Complementary colours in the garden . . .

(. . . but first a few plane trails.  Wonder where they are all going?)

 

 It is surprising how much red and green is around in gardens, what with leaves changing colour . . .

 . . .nice juicy fruit . . .

 . . .healthy salads. . .

 . . . food for the winter birds . . .

 . . .and food for us.

 Flowers and their leaves . .

 . . and stretching a point with a warm brown.

 And how about another complementary pair to finish up with?

Summer garden round-up . . .

. . . mostly on the sunny days.

 

 \a very reasonable harvest, sometimes because of the rain, sometimes in spite of.

 

Brightening up the hall . . .

 . . . and a lovely bright carpet in my sister-in-law's garden.

 Yummee, gooseberry jam, gooseberry crumble . . .

 A lonely seed finds a home in an unexpected place.

 Self-seeding poppies . . .

 

 . . .and a bit of beaded embroidery to finish up.  A purse/wallet that's been sitting round for ages unfinished.  It really cheers me up when I take it out in a shop to pay the bill!

Some summer stitching bits . . .

Some fresh (for me, anyway) ideas for postcards, for a workshop coming up next week.

 

Landscapes from scraps - pinned, looked at with a window, waiting for some stitching.

We had a very inspiring speaker at the West Country Embroiderers Dorset Day back along, among other things showing beading embroideries.  I've eventually got round to doing some small bits.

And the ancient hexagon quilt is being finished.  I had to square off a large, roughly circular section and extend it.  Just have about 5 rows to add now, then it must have a border added, then all the rest - wadding, backing, quilting . . .  But I love hexagons!

Granddaughter Hannah came home to us after her last day of the summer term and wanted to make something for her mum - so here's a lovely little bookwrap, all stitched by her on my machine, plus a handmade book inside it.

And the rest of the beady bits!

Stitching catch-up . . .

. . .  since January, help.  I have done more stitching than this, but not taken photos evidently.  And in the meantime blogger has updated itself and I'm not quite sure what I'm doing.  That'll teach me to ignore the blog.

So,   first, the latest stitching work for church, an altar frontal for Pentecost, hexagons with flame shapes appliquéd on top, made by Threads of Faith, our church stitching group.

 Second - Journey into Space, family fun day, also at church, one of the craft activities, stitching shapes to felt background and sticking to a folded card.

 Third - a completed bag on my Brilliant Bags  workshop at Sherborne West Country Embroiderers.  Several more of these turned up at the Dorset WCE exhibition at Upton Country Park last weekend,both as exhibits and being bought by visitors!

 Fourth -my Dippy Dolls , another workshop , small creatures made from real scraps and bits of interesting knitting or stitching threads.

 Fifth - the last quartet of Contemporary Quilt Group journal quilts for last year - how out of date is that! - in which buttons had to be included.
This one raided my stash of buttons inherited from my grandmothers, and include several from army uniforms.

 This one used printing and painting with interference paints and a lot of swirly free stitching with some lovely Valdani threads bought at Quilt et TextilKunst in Munich.

 The last two show buttons in a normal place - down the front of a blouse . . .

 ... and a shirt, a scruffy painting one, hence the cut up bits.

. . . and that's it till i take a few more photos!

How do you get tags on with this new setup?

And now for something woody . . . .

We had Christmas in Germany, near Munich, and one of our trips was to a Wildpark at Poing.  A delightful bird feeder caught the eye and gave Derek inspirsation . . .

. . .  so far so good . . . 

Success!, but so far only a robin and two blue tits have dropped by, oh, and a squirrel.  But I don't think we'll ever get a nuthatch, not being in a forest like the inspiration source. 

And sawing up salvaged timber for the woodburner yields some interesting results: 

Turn it round:- 

  

 I think I should have rotated this one.

Valentine's Day coming up.

And the next project . . . .  trouble is, builders round here don't have discarded bits of log, onlly pallets and unwanted roof beams and bits. 

Signs of Spring . . . .

. . . . but a big freeze is on its way from Finland.  Nice of them to share it! 

First, a Christmas rose . . .

. . .or two (or three) . . .

. . . food for the blackbirds  (these apples are all very small, that's why they didn't get eaten by the local humans) . . .

. . .touch of purple . . .

. . .  and of white . . .

. . . and two nice smelly ones, a sweet shrub  . . ( I can't remember the name of this one, though a kind blog reader told me it last year when I asked if anyone knew it.  Are you still there?)

. . . and a rose.