My first 4 books . .    Welcome to my new blog subscribers.  I have 2 mailing lists one for this blog, and one for my newsletter. This blog tends to be a long read, it can contain all kinds of things, my life here in Ireland, my dogs, my travel, whatever takes my fancy, I can ramble, I like to talk to you all. There is a search engine in the top right hand corner, I have been writing this blog for 10 years or so, so if you want to find out what I have written about Lutradur or Tyvek or New Zealand, anything really . . just pop it into the search engine My newsletter is more of a short read, what is happening with my teaching, news of shows and new travel tours. That kind of thing.         I don't know if you can hear it from where you are, but my brain is whirring with new ideas and techniques. While I am filming and updating my 12 most popular workshops, I am developing new ideas to share with you. My 'what happens if . . ' head is definitel...

This is a detail of the larger piece by Morag which is featured further down this post. A New Starting Point is one of my favourite workshops. It is newspaper based and can be taught over 2 - 5 days. This summer school at Inkberrow Design Centre was the 5 day version which means we could add print and stitching onto water soluble fabric. I love teaching at the IDC studios, there is plenty of room and the atmosphere is fabulous, slightly bonkers - just brilliant . There is room for the students to work comfortably.   Starting to paint up the newspaper and Bon daweb. The first thing we got on with was the 'prett y and background' technique featured in my book Reclaimed Textiles . B asically tearing, layering and then tearing again . . . working with both painted and unpainted B ondaweb. The group were working with all types of paper, old books, magazine pages, music . . .  We also included mica flakes and gilding flake - of course we did....

The view from the workshop door - one of my favourite views. West Dean College has got be one of the best places to teach in the U.K. The grounds are beautiful, the gardens are varied and colourful, the teaching areas are excellent and the food is - just fabulous!  East Sussex Embroiderers Guild hold their Summer School there every year. I was lucky to be asked to teach this year. Sophie Long was the other tutor. Her goldwork is very modern while still being traditional. We had great fun - we were a small group of six - I think I have taught all the other member of the Guild in this area of the country over the past ten years. I had been asked for a three dimensional slant on my newspaper based workshop - A New Starting Point. So I took my die cutting machine along to cut the boxes and brooch blanks. Some of the group painting up their papers and old books. The group brought in a great selection of foreign language newspapers, old atlases, technical and child...