More journalling

This week has been bits and pieces but finally I have settled down to some journalling. Our next two lessons arrived on Sunday and I have pages drying in the sun - it's beautiful today so I thought I'd better record it for posterity. Besides, I'm not in the mood to do anything strenuous because Peggy has had me up during the past two nights although I can't pinpoint the exact problem with her. It is a pity dogs cannot talk it would be so much easier to help them.

I've managed to put together the second signature for Mother's journal. The words were Knowledgeable, Worrier and Fashion-aware (I didn't know what word applies here really but wanted to convey a person who looked after herself and dictated her own fashion, not what the shops said she should wear). I made this the middle pages because of the poem "Warning", I thought it would appeal to her sense of humour.

Knowledgeable was again a word that could be interpreted many ways, so I concentrated on the brain and how to retain the knowledge rather than the content of that knowledge (which covers such a wide spectrum). When I speak to Mum I can always count on her to have information on any subject and she is always interested in what is going on - in the world and the family.

Worrier was more difficult, as I didn't want to dwell on the negative aspects, so I found some little sets of sayings that boosted the "feel good" factor. I added two green tea bags as this is supposed to be good for us. Maybe I'll find other things to add later on.

Also, looking through my workshops I came across a piece of art by Maggie Grey that could be interpreted for the journal. I used pipe cleaners beaded and wrapped in knitting yarn, and strips torn from a page painted by my granddaughter, Lucy (aged 5) and wove them into a grid. I added paper beads made from tiny strips with the edges dipped in copper paint and rolled up, the whole piece was stitched onto some green dyed calico I had just finished. I called this piece "Worry Beads". The right hand side is blank so that Mum can add to it.

Well, next task is to tidy up the garden ready for Bert arriving on Friday. We have a busy week ahead, with the market tomorrow, a wedding on Saturday then Peggy is off to summer camp at the Kennels whilst we head south to Plymouth and my youngest son, Edward and family, for a well earned holiday. This will be our first holiday since moving to Devon and I'm really looking forward to it.

'Fess Up...

It's time to come clean, unfortunately, since I wasn't going to let on...but I lost my door keys! I had a horrible day last Sunday, my PC crashed and no matter what I did, it would not get back together again and my whole life revolves round my PC! So I piled a load of things for Peggy into a bag and harnessed her up and we drove down to the park for a walk and to calm down. During that walk she did what dogs do in tall grass and I had to clean up after her with the bag which meant I had a tub and two water bottles, two toys, a mobile and my keys to carry bagless. I tucked my mobile down my waistband along with my keys thinking if they slipped they would end up in my knickers but somehow the keys missed them and slipped away unnoticed. When I finally got back to the car and they were gone, I had no chance of finding them so I walked Peggy back to the house, then asked the lad next door to reach in through the dog flap to undo the key in the lock of the back door which he did, bless him. Then I got my spare keys and hurried back to the park hoping my car was still there - it was...huge relief! Later that evening Ed called me and sorted out my PC - he is such a wonderful son - and my life was back with me. Then on the Wednesday evening a young girl knocked on my door and handed my keys to me. The people who found them in the park had seen the little Tesco tabs attached and taken them to the local Tesco who had traced me from their database and sent round the girl with the keys. That is so kind, and I do thank everyone who took the trouble to do this for me.

There were no sales on Thursday at the market, so again I am lost in my course work (which I rather do anyway). I had to dye some natural fibres like cotton, silk, wool etc. with various types of dye and although I had done the Jacquard dying (see left) I was waiting for my starter pack to begin the Pricion dying - much more involved. I had to fill a bucket with 5 gallons of water and add a quarter of a cup of soda ash, but finding out what these measurements were in fl.oz did my head in! I found a plastic garden bucket that held 3 gallons and tried to work out what two thirds of a quarter of a cup was...Duh!! Bert rang me and said (like men do) "why don't you use 2.5 gallons of water and halve the cup measurement?" Well, don't you feel foolish when it is so simple! So in went the pieces of fabric to steep for 15 minutes whilst I measured out the dye into pots and added the required water...again cup measurements were used, but my secret weapon was my bread baking book that had a conversion table in it. There I was with a mask round my face, measuring tiny piles of dust into cups of water and getting dye everywhere, because my sink was filled with a bucket of steeping fabric...what a carry-on.

Well, to cut a long shory short the dye met the fabric and set overnight, then was washed and dryed in the dryer and ironed the next day...job done! The dye gave some interesting striations and patches and took differently to the cotton, cotton/polyester and calico I had used.

In between all this I have been working away at my mother's journal. I made up the cover and added a flower button and cord for tying. Then bought some lovely paper for the inside - just 15 sheets left of this particular green look - then I started putting the words to the pages. I have almost completed 1 signature (3 pages folded in half) with 3 of the words - Independent, Supportive and Stubborn (see pictures). I'll show you Stubborn when it is complete and the last two pages hold a quick garden crossword and a piece of painted, stamped tyvek.

Independent is a series of sayings about being independent and a picture of Rose Solitaire. I printed off 3 copies of this rose on paper and 1 on acetate which covers the sayings page. The right side has two of the roses cut into strips for weaving and a picture of the finished rose. Something to keep Mum interested and not dwelling on the words too much - this is supposed to be fun!

Next comes Supportive, the left hand page has a picture of a trellis in my garden that Tom made for me, supporting a Passion flower, Clematis and a couple of other climbers. I covered it with a piece of green netting I found on one of my walks. The right hand page has a definition of Support and a glued on ribbon showing flowers climbing up the page.

The middle of the signature has been used to give Mum chance to add her own journalling because I know she intends to change part of her garden and I thought it would be nice to record the change. She could also add bits of interest, labels and maps of where she bought the replacements, the labels from the pots etc. in the plastic pocket on the right.

I have started several other pages, but this is the first of 5 signatures that is almost ready to be sewn into the journal. I just need one of my nephews to draw a picture for me then in it goes. Watch this space...

A troublesome week

Firstly, a few updates. Tuesday last week was a bit hectic hence the missed bits of news. That morning I had a dentist appointment and I have a lovely dentist called Emmanuel but I call him Speedy. I go in and out of his surgery like a dose of salts and don't even have time to feel deprived of my expectations. I showed him my damaged front tooth where I had hit myself in the face with a metal bar that had caught in the door. He straightened it across the bottom and added some sort of coating and my tooth looked exactly how it did before the accident. It took him all of 5 minutes and "that will be £45.00 please".

In the evening I took Peggy to a local pre-school just round the corner from me where they were chipping dogs for free. She is now the proud owner of a number and was very brave, not a peap out of her, which is more than can be said of some of the bigger wooses.

This weekend I started on a new project with some trepidation. I have come up with about 10 words describing my mother and want to put them into a journal with a garden theme for a Christmas present for her. I got in touch with my sister and brother-in-law to make sure the words were reasonably accurate and to get a male perspective. I had no idea of how to start the front cover and went through all my magazines and articles to find an appropriate picture/ technique. What I arrived at did surprise me, but was near enough to what I hoped for; it is made up of a layer of painted lutrador over white and green garden fleece and grungeboard letters that have been splodged. I free motion stitched clematis flowers and leaves with metallic thread then heated the whole from the back to give a scrunched look. Then I attached it to a background of painted cotton.

Now I have to wait until next week when Sue's next lesson is how to make up a small journal with signatures (pages), then I'll know what size to work with for the inside of my project pages. I bought a sketch book to put all my ideas in - another idea that Sue encourages so that we can track our progress. Once you have given the present away you have no record of what or how you did it. Life is so busy at the moment!

Ahead of my Teacher - WOW!

Yesterday was market day, very slow but I did have an order from a retired policeman. Why is it that every customer wants something different than is on offer? This man wanted a straight edge to his waistcoat instead of the usual V-shaped front, so I'll have to alter my pattern for him. Still, it is always a challenge and keeps me going and I don't have to start until Monday.

I arrived home tired and happy and uploaded my emails. To my surprise there was one from Sue with yet another challenge...take two of our words and create journal pages from them, then do a recipe art journal. It was so funny that I had already done almost two of these items and just had to finish them off, so I was well ahead of the rest and the teacher.

My first word was the dreaded Challenge - however, Wimbledon had just finished and when I watched the televised final, Federer and Nadal were shown reading the Rudyard Kipling poem 'IF', so I downloaded it off the internet and printed it on my Challenge papers. Unfortunately I got them upside down and the punch holes were on the wrong side, but not to worry, Sue had explained we could thread fibres through holes down one side to emphasise a page, so that's what I did. Then my printer ink ran out, so again Sue came to the rescue by saying we should use pens, crayons etc to enhance our pages, so I just got a black pen and wrote the rest of the poem. I made a little booklet for the last page and put a pocket at the bottom to slip it into. I got some pictures of the finalists and some comments made by fans and pasted them into the booklet. The Wimbledon logo was pasted on the outside to finish it all off.

The second word - Impatient - was harder, surprisingly. I did a little research on the internet and found that impatience comes from tension and that tension causes knots in muscles and headaches. There was my starting point, I picked up a picture of a jumble of knotted fibres, raided my red embellishment box for anything that suggested tension, knots and problems. I fused a web of glue across the page and threw the bits and pieces onto the page then fused them down. I couched wire springs I had wound round a stick to represent problems along with french knots, and added a tassal to the side - job done!

The third challenge - the recipe art journal - was already done (see Wednesday) but in the meantime Stephanie had sent me extra photos and they had to be added to the journal. I also needed sand to add to one of my pockets, and found some in the shower of all places, so that went into a little plastic envelope to be sewn down on the inside. They had all gone to The Big Sheep adventure park for the last day, so I added the brochure to the back pocket, tied the journal up and popped it into the pocket I made on my journal page that Lucy had also painted. I added the photo of the three of us (3 generations) to the front of the pocket.

Realising what journalling is all about has given me lots of ideas for future pages and the next lesson is how to make small art folios designed for one off journaling. My fabric dying has improved as has the planning and research for new journals. My poor family will have to watch out as unsuitable items wing their way at Christmas and birthday time.

Awful weather

Today is very wet. I needed some ink for my printer and dashed into town to get some and got thoroughly soaked through every piece of clothing I had on. But it had to be done, I can't go through life without a working printer. I was up early today and doing my wii-fit exercises. My weight goes up and down daily so I don't take any notice any more, but I'm getting better at the exercises and gathering enough extra minutes in my bank to unlock lots of other exercises. Also I don't ache as much as I did when I first started, so something good is happening!





Last week I made a little book cover for my stall accounts by trying out one of Carol Coleman's little workshops. This is made from trapping bits of fibres between cling film and also the first time I've tried free motion stitching on cling film. I needed to change to a teflon foot, and be extra patient as the metallic thread broke so many times I have a bag full of ends, but I got the hang of it and was quite pleased with the cover.





Our latest lesson came from Sue on Monday, all 19 pages of it, and I have been working through all the different techniques she has listed. I dyed fabric and lace in several different ways, and added the lace to the pages of my journal.


An item she showed us was a memory book and I suddenly had the idea of making up one of the pages Lucy had painted a butterfly on, into a memory book of her visit - see photos - I fused a blank page to the inside, adding a tie through the centre then I added the photos of the beach, some plastic sewn into pockets for some shells she had collected and a strip torn off another page she had painted. Then I added a pocket to one of the pages in my journal for putting the book into. I need to get some sand to put into the 3rd plastic pocket.

I have another butterfly page waiting for me to add something and as I have been invited to a wedding in a couple of weeks, I thought this would be ideal to capture the memories of that day too.

Now I need to get everything together for the market tomorrow. After two weeks away I'll have to find all the stuff I take and make sure it is all up to date.

Time to relax

What a week this last week has been! My day at the market left me with orders for two waistcoats to make but although I managed the first on the Saturday, Sunday's waistcoat did not want to go together. The pockets would not line up, and as I pulled the fronts through a stray pin caused a pull and showed a dotted line across the left front. This meant I had to do the front again and I didn't have time so I went and watched TV for the rest of the day. On Monday I shopped, cleaned and bathed Peggy ready for Stephanie, Mike and Lucy to arrive which they did at lunchtime. Fortunately the weather was glorious and we were able to have lunch outside in the garden whilst Lucy got to know Peggy. That afternoon Steph and I went girlie shopping and Mike took Lucy to the local beach for a couple of hours. Sometime during this day my Wii-Fit arrived and was left next door.


Tuesday was again a very nice day although rain had been promised, so they went shopping whilst I stayed at home for the morning, then we had a quick lunch and loaded up the car for the beach.

Peggy came too and had a wonderful time paddling in the sea and playing with other dogs on the beach. We saw several other JRs who proved quite friendly and willing to play with her and Lucy found a bucketful of shells and pebbles to bring home. We came home suntanned, exhausted and full of sand so we all had to dive into the shower before heading into town for a well cooked evening meal at the local pub.



Wednesday saw them getting ready to leave, and I tried out my Wii-fit, setting it up and loading my software. It was great fun watching the little Mii take on a 63 year old stance. Mike had a go at the tennis on the Wii-Sports programme, but he was a bit too tall for the sensor on top of the TV. I believe, given the chance, he could really get to grips with it or maybe the Golf was more his thing. Then as it rained they went off to the Adventure park nearby to spend most of the day before leaving and travelling back to Salisbury then heading home to Munich at the weekend. I took Thursday off from the market and finished off my bad waistcoat and made two matching bow ties which were all sent off on the Friday.





Today, I am catching up on all my little jobs and sorting out my journal folder. Sue had asked us to pick out two of our words and cut out magazine pieces relating to those words and paste them on the relevant pages. I think I chose the hardest words - Challenge and Learn - because I could not find much in the way of pictures or sayings that were relevant. I managed to get some together and pasted them into the book. It is quite amazing how this changed the whole outlook of the book and I suddenly found out why we were doing it. I stitched little pockets onto the thick pages and banners for each word. Doing this made me realise I had missed two sets of pages for two words and I went back to my paints and papers to remedy the missed pages.





One of the magazines I had bought (I don't usually buy these) had an article for a walking programme which took my interest. Since moving to Devon I haven't been able to find the right way to exercise, hence the Wii-fit, but this walking programme showed that you could get fit just walking every day, so I downloaded the instructions and ordered a pedometer ready to start my base line. I'm hoping Peggy and I will both benefit from this exercise, along with the Wii-fit programmes that my Physio has asked me to do. Up to now I have lost 3 lb of the 4lb target in two weeks that I set up. Today I have increased my exercises and included a couple of new ones. I must say the Wii-Fit is a lot of fun as well as improving posture and balance; you just have to ignore the little fatty that runs around the screen! My latest achievement has been to get all the balls into the holes in the balance programme - top marks!