With a little help fom my friends- last Journal Quilt January 2012

I asked my friends to give me a button and a quotation that they liked. I made little two inch pockets and stitched the buttons on the front. A variety of techniques was used for the pockets - some appliqued, some machine stitched and painted. I printed the quotes onto calico, stitched a buttonhole on the strip and wound them around some small bamboo pegs and then popped them in the pockets. Some of the buttons are quite signifcant. One belonged to a friend's father who was in the Navy, another was from my friend's mothers button box. The quotations can be taken out of the pockets and buttoned on the front.

memories and connections

Several months ago my brother and I were forced to make the decision that our mother could no longer live at home and needed more help with her needs. She is suffering from dementia. Neither of us was prepared for the emotional implications of this decision let alone the practical ones. We were faced with a home crammed with things that represented our lives and those of our parents and grandparents. The home is now just an empty house and we have tried to deal with the contents. I collected up pieces of linen - table mats, hankies, embroidered napkins and tablecloths, gloves and aprons. These had been embroidered, crocheted, stitched, darned and and owned by my grandmothers Maud and Gladys and my Mum, Eileen. What on earth should I do with them.  I do not want to leave my boys with the decision of what to do with my things let alone my grandmother's. I wanted to do something that would connect me to them and also be relevant and even something of use for my children. I bit the bullet and started cutting up the pieces. I am stitching a crazy patchwork quilt in squares made up of pieces belonging to Maud, Gladys and Eileen. I am using old transfers to add my marks to the pieces now. So far I have made 17 squares so a long way to go but all the time I am stitching them ( glass of wine at hand in front of the telly) I think of these women, their lives and how they have made me what I am.

new fabric collage of Suffolk snippets

Finished this textile collage of snippets from Suffolk. I used a photo montage type approach and raided my collection of fabrics. Really pleased I managed to use a piece of acrylic painted fabric I'd had for ages. It was not very beautiful but it did the job for the beach texture - there you are, never throw anything away! I've framed the piece and covered the mount in calico now. To complete the recycled theme John made it a rather nice oak frame from our old oak door, which has now been ressurected as three oak windowsills in the house as well.
The collage was made as a present for a friend with a significant birthday. The features in the piece are The House in the Clouds, Thorpeness, Southwold beach huts, Sizewell seagulls and a rather ghostly stitched Leiston Abbey.

More pieces for exhibition

This piece was started as a little gem but I didn't finish it in time. Lichen Stars.