Mosaic Monday

Good morning Monday
Mosaic Monday - red paint

delicious red paint - all textured and peeling - so wonderful!
1. Arch 2. Red door 3. Red paint 4. Painted bondaweb
5. Nicola 6. Red barn paint

thank you to my flickr friends and faves for sharing their art ♥

because every now and then a girl needs a fix of red!

have a "fabulous" week ♥

Autumn blessings (part 1)

Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans

John Lennon

berries, shining and scarlet

Life seems to be so busy all the time...

We all seem to juggle so many things in our daily lives and working weeks. I don't know about you ... but I am constantly trying to find that elusive balance between meaningful time with family and friends, working, blogging and actually creating

I make endless lists and try to work out new "realistic" housework schedules in an effort to gain control. The days rush by ...

~ petite pomme ~
a tiny apple the size of a cherry

I feel like I missed the best of the summer ... so I'm making sure I don't miss out on my favourite time of the year. Every spare moment I get I've been out walking, gathering Autumn treasures and taking photos

berries, shining and scarlet

conkers ... richly dark

Sadly, I didn't find time to go blackberry picking and make jam this year. Devil's Blackberry Day is nearly upon us and the blackberries I've seen in the hedgerows are now past their best ...

... but I did make a collaged card for a friend's birthday
with sycamore seeds and a leaf

on the dry leaf carpet

and the colours in the leaf inspired this mosaic for
Things I Love Thursday

Autumn blessings

Things I Love Thursday

... rich rose pink tones, warm Autumn reds, berries
pomegranates, roses, sunsets, poppies, nature and textiles ...

1. Melagranata - Pomegranate *Happy*New*Year*to*All*of*You*Buddies!*
2. After the rain 3. Red berries - closeup 4. Sunset poppy
5. Texture #27 6. Pomegranate (again) 7. velvet laid on roving
8. Heart doll 9. Nature is an artist

I also made a couple of little stitched ATCs from silk velvet and beads

with love

I like to ramble!

it was such a glorious day

in the woods and lanes the leaves were beginning to turn

Autumn's rich berries

and I like to press a few fallen leaves for projects through the year

leaves of many colours

A busy time ... we went "up country" for a wedding at Chiddingfold, Surrey on the 18th September

We had the St. Ives September Festival from 11th to 25th September and went to see Robin Trower, The Hamsters, Limehouse Lizzy and Livewire AC DC "For Those About to Rock" which took me back to my NWOBHM days :o)


Then on 24th September blog buddies Julie and Stewart came down to St. Ives for a couple of weeks staying in a cottage at Westcotts Quay

The day we chose to meet up it was dark and raining heavily so we were quite happy to sit in Bumbles Tea Room in The Digey most of the morning, drinking tea with a tea cake, chatting, catching up and exchanging gifts

Julie's DH gave me some of his cards featuring his beautiful photography. This is one that he took in Italy, one of my favourite places, and I chose to show it because I love those warm rosy tones. I think it's a great photograph. Thank you Stewart ♥

Julie is such a nice blog friend, we get on so well :o)

I had some lovely pressies from her ... some cream lace from a vintage dress, a rose scented heart, some red beads made from carved stone, some textured hand made silk paper from textile artist Dawn Correia in Lincoln and something extra-specially gorgeous that Julie made for me (which is connected to my pebble project on the other blog so I will be showing it there). Thank you Julie ♥

We had lunch in their cottage in Westcotts Quay and her DH made us delicious cheese on crumpets and we had buns with our tea. Soon after, it stopped raining and it brightened up so we went on the lifeboat beach for some beachcombing

flotsam and jetsam washed ashore

ballad of the fisherman hauling his nets

To top off our day nicely Julie and I had a look round an exhibition of textiles and crafts in The Arts Club where I bumped into many friends. It was a grand day out :o)

Thank you for visiting my blog today

I do hope you will pop back for Autumn blessings (part 2) coming drekly ... natural dyeing with plant dyes, Alfred Wallis hearts, nature tags, more autumn photos, a workshop Julie and I did with favourite artist Sally MacCabe and special things from friend Cathy Cullis ... and there will also be a post on my other blog some time this weekend ...

Happy days
Carolyn ♥

Fairy of the Rose

Best and dearest flower that grows

Perfect both to see and smell
Words can never, never tell
Half the beauty of a rose
Buds that open to disclose
Fold on fold of purest white
Lovely pink, or red that glows
Deep, sweet scented. What delight
To be Fairy of the Rose!

Cicely Mary Barker


The summer was a busy and distracting one
and there is much to share here on my blog
I shall be spending the weekend going through my photos
and visiting dear blog buddies

I hope you have a wonderful weekend
Carolyn ♥

Tea and Textiles

Thank you for visiting me today. I hope you will share a cup of tea with me while you visit ... and pass the biccies ...

I'm up to the letter T in my alphabet series. T is for textiles, tea, teabags, tea cups, teapots, tags, teabag art and thundery skies

poured tea





















Tis for tea - my inchy for the inchybyinch challege. I used a scrap of torn tea towel (drying up cloth) and a teapot button mounted on a black inchy chip with a snippet of text - poured tea

The teabag is raspberry, cranberry and elderflower. It's such a lovely colour I like to use the tea to colourwash sketchbook pages and papers

having tea













Torn linen, text and image from Emma













T is for tags coloured with tea and embellished with tea time thingies

fairy cakes





















This one was made with a tea dyed tag, torn linen, a dried teabag, cup cake and some text






















I photo'd the tag on the first cookery book I ever owned when I was aged 13 called "Good Housekeeping's Cooking is Fun". It even has instructions on how to make a pot of tea or coffee including wise counsel such as "fill the kettle from the cold water tap and put it on to boil" :o)

the tea tray


















This tag was simply made from a scrap of torn tea towl, a tea cup button and the words "the tea tray". It just needs a little bead or button for the lid which I forgot to do!

share a cup of tea





















Torn linen, torn (are you reading this Carole!) tea towel, torn teabag edge and a snippet of text ... share a cup of tea

Tag treatments





















T is for tags dipped in tea ... I added some paint and specks of copper metallic powder while the tags were still damp. This is how I do my tags and then I sometimes edge them with distress ink to make them look like they've been around a bit

I made a teeny mosaic inspired by the colours of these gorgeous tea cups - this is my particular favourite tone of red (but all reds are lovely!)

Red spotty teacups





















1. Wall Hanger Be Mine 1 2. For those of you who love those cups 3. Tiny Spark Mixed Media Collage 4. Untitled

The picture on my kitchen calendar for June was pretty and aptly tea related ...






















... make the most of a sunny afternoon, bring out the best cups and saucers and linger over tea on the terrace ...

Thundery ... our weather this week has been more humid and moody than sunny

Stormy skies
















I took this photo from the top of the open top bus on Wednesday. I went on the bus to Geevor to meet up with a good friend. We went to Morvah Schoolhouse gallery and tea rooms and had a pot of tea and hot buttered crumpets. They were yummy!

Textiles - the current exhibition was called "Natural Elements" showing textiles by Gillian Farrell and ceramics by Jemima Mitchell

Treading Lightly - we also visited the current exhibition "Treading Lightly" at The Yew Tree Gallery at Morvah ... a wonderful gallery of contemporary art in all media

I was so pleased to see the beautiful woven willow work of Lizzie Farey at The Yew Tree Gallery. I was at school with Lizzie and her twin Rachel for five years ...






















... and I really enjoyed seeing the whimsical art of Edwina Bridgeman






















I made a little mosaic from photos I took on Wednesday






















1. Jemima Mitchell 2. Interesting patterns in wood 3. Magie Hollingworth 4. Gillian Farrell 5. Pebbles 6. Edwina Bridgeman 7. Edwina Bridgeman 8. Gillian Farrell 9. Jemima Mitchell

Textures - the 3D paper pieces by Magie Hollingworth were wonderful, with such interesting and inspiring textures



















Thursday I had another go at dyeing with avocado skins, this time with a bit more success! I boiled the skins for 15 mins and then added the fabrics for another 15 mins






















I had these fabrics (below) in the dye jar for two days






















I'm leaving the fabrics in the other jar for one more week to see what happens and will let you know if anything interesting develops

Things I Love Thursday
Tea dyeing and teabag art





















Things I Love Thursday - fabrics and lace dyed with tea, natural dyeing experiments and samples, using tea as a colourwash on paper and beautiful teabag art

1. New works 2 - flock 2. Highfield Wagga 2002 3. Tea + iron 4. Teabag art 5. Autumn 6. Muslin lavender sachets 7. On a rainy day 8. The tea bags - so far 9. Cyanotype tea tone tests 10. Teabags 11. Tea 12. Pure but never simple - scrap salvage corsage brooch 13. Winter acorns - a mosaic I made for the flickr group TILT on Thursday just gone

Thank you for reading my rosy ramblings. Hope you have a fab week
Carolyn ♥

Rosy red ramblings

R is a lovely letter!

Rosy red ramblings make me so happy ... so my post today is full of roses and lovely things that are red ... perfect for the month of July

Starting with a mosaic I made full of gorgeous inspiring reds






















Beautiful reds

1. ~peek~ 2. Barn stationery 3. Slow cloth detail 4. On the bias ATC 5. Red background errors 6. Badcock T- blue wren 1 7. Spring's heart 8. Coral garden sketch book 9. Seeds 1998 10. A heart's affection 11. Coral garden sketch book 12. Growth series: Creep (red) 13. Monoprinting - red paint 14. Silly girl 15. Things to do with leftover scraps 16. Kimmeridge no entry 17. The red stuff 18. Starting with the back 19. Tie dye explosion 20. Doublet 21. Knitting 22. Untitled 23. Hide 24. Who knew what when? 25. Vintage girl tag

Thank you to my flickr friends and faves for their amazing REDS






















Berries are one of my most favourite red things. I made a tag using a vintage photo of a little girl with a basket of red berries






















I sewed some Christmas berries to the tag and added a vintage sewing machine bobbin with red thread (which I found in the loft of my old cottage). The thread is too old to use but it makes a nice embellishment

















R is for rubies - my inchy for the alphabet challenge on Inchybyinch


















R is for red letter day and red stamps






















Things I love Thursday - romance, love notes in a keepsake box, antique papers/envelopes, vintage letters, beautiful handwriting, black ink and red postage stamps from faraway places I may never get to visit

1. Original envelope from outlaw Frank James' widow - 1915 2. Love letters 3. Vintage envelope 4. Postage stamps 5. Postcard for Alice - #11 - Red Ink! 6. Untitled 7. Stamps 8. South African stamp 9. Untitled - for the flickr group TILT















Red letter day

I really love making tags. For this one I used some undyed silk paper, some vintage text about collecting postage stamps, an English stamp that is a particularly lovely shade of red and the words "a red letter day"






















Time is flying so fast, I can't believe we are into another beautiful month!

In my calendar for July I used a vintage photo of my Mum and Dad with red heart shaped rose petals from my garden and some text about love






















Rose petals I picked this week






















Roses in my gathering box - as well as limpet shells, a mussel shell, a pebble, a lead bullet I found last year, a fossil from the beach and some oak apples






















During the week I had fun making a whimsical stitched collage






















It wasn't easy to photograph but there are lots of layers - a calico base with vintage beige lace that features roses. I added some linen and scrim

The leaves are free machine stitched ... you can see on the back here















The flowers are cut from a strip of lace Julie gave me last year and I used various vintage buttons on top. The "love stitching red" stitched strip was made for me by Cathie

Love Stitching Red
















I decorated with printed tape machine stitched down and some hand stitching with red beads and finally added a dried seed head that I dyed red






















The red ribbon flowers with buttons gave me a whim to make some rose corsages using silk petals, crochet lace and old buttons













































































































































I had a "Crow Day" with Jo yesterday. We both worked on hand stitched projects, had a good natter and put the world to rights. I took along my red slow cloth I've been working on from time to time. It hasn't seen a lot of action for a while!

I cut 22 squares (each roughly 4 cm square). The photo shows the squares positioned. I have since sewn them to the cloth and shall decorate some of the squares with more embroidery, before adding the next layer

I found it very hard to photograph the red which in real life is very rich and vibrant with shiny gold metallic. I think my photo looks a little flat

It's an ongoing project I come back to every now and again, inspired by trips to Thailand and Mexico and stitched during my trip to Egypt earlier in the year. Some of the gold embroidered fabrics I brought back from Egypt



















Jo spoilt me with more birthday pressies including this wonderful rustic bird she made for me. Meet Rosy Bird

Rosy Bird












Rosy Bird is made from hessian and red/pink rose fabric with secrets in the pockets (I'm whispering ... there were little heart shaped buttons hidden in Rosy's wings). I'm a lucky girlie. Thank you Jo ♥

Wishing you all a very happy and sunny weekend and thank you for reading my rosy red ramblings

Carolyn ♥