Beautiful repeat shapes - individual baked cheesecakes with honey sauce!!!! I am back teaching at Denman College  having a great time with a fabulous group, they are very funny and VERY naughty at times - perfect!  Denman is a beautiful place at which to teach, stunning grounds with beautiful flower borders and an amazing collection of mature specimen trees. The food is also very good . . . .   We can be healthy if we want to - with fruit salad . . . . . but if there is lemon and lime posset - no competition! The textiles studio is very spacious with plenty of power. A great place in which to play. I am very lucky to teach here. Guess who has the most messy table? The girls working hard. Torn painted Bondaweb decorated with foils, sequins and threads. Torn painted Bondaweb decorated with flower petals. A simple, but very pleasing composition.  . . . . and of course - we are using newspaper - well it is a Layered Textiles course. 

The Craftynotions stand I am off to the NEC this morning with all my books to sell and all my demonstrating kit . . . .  I hope my poor old Volvo will move - the boxes of books are VERY heavy!! Sarah Lawrence of Craftynotions has very kindly extended her stand so I can sell my books and have a presence at the show. I couldn't afford my own stand this year. In return for this very generous gesture I will be demonstrating some of the techniques in my new book, including layering newspaper with painted Bondaweb, decorating boxes made from heavy iron-on interfacing and distressing Vilene Spunbond. (poor Vilene Spunbond).  painted Bondaweb decorated with heat transfer foil, skeleton leaves and glitter Signed copies book will be £18 (RRP 19.99) So - if you are coming to the show do come and say Hello!!!! It's always good to meet my readers and customers, email is a wonderful way of communication, but no substitute for the real thing!!!!! I am looking forward to seeing Viv and Ke

the desired result  AARRGGHHHH!!!! I have a degree in 3D, excellent hand to eye co-ordination, I can assemble a flat pack chest of drawers in under an hour - but could I work out how to fold my new packaging for my books????? Oh it was SO frustrating - the packaging came with instructions and I couldn't make anything work - I had to ring the supplier in the end and the lovely man at the end of the phone explained it was quite normal, either you got it the first time or you didn't. Once he had talked me through the VERY simple folding process I was fine . . . . . if a little embarrassed. All you have to do is go from this -  to this -  to this!!! It was a salutary reminder that we all need different kinds of instruction depending on the kind of learner we are.  Visual learners learn through seeing Auditory learners learn through listening Tactile/Kinesthetic learners learn through doing, moving and touching I wonder which learning style is most common to those of you re

Hurrah! and lashings of ginger beer . . !  The books have just arrived - too late for today's post though .  All orders will be dispatched tomorrow, I have so many parcels to post I will have to make 3 trips to the Post Office, or there will be a riot!   AAHHH!!!! that is a sigh of relief! It is great to have all the boxes of books stacked safely by my front door ready to go to The Festival of Quilts next week.  I shall now go and continue packing up and labelling parcels - Yeehhaaaa!!!!!!! X

 my charcoal drawing of a section of the still life Drawing is the backbone of all creative work - and something I do very rarely unless I am made to. I never find the time to do something that is so important and should really be practiced weekly if not daily!!!!! I am very ashamed to say I only draw once a year - at the Textile Study Group summer school. textilestudygroup.co.uk I always promise my self I will do more, I have all the kit I could ever need, I just don't make the time. Projects like The Sketchbook Challenge (see link on the left of this blog) are very helpful in addressing this. Do any of you get together to make yourselves draw? There were three tutors teaching on the five day summer school. Rosemary Campbell, Alison King and Bobby Britnell. I was on Alison King's course. The title of our course was Meaningful Territory. Alison had set up a stunning black and white still life down the room and our first exercise was to take a section and draw it in char

Shoreham Gallery, 27 Brunswick Road, Shoreham - by - Sea gallery website   I am now part of a co-operative! oooeerrr!!!! There are 20 or so artists in the group and we all take turns in manning the gallery and taking on extra jobs to help things run smoothly. The gallery is just by Shoreham railway station so we are busy all day with passing trade and regulars popping in for a chat. The area is full of lovely small independent shops, it has a small village feel - quite intimate. I love being in the gallery, it makes such a wonderful change to dashing all over the country. The gallery was previously a few streets away from it's present location and we moved 3 weeks ago to these lovely new premises. There is a small garden at the back and a room upstairs I will able to use for workshops - Yeehaa!!! Somewhere to teach near me. The room is on the small side so I think it would take 8 students, that's enough to have some fun! The re launch party was from 4 pm - 7pm, all the arti

AARRRRGGGGGHHH!!!!!! I STILL haven't heard when my book is arriving from the printers in the Far East. It was due to be delivered last week!!! I am so SO fed up - and I am sure those of you who have pre-ordered from me are also getting a bit peeved. Needless to say as soon as the delivery arrives I will send the orders out along with their special Hot & Sticky packs.  I am off to attend the Textile Study Group Summer School textilestudygroup.co.uk on Sunday so I am praying the books arrive before then. If not, I will have to try to get some of the books delivered to the Summer School and post them from there. They shouldn't be MUCH longer . . . . . . .   x

75gm (heavy) Tyvek ironed lightly between baking parchment I am off to Emsworth later today to deliver a lecture this evening and two one day workshops - Tinkering with Tyvek. I had been booked for just one workshop but the waiting list was so long we had enough for another day. I am excited about spending two days playing with Tyvek. I have taught so many 'Hot Textiles' based workshop recently it will be a welcome change.  layered decreasing shapes of 75gm Tyvek (Heavy) stitched in the middle and gentle heated 75 gm Tyvek (heavy) layered with polyester organza, machine stitched together then zapped with a heat gun to reveal different layers of colour I will update the blog with all our exploits at the end of the week, I shall be a bit tight for time as I drive to France the day after I get back from Emsworth to see my friends Sue and John to sort out our teaching programme next year. I'm looking forward to driving down to the Charente Maritime district where they live,

 Hayley Watson While I was writing Layered Textiles I met Hayley Watson at The Knitting and Stitching Show at Alexandra Palace , London . I had a stand at the show and Hayley walked past. I was so taken with what she was wearing and how she was wearing it, that I dashed up to her and asked If I could take a photograph of her. She was very surprised but said Yes! I explained I was working on a book and why I would like to include her in it. I had wanted to include Hayley in the 'Inspiration' chapter but this was vetoed by my editor - ggggGRRR!!! So to make up for not being able to include her in my book I said I would write about Hayley on my blog - so one of Hayley's fashion illustrations using ink, bleach and white paint for the background, she then   made pages of a mixture of meduims and paper and cut them up to make garment shapes Hayley is twenty one years old and is currently studying BA (hons) Textiles for Fashion at Basingstoke College of Technology. She is ins

The Tulip Tree ( Liriodendron tulipifera ) in full flower - quite stunning, just one of the many specimen trees in the grounds One more post about Denman College. www.denmancollege.org.uk It is a very beautiful place to work, learn and play! Denman has it's own new website which will be continually updated over the next month or so. Although the college is the home of the W.I. all the courses are open to the public - MEN and women. You don't have to be a member to enrol on the courses and enjoy the whole Denman experience. The grounds are stunning and well kept with plenty of areas to explore in any spare time you have. They look good throughout the year. Amongst many attractions I love the long flower border and the lake. looking across the grounds to a beautiful group of trees one of the gorgeous flower borders one aspect of the lake with its well established trees and surrounding planting There are usually several courses running at one time at Denman and on the l