Framing - preparation

so I've stitched these little bits of cloth together to make a bigger bit of cloth. Now to frame it. I don't have a big enough piece of the remaining fabric to make one long border, so will piece in strips to make a three inch frame. A suggestion of some dark blue to add into that mix prompted an impromptu ice cream tub shibori session. I've kept some of this fabric as it is, but have taken a couple of bits to darken down. An opportunity to add another layer - remember this started as white fabric with some onion skin eco printing done in 2011

First stich the cloth, trying to regularise the pattern underneath, whilst keeping some of the subtleties of what's gone before, reserving little bits of light or colour with stitch to draw up tight and save from the dye.


Tie up good and tight and fluffle (yes, that's a technical term) out the wrinkles to make them lie evenly and flow away from the pulled up stitching.

Then in to the ice cream tub with a good dose of salt, more turquoise, a splash of black and a grain or two of scarlet.












Half an hour and on with the soda.


Now we just have to wait for morning.

A little homage cloth

This is a little something I'm working on at the moment. Some Conny and Harry's sheeting, eco printed with onion skin and maple leaf some considerable time ago, left to be thought about.

Last weekend I took them out, extracted the leaf prints and dyed the rest a gentle turquoise, some shibori'ed, some just dipped.


I dyed them in little batches, each of thirty minutes, then took out of the dye and plunged in a soda rich solution in another bucket.

Now cut into pieces of regular size and proportion, I've been hand stiching them together using the Jude method of (in my case) finger pressed paperless piecing. She has made a significant proportion of her early online classes available free. It was these that got me started, though I have changed her basic nine patch construction for something a bit more free form.

Influences paid homage to with this?

Jude              India                 Susan                   Judy                    Lotta

all women whose blogs I follow regularly and whose ideas I ponder on and absorb.

I am struck, as one can only be from personal experience, by the portability and ease with which this human powered assemblage of pieces can bring small scraps of fabric together into a larger whole. You can finger press seam allowances, stitch anywhere, become absorbed in the rhythm of the stitching, recognise a deep link with stitchers everywhere and at all times, that swish of thread through fabric, the shape and pattern found in stitching, the way the whole thing, because it's taking place slowly, allows for modification along the way.

Not quite complete yet, and pre proper pressing here. I have changed layout, orientation, combination of these bits of fabric as they have joined with one another and, because I'm working with regular blocks of 1,2,3 and 6 inches, I can chose to combine elements in various ways, which all build to a maximum 6 inch block. These are now being assembled into a larger whole, which will then get a border to frame. A twelve patch.

Then, of course, more stitch