No Stress

As it turned out the exhibition in the Hayloft at the National Trust Rainham Hall was well worth waiting for. It had a good response from the public, the day I was stewarding there were over thirty visitors and considering the weather that was good.

My work was inspired by the tiles in the Hall. The work above I painted the fabric, stitched around the design and used EPP it was then mounted and framed. A good thing this was behind glass because it was put into a fire place and by the end of the exhibition the glass was covered in dust and there was even a selection of bird poo on the glass (hope this wasn't a critic's review)!

My second piece was staged on a sewing table along with an old singer sewing machine (not mine) but the rest was all me, the quilt I made years ago for my Mother in Law, a basket full of quilting samples and a bowl of threads added to the setting. I wish my studio was a tidy as this....

Below is a close up of the second piece this was indigo dyed fabric,  Appliqué and embroidered, the third piece is displayed in the main house in a fire place.

I thought you may like to see a small selection of the tiles that inspired me. I actually felling love with these tiles the first time I visited the house. Although I have lived in Rainham for Sixty years (all my life)  and walked past the house most days when I was on my way to the railway station I only went into the house about five years ago. Now I feel as though I'm rarely away from the place.

Four of the MG's are volunteers at the Hall and we'll be taking it in turns to go along once a month to sit and stitch in the Lloyd's Coffee house. We will be stitching and chatting with the public, I'll be there in April. The Hall is very local to me, I'm going to go along and see what goes on at the 'Knit and Stitch' group it meets every Wednesday in their Café, they do make a decent cup of coffee but I will be making every effort to resist the cake!

While all this has been going on I've been working on the next MG project and also trying to get two baby quilts finished. As always I've left it to the last minute, no stress, but the Mum's - to -be both left work on Friday and only have three weeks to go. Both babies are due on the same day.... whoops back to the quilting then!

I've been trying to......

..... write a post for quite a while, ( looking at the drafts there have been four attempts since the beginning of this year)  for some reason or another It's not happened!!!! Why? To be honest I can't say why not, it's not that I have been sitting idly twiddling my thumbs, I've just not felt inspired. I have been reading others posts but not always commenting. Like me most blogs I read also post on Facebook and I catch up with them there and just pressing the like button is so easy. I have been keeping the Material Girls blog, Website and Facebook upto date so maybe it meant I was spending my time on those rather than here, now I'm back and feel that I want to blog again so here goes......

Since my last post I've completed my City and Guilds Certificate in Patchwork and Quilting with Janice Gunner, it took me Three Years instead of the Two that I hoped it would. That's because I did have a lot of other things going on and I couldn't dedicate as much time as I should have to it, got there in the end though! This is my final project a wall hanging.

There was also another quilt made for my Great Niece Ella, I got the fabric last year in the US on holiday. It's not a great picture but you get the idea! There's also another baby quilt I can't show that one just yet, and also a crochet baby blanket that I forgot to photograph, but I'm going to see Reggie on Tuesday so I'll take a photo and show it next time!

I have been working on a project with The Material Girls for our next exhibition, it's being held at a National Trust property very close to where I live, Rainham Hall. We have all been busy with this project, it's now a waiting game for the Restoration of the house to be completed before we can hang. In the meantime  a sneak preview of a very tiny part of one of my pieces, a lot of hand stitching went into my pieces, that's  my favourite thing to do.

I think your more or less upto date now, I've not mentioned our holiday in North Wales or trips to London, family get togethers, but I'm sure your already getting bored.... So until next time........x