and a visual diary. Just as certain pieces of music or scents instantly transport you back to where you were when you heard or smelt them, drawings do the same thing. I have all my old drawing books right back to art college, and not only do the early ones smell of College of Art in the 70's, each drawing takes me straight to where I was and what was happening when I made it.

Here are the first few from my current book- memories in the making.

I have also been doing some drawing with the sewing machine- little cactus brooches which are now for sale in the lovely Handmade Happiness shop in Petersfield:

http://jenny-handmadehappiness.blogspot.co.uk/

Here they are posing beside the real succulents on my windowsill. I like to look at the cactus's miniature rhythmic patterns when the rest of the garden is out of hand in its even-more-than-usually dishevelled August state. August must be my least favourite month, and I'm glad its over. Too hot (this year!), and there is the constant thought that one should be making the most of the weather outside. I'm looking forward now to lighting the stove and getting back to the sewing machine.

windowsill wednesday

Strange what accumulates on the windowsill...

a cat with a jumper on, and a man carrying a saddle...