English tradition...Mayday celebrations

Went to join in the Mayday celebrations at the Sweeps Festival in Rochester this weekend. There were Morris Dancers from the end of the high street all the way up to the castle! An interesting selection from girls with bows and flowers in their hair, to blackened faced dancers with animal skulls in their hats:

'In the 16th and 17th centuries in England people would make garlands of flowers and leaves for the May Day celebration. After becoming a source of competition between Works Guilds, these garlands became increasingly elaborate, to the extent that it covered the entire man. This became known as Jack in the Green.' He also made an appearance in the parade through the town:

It's great to see these traditions are being kept alive.

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A new location...

Just reporting a slight change in my blogging practices. I have a new exclusively embroidery and art blog set up on my website, click below to be transported there:

Sarahs New blog

I wanted to have everything in the same place and now it is: Website, shop, blog - all in one! The website web-log will be embroidery/art based only. I might be completely self indulgent therefore, and keep this one about other topics. Talking of which, here is a picture of Alice the Cat making herself a bed in my felting wools. She was only allowed to stay there because she is an old lady and she looked quite sweet...

Inspired to paint

I visited the Society of Botanical Artists exhibition last Wednesday and it made me want to paint! So that's what I did. My efforts compared to theirs are a bit pitiful but it was good to put paint to paper again. I did some quick studies of a tulip from my garden that had been snapped off (I think the cat may have something to do with that).

At the time I didn't like the results and threw the piece to oneside annoyed with myself for rushing it, but there is nothing like a little distance from something to look at it more objectively.

The exhibition is over now, but you can see some of the amazing work at their website (click on the link below:)

http://www.soc-botanical-artists.org/gallery.php

Shop news

My shop is now up and running! You can now buy your 'Critters on Canvas' materials pack online. Click the link below:

www.sarahhomfray.com/myshop/

Making a piece of history...get involved!

Whether you like it or not, it's coming to London in 2012....yes it's the summer Olympics! My opinion is you have more to gain from joining in than you have from being a Victor Meldrew so what better opportunity for those of you with a creative streak than to make a piece of Olympic art?

The idea is to make a pennant for an Olympic athlete (traditionally in sport, competitors exchange pennants as a sign of friendship) and hopefully there will be enough to present every athlete with one at the end of the games. That's alot of athletes by the way (apparently there were 12,000 in Beijing)!

For lots more information and guidelines on how and what to make click on the link below to go to where it's all happening:

quilts4london

The pennants will be displayed in various exhibitions before the games kick off, so here's a great chance to get your work on show! If you're not confident with your skills, there are step by step instructions, templates and lots of images of pennants already finished for inspiration. EVERYONE CAN GET INVOLVED!

 I think this is a fabulous idea and shall be making one and will display it here when it's finished...

Lots of new stuff!

Well it's been a busy day! My website is now up and running again with a few changes. Visit http://www.sarahhomfray.com/ to enter my world of embroidery. You can see a gallery of my work, open up my latest newsletter and see items for sale on my Etsy site as well as accessing this blog.

There are a few tweaks to make and I will be working on the shop and adding more pages in the next few weeks so pop back to see the changes.

My 'Critters on Canvas' project is now available in the latest issue of 'Stitch' magazine, and it made the front cover! I'm very pleased with how it looks and hope anyone that wants to have a go at the project will have great fun doing it. Buy the magazine from good stationers or craft stores.

Just can't help it...

...buying beads that is. Went to the stitching show at Olympia last weekend, and it goes without saying that I will come back with beads, I just can't help myself. I'm not a mad beader, I just like to get them out of their box every now again, shake the containers, run them through my fingers, hold them up to the light, plan lots of things to do with them in my head then put them away again. Having a box full of beads is akin to having a treasure trest. These millefiori beads are the latest addition to my hoard...

Not much spare time?

Have a go at inchies! I first heard about these from a good friend of mine and with half an hour to spare one day I thought I would make a few of my own. The principal is simple, a piece of work that measures an inch square. I made 3 felt inchies...

It's a good way of trying out small samples, using up scraps and making something quick and it would be interesting to see how much detail you could get into one of these although I'm a little mystified what you do with them when they are finished! I guess they might look good as a set framed in a box frame but then you might as well do a larger piece...

Website

Just to let everyone know, my website has gone off line for a very short while while it is being upgraded. You can get in touch with me and keep up to date with happenings through this blog for now and I will let you all know when then new site is up and running!

I'm sure the news that Jonathan and I got married has got round to everyone by now, but for those I didn't send the picture to I apologise. Here it is...

March Newsletter

OK, here goes with the technology...hopefully you should be able to click on the link below and see my latest Newsletter! Any problems let me know...

Aurata Embroidery March 2010 Newsletter

It should look like this!:

If you would like to subscribe to this newsletter please send me an email to sarahhomfray@yahoo.co.uk and type 'sign me up please!' in the subject box.

Well worth seeing....

Made a trip down to Portsmouth to take in a few sights last week, namely the Overlord Embroidery and HMS Victory. For anyone who likes embroidery (and indeed even those who don't particularly!), the Overlord is well worth a visit. Designed By Sandra Lawrence and made by the Royal School of Needlework, it tells the story of Operation Overlord, the D-Day landings of Normandy by the Allied forces in 1944.

The embroidery measures 83 metres in length and is split into 34 panels (it is longer than the famous Bayeux Tapestry). Techniques include applique, couching, shading, goldwork and surface stitching. I had seen many images of this embroidery (and indeed a practice sample of it in the collection of the RSN) and was still more than impressed by this piece of embroidery. If you are in the South East of England, stop by!

The Embroidery is housed in the D-day museum in Portsmouth, follow the link below for more information:

D-Day museum and Overlord Embroidery

We also went to see HMS Victory:

It was comforting to see Admiral Lord Nelson's bed was covered in hand embroidered hangings to give him some privacy! Especially surreal on a ship thats only purpose is too fight..

Visiting this historic ship is fabulous, you can see every deck and go right down into the bowels of the ship. There is a piece of the original mast complete with shot damage and a plaque marking where Nelson fell and where he died. You spend most of the visit bent double as the decks are low so don't go if you are claustophobic or have a bad back! For more info click on the link below:

HMS Victory

Competition finalist!

Just thought I would let you know, I entered the 'Bridging arts: British Sari Story' competition and my design has been picked as one of the five finalists! I am very excited about this as the Sari will be made up and I will get to see the design for real. Can't give too much away at the moment, but the design is something to do with the weather. Here is a picture of previous entries on display at Canary Wharf:

Click on the link below to see more about this competition:
British Sari Competition

Critters make it to print..

Look out for my 'Critters on Canvas' canvas and stumpwork project in the next issue of Stitch magazine, which is out on March 25th (ok, I know that's a long way off but it was exciting to flick through the magazine and see it!). I guess the cuddly toys are critters also....

More embroidery training!

Been enjoying making stuff for my Etsy shop. It's nice to make small stuff that is creative and doesn't take hours! Made some egg cosys in needle felt and hand embroidery.

I am in the process of signing up for a distance learning course in Indian Embroidery which I am quite excited about although the joining process is a little convoluted. I've picked which technique I'm going to start with (mirror work, no suprise there!) and have returned the application form, now I just need to work out how to pay and they can send me all the stuff.

The school I will be learning with is Mridula's School of Embroidery and Fashion Design, based in Tamil Nadu in India. See more about them at: www.mridulas.com/. Can't wait to get going. See a piece of my mirror work below...

Getting creative again

Got a few things done and out of the way this month, so now I can relax a little and do something creative again. Still needle felting although I broke my needle last night maing a toadstool! Luckily I had a walk down into Rochester earlier in the day and happened to stock up with another one. Also got some new fabrics for doll making (it's terrible, I have two baskets full of fabrics and I can't help buying more!) so look out for new kits on Etsy.

I have also just finished a couple of articles for Stitch magazine so look out for those also. I think the first comes out in the April/May issue and the second in the summer issue. It was good to work on a summer project in winter, very cheering!

I have also started a newsletter the first issue of which came out in December, and am working on the Jan/Feb issue at the moment. I will try to work out if I can upload it somehow so you can see it...watch this space!

A little sheep

In needle felt...

Still playing with needle felting. It is very sculptural, made this little fella in a few hours. It's also very theraputic....

A new year

Happy new year to all my readers!

Well the new year is here and it's time to get down to work again. There always seems so much to do, how are you supposed to fit it all in in one lifetime? I've made a plan, now all I have to do is stick to it!

I allowed myself some play time over the Christmas period and I've been messing around with some felt making. Below is a felted panel of roses:

The before and after effect are quite different. The colours seem to mix when the fibres are laid out then separate again once the piece has been felted. Felt is great to stitch on, there is no grain to follow for a start! You can bury the ends easily, you can gather it up by pulling the stitches tight and it looks lovely embellished with beads and sequins which are a real contrast to the soft fuzzy look of felt.

The above is a sample I made some years ago of the garden where I used to live. It is wet felted then embellished with machine embroidery, hand embroidery and shisha mirrors. I have also just discovered needle felt (I know, I'll get there in the end!) which I'm very excited about. It is much easier to control than welt felting and much more sculptural. Here are some beads I made in this technique:

Seasons greetings!

Wishing everyone a very happy Christmas and all the very best health for 2010.

A white Christmas?

A snow covered tree, Jonathans bike and my car (after some of the snow had melted!)

I know we have all seen snow, but I don't think I've seen as good a fall as this for about 5 years. I always seem to be somewhere else! It was supposed to be my last day teaching at the RSN before christmas, but when they announced they had shut the main road out of Chatham at 7.30 this morning, I went back to bed!

When the snow started to fall yesterday evening, we also had thunder and lightning. I have never experienced that before...

And the winner is....

Richard Wright, winner of the Turner prize:-

An excert from a review in one of the newpapers sums it up well in my opinion:

"And here’s a sentence I never thought I’d write about a Turner Prize winner: the result is so damn beautiful you stand transfixed in front of it."