Recent Art Adventures

It kind of makes sense that as an Art teacher I enjoy Artmaking. This is true, although I don't often spend as much time creating as I would like. It takes a while to get all my materials out and set up, so I have to plan to spend a whole day making if I'm doing this at home and I take up A. Lot. Of. Space. when I'm working. My sewing, on the other hand, is usually confined to a much smaller area, unless I'm cutting out and therefore is easier to pick up and do a bit at a time. so I always take opportunities to attend workshops when I can.

Last week I have been fortunate to attend some CPD at The Northern School of Art at Hartlepool (formerly known as Cleveland College of Art & Design). It was a bit of a trek from school, but well worth it and it was inspiring to see the degree shows at the same time.

The CPD was focussed on printmaking with found objects. The instructor was Helen from Northern Print and she went over a range of different printing processes and how we could achieve effective results in the classroom, with or without a press.

As often happens I found myself drawn to the monotype processes. I don't know if it more to do with the painterly aspects of this type of printing or the immediacy and unpredictability of the technique that I like. I played with the layering of textures and shapes, using both hand printing and the press to achieve different results.

What was new to me was using a printing medium for using with acrylic paint. I was pleasantly surprised how long the paint stayed open with the medium added. I think I will buy some to use with my Gelli plate at home as I have found the fast acrylic drying time limiting when working with the Gelli plate. When I make monoprints at home I usually use oil-based ink, which I have grown to love but it can take a long time for the inks to dry and then there is the cleaning up!

I am constantly drawn to printmaking and would love to pursue this further, especially textile printing methods.

On Saturday we also had our monthly crafternoon and I decided to start a painting. So I took along some paints and some design ideas I've been working on and began to create the underpainting. I go from excited to bored very quickly and I'm starting to realise that I like my paintings to have textural qualities and at the moment this work is far too flat and the colours and layout are not quite right. Over the coming weeks, I will be adding to this to start to bring it to life. I really do like to work with mixed media and would love to bring some stitch into this work at some point. Watch this space!

It's always amazing to see how my preferences and ways of working change and develop over time. I wonder where this will go next?

Last Minute Alice

The exam season is drawing to a close and it's almost the end of the university year. My eldest son will be back home on Monday after completing his first year at Leeds University. My daughter takes her last GCSE on Friday the 14th of June and my younger son will also finish his last A level exam on the same day. My husband has had all his grades back for his university course at Durham and he is happy with them. For all we thought that early June would be fairly quiet it's actually turned out to be quite a busy month, with lots of traveling around the country and some key events.

The 7th of June was John's college party. It's the end of term and his final year, so the last opportunity to see many of those he's been studying with. The end of year parties are quite legendary and always have a theme. Last year it was Children's TV and we went a Florence and Zebedee from the magic roundabout.

Florence and Zebedee

The year before was 80's themed and we went as music icons, Souxsie Sioux and Morrissey.

Channelling the 80's

So when we heard the theme for this year we were truly excited - Alice in Wonderland. I had borrowed my Queen of hearts costume from panto from a couple of years ago and we had the materials to make John a Mock Turtle costume. However we found out that it was to be more a tea party and less fancy dress, so my costume would have been way over the top!

A bit too much?

Last minute my husband decided that a dress with Alice on rather than going as a character might be more in keeping with the evening, so off to The Sewing Machine Guy I went and picked up just over 1m of this Kokka printed fabric.

I knew I had just enough to make the pencil skirt version of Butterick B6453 as long as I used another fabric for the facings. I already had a long invisible zip in my stash.

It took just over 1 1/2 hrs to cut and assemble the dress. I did end up taking in the side seams on the skirt and the princess seams on the bodice, just under the bust. As I'd made all other necessary alterations on prior makes this was super easy to complete. My Irregular choice shoes were the perfect match, I also made a pocket square for my husband to wear with his suit - there wasn't enough for a tie.

I'm glad I went for the simpler option as we got a bust tyre on the way home and it was pouring with rain. The wheel wrench was not very strong and wouldn't shift the wheel nuts. We were rescued by a friend who came out with a better quality piece of kit and we were back on our way within 10 minutes of him arriving.

I finally got to wear my Queen of Hearts costume while fundraising for Morpeth Pantomime Society on Sunday at Morpeth Fair day. Can you spot me?

Me Made May Review

Well, I made it to the end of May and I wore me made every day. I didn't manage quite as much colour as I'd like, but I think that's down to many of my more colourful items being summer wear and it's not been that warm.

I didn't document my outfits simply as life has been far too hectic to do so and I can't stand bathroom selfies - unless the bathroom is stunning.

So what have I learnt about my me made collection?

I have enough me made to wear every day without having to really try and many of my me mades didn't get a look in.

I wear dresses for work - a lot!

Finding separates for work is more tricky. I only have one plain skirt to pair with many patterned tops. I think I need plain bottom pieces - skirts and trousers that are suitable for work.

When I'm not at work I often wear very casual clothes -  jeans/ shorts and a t-shirt/ hoodie. I now have two me made pairs of jeans and two pairs of culottes. I have lots of sorbetto tops.

One thing I think I'm missing is a hoodie/ sweatshirt to wear with my jeans. the one I've been wearing is a cast off from my boys and they had it second hand. It's starting to get a bit tatty, as are my cardigans. I need to make or buy some to go with all the dresses I wear.

I have been quite busy making - I have recently completed 3 pieces for Minerva Crafts Reviews so more on those later. I've also made a dress for a party I'm going to next week. Made in a couple of hours this afternoon.

May has been busy at work and we have had several workshops making costumes and a giant flying saucer ready for the Whitley bay carnival, which took place last weekend. The theme was out of this world. we had about 40 adults and children dressed up, parading, dancing and drumming. It was a great atmosphere, so on that day, it was a completely different me made.

Our Flying Saucer

Dancing along the street in our flying saucer costumes

So what lies ahead for June? A quieter making month. I have report deadlines coming up and I'll be spending a lot of time doing those. I have a couple of things that I need to do, but that will be it really until the end of the term in July.

Me Made May and other stories

I always start out with good intentions. I will photograph my outfits every day and post them to Instagram but then life happens and taking photos is the last thing on my mind.

The last three weeks have been super busy. Busy at work and busy at home. I thought I would share a little of what's going on.

Me Made May so far...
We are on day 12 and so far I have worn at least one me-made every day:-
Flying pigs dress - once
Handbag dress -  once
Red floral Saraste dress - once
Chiffon skull top - twice
Red Sorbetto top - once
Blue Sorbetto top  - twice
Burdastyle overlap top  - once
Ginger Jeans  - 3 times
Burda Spotty sleeveless shirt  - just the once
Refashioned denim jacket  worn 5 times
Zero waste denim culottes  - worn twice
Burdstyle gathered neck top v1 & 2  - twice each
Black Ponte Lucinda skirt  worn once
Draped tartan Vivienne Westwood inspired dress  - worn twice
Elise T shirt  - 1 wear
Refashioned Jacket  - 3 days
Self-drafted undies  - 12 days

London Baby
I had a course booked in London on the 7th of May. This was the Tuesday after the bank holiday, which also happened to be my hubby's birthday, so we planned to spend a couple of days in London visiting my sister. Unfortunately, my hubby was unwell and couldn't go. As I had my course booked I went as planned.

I stayed with my sister and her hubby and we spent Monday at Little Venice, Camden and the Saatchi gallery before going out for Pizza.

On Tuesday I attended my course at the British Association of Art Therapists. I'm not an art therapist, but they run a course for professionals in school, to support vulnerable children. I made this cute little fella as part of the training. I can't wait for day 2 in June.

Before getting my train home I had time to explore the British library and loved some of the work on display. Unfortunately my train was delayed by 45mins and I had time to admire the ceiling at Kings Cross Station.

Work and Home Stuff
It's a crazy time at the moment. The year 6 SATs start tomorrow and there have been lost opf preparations at school. I'm busy with ceramics projects with some of my students and as my pug mill isn't working correctly I'm hand wedging clay for between 3 and 4 classes a day - now that's a workout!
We are also taking part in Whitley bay Carnival on the 25th May and are busy making our giant flying saucer and costumes. it's hard work, but i'm sure it will be worth it in the end.
My own children are just about to head into a month of exams as Bethan sits her GCSEs and Cai sits his A-Levels. John also has his final university assignments to hand in by the end of this week.
Yesterday my daughter performed with Alnick youth theatre at Northern Stage in Newcastle. It was her first experience of performing in a theatre setting. I think she loved it. I've needed a bit of me time this weekend and i've been sewing up this lovely skull print cotton form Minerva crafts. More to come on that one.

Zero Waste Culottes

Happy Easter! I've had two weeks off work and lots of time to be creative. I've helped my daughter with some fundraising and made her prom dress. I've done a fitting for a wedding dress I'm making and I've altered another wedding dress - lots of selfless sewing. So this Easter weekend it was time to refashion the pile of Jeans I've had lingering in the wardrobe.

I used some old jeans and offcuts from previous projects. This pile of denim had been destined for the bin until I decided to reuse some of it. The rest has not gone to waste and I'm in the process of piecing it together to get some usable yardage.

I pulled out my trusty culottes pattern, which is #114 from 03/2016 edition of Burdastyle magazine. This requires just 1.5m of fabric. after harvesting as much of the jeans fabric as I could I pieced the scraps together to make big enough pieces to get the legs out of. I took a pair of back pockets off one of the pairs of jeans I was using and kept them for the back of the culottes. I quite like that you can see the dark patch of denim where one of these pockets was placed originally on the front of the finished pair. I used offcuts of cotton for the pocket bags in order to reduce the bulk.

This pattern is an easy sew. The straight cut of the legs means that it is quite easy to cut from regular fabric with very very little wastage and made them a perfect option for a refashion. The legs are shaped at the waist using a pleat on the trouser front and darts at the back. I cut a size 38 but I increased the back darts by about 1cm each and took off about the same of the CB seam at the waist. It's what I need to do to make sure they fit at the waist and the hip. I also drafted a curved waistband to help with the fit. 

The culottes came together quickly and I used some grey extra strong thread for topstitching as It seemed to fit the faded denim quite well, rather than use a new brashy gold. Most of the topstitching went well but the waistband was problematic. My trusty Bernina struggled to go through all the layers and the tread caught frequently. From the right side, it looks ok, but the inside is a mess, despite hammering the seams and steaming the heck out of them. I really need to do the stitching again, but I think I might leave it until I've washed them a couple of times and the fabric has settled. I think using a bigger sized needle might help too.

I haven't added a button or buttonhole yet. I couldn't find the back to the Jeans button I had and I need to sort out the topstitching thread to get a good finish when I do the buttonhole.

I love the shape of these and I'm sure they will get quite a lot of wear over the summer months.

Blooming Bomber Jacket - a review

What a riot of colour?
This is the Blooming Bomber Jacket. It is a design by Katie Jones and the pattern is available free on Love Crochet. I first saw this in Little Treasures blog a few weeks ago and knew that it would be my next make.

The recommended yarn was Paintbox yarns Arran weight. I managed to get all I needed for less than £20 - which is just what I had left of my Christmas money.

This pattern is classed as intermediate, but a confident beginner could handle it as it's not difficult.

I really like the finished jacket - it came up a little bigger than I was expecting, even though my tension was spot on and I think I might be tempted to use a DK yarn and a slightly smaller hook next time - I'd also like to see it made in Cotton or bamboo yarn.

So what drew me to this? Firstly the colour. I love bright colours and I am trying to embrace it in my clothing too. I love that the design is inspired by Frida Kahlo who is one of my favourite artists. I also loved that the pattern has statement sleeves and huge 3D floral motif pockets - what's not to love?

This was a very quick make (after the months it took to make my Eastern Jewels blanket), taking just 2 weeks to make.   I spent most evenings doing a bit and it came together very quickly. I'm sure this was helped by me using the time while my daughter was at drama rehearsals to get this to progress quickly.

So how easy is it?
The construction of the jacket is very simple and the challenge comes on the cuffs and the pockets. I did find the instructions a little sparse, as I'm very visual I like to see pictures and understand how what I'm doing relates to the garment. I think I'd been spoilt as the Persian Tiles instructions for the Eastern Jewels blanket were incredibly clear and well presented. The Instructions weren't difficult for the Bomber Jacket, just rather brief.

I like to know which part of the garment I'm starting with and the order of construction. The diagram for the pocket was clear and did help, but I spent the first few rows of the jacket wondering which bit I was starting with and working out how it was going to work. For those who need to know - it's the underarm point.

I also had to look up what crochet tapestry technique was - you use this for the popcorn stitch on the cuff. It wasn't hard, but it was terminology I hadn't come across before and I found a couple of youtube tutorials which made it clear. There were more complex stitches in the Eastern Jewels blanket, but they were explained more clearly. That being said, I have a jacket that looks like the one in the photo and I've worn it quite a few times. It looks great with my black Jeans and Docs and I can see me wearing it with my next Minerva make - which is very bright. All hail colour!!!!!!

Red Floral Saraste Shirt Dress

This is my first version of the Saraste shirt dress from the Breaking the Pattern book by Named Clothing and it will not be the last. After a few recent makes with some tricksy fabrics, this was an absolute dream to sew.

I'm always a bit nervous when I first sew a pattern as I wanted an easy well fitting garment. This week has produced both an unwearable pair of trousers (which I won't go into here) and this stunning dress, which I love.

I compared my measurements to the size guide and finished measurements and based on these I cut a straight size 3. The pattern calls for just over 2m of 150cm wide fabric. Unfortunately I only had 2m of the fabric and it was narrower than 150cm wide too, which meant I had to shorten the skirt portion of the dress considerably and cut the inner yoke, inner collar stand and under collar in a contrasting fabric, which I also used to make bias binding for the armscye as there was not enough fabric for sleeves. I quite like the contrast effect if I'm honest.

I'm not normally a huge fan of floral fabric, but there was just something about the colour combination of this fabric that I really like. I didn't buy it myself and I'm not sure where it's from, but it has a really nice feel and a slight stretch. My sister-in-law gave it to me as a Christmas gift and I've been looking for a project to use it on since then. The contrast fabric was also a Christmas gift. My sister had bought me some yardage from Simply Fabrics in Brixton and had also spotted some remnants. This was one of those remnants - there was about 1/3m of this one.

Once I'd managed pattern Tetris to make all the pieces fit. I started on the construction. I followed this exactly as directed in the book. The bodice back and side front are constructed and stitched together at the side seams, then the gathered skirt is added before the centre front pieces are added and yoke are joined at the shoulder.

I can see why it's constructed in this way, but it doesn't leave many options for alterations. I really like the fit and won't be making any changes to this one, but I would normally have a closer fitting waist, so taking a bit off the side seams and back darts would help with this. If you think you might need to make similar alterations I would construct the back and front separately before joining at the shoulders and side seams.

The drafting is excellent on this and all the pieces matched perfectly. I left off the frill at the edge of the collar and used the grainline archer sew-a-long for the construction of the collar as it gives a great finish. The Saraste instructions are similar here, but the sew-a-long just gives a bit more detail.

I finished all inside seams with the overlocker. The hem was also overlocked and a narrow hem sewn in order to keep as much length as possible. The armscye is finished with contrast bias binding.

This dress is just completely my style. I will get a lot of wear out of it and I think there will be more of these.