More Snow

I woke up to a sunny, snowy morning and rushed out with my camera:

My snow dyeing bundles are frozen solid but most of the dye has passed through the snow so I've brought the fabric into the lean-to to thaw slowly.

DH's toe is a lot better, stitches out on Wednesday.  He drove the car yesterday and is no longer taking pain killers, thank you for all your best wishes.
Today my lovely DD and my scrumptious Sam are coming over for lunch.  Before that I hope to get a binding on a second Fat Quarter Frenzy quilt I've made and then I can sit down this evening and do the hand stitching of it.  Have a lovely day and keep warm and safe.

Festival of Broken Needles

How quickly the years go.  It doesn't seem very long ago that I was writing a post about the Japanese tradition of hari-kuyo, the Festival of Broken Needles, and here we are on 8th February again.  You can read the post here, with all the details and there are some great photos of a ceremony here.

This year I have been putting my bent, blunt and broken needles in a little cylindrical tin and today I've thanked them, wrapped them and settled them down to rest.  The little bag is decorated with Cretan Stitch and Herringbone Stitch and is my TAST2012 piece for the past two weeks.  I've put a loop on it so that it can hang with my other TAST "baubles" (which are now on various themes, not all Christmas).  I loved doing the Herringbone, I could get quite a good rhythm going but the Cretan made me think - thread under the needle, thread over the needle, oops, try again....it needs more practice as I think it's a nice stitch.  This week the TAST stitch is......Chevron Stitch.

Australian designer, stitcher and all round textile wonder woman, Lynette Anderson, has posted about her meeting with our sensei, Bryan, take a look here.
Another great report on the Tokyo Quilt Festival is here.   Better make yourself a cup of coffee!

7th February 1812 - Charles John Huffman Dickens born

Dickens2012

The son of John and Elizabeth Dickens, Charles Dickens was born on 7th February 1812 in Portsmouth, England. His early life was a mix of good and bad with an early spell of education followed by having to work in the dreadful conditions of Warren's blacking (boot polish) factory when his father was sent to prison as a debtor. Charles later returned to school but his experiences inspired his books including "Great Expectations".
Charles' career path began with journalism and following his marriage to Catherine Hogarth in 1836 he published "Pickwick Papers". He wrote novels, plays (and acted), he edited journals and wrote travel books and autobiography. He travelled extensively and campaigned on many issues including against slavery and he fathered ten children before leaving his wife. His mistress was the actress Ellen Ternan. Not surprsingly maybe, in 1870, he died of a stroke and was buried in Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey in London.
Dickens is much loved the world over and must have been an amazing man, full of enthusiasm for life. I have to confess that I have never read any of his books (waits for thunderbolt...)  I've seen films and television dramatisations of many novels but have not read any for myself.  So, I'm starting with Great Expectations, today, the bicentenary of the author's birth.

Snow Dyeing Take Two

Thank you for all the helpful comments on my last post about snow dyeing and thank you especially to Julie who posted about her own fantastic snow dyeing.
We still have plenty of snow so I thought I'd have another try and take things snowly today.  I've set the fabric on the wire rack and I've left it outside.  I'm keeping an eye on it in case the birds think I've put out a massive cup cake for them!  If a freeze is forecast tonight I think I'll bring it into the lean-to.  I've got three pieces of fabric under the snow, all folded/scrunched in different ways.

Let It Snow-Dye

Today I awoke to the pile of snow that was forecast, about 6", the poor birds must have chilly tummies from walking through the snow.

I decided to give snow-dyeing a try.  I've never done it before but have seen some interesting results.  I had a quick Google and found some tutorials, I used this straightforward one from Lucy.  I also read this more detailed one from Prochemical & Dye.
My amazing DH found some soda ash in the garage - I think he has everything one could possibly want in the garage, just not always sure where exactly.
The fabric soaked in the soda ash (1/3 cup), salt (1/2 cup) and hot water bath for half an hour.  Then I packed it in plastic boxes with snow and the fun part began.
I used Procion dyes, in powder form, and sat the concoctions on the woodburner the let the snow melt and the magic happen.

 While I was using the kitchen as a dye-house I unwrapped my steamed poinsettia:

Hmmm, another sludgy brown piece, the red that seemed to be seeping through has vanished.  Never mind, onward and upward!
As the snow melted I wondered whether I should start draining the pieces, or they would end up with everything the same colour.  I noticed from various blogs that some people dye on a grid or mesh or slope their containers so I imagine this is for that reason.

This piece was not drained and so all the dyes have mixed, quite a nice orange though!  The others were similar so I tried dyeing them again, this time on a wire cooling tray.

 When the snow had melted I rinsed my pieces of fabric and, tah-dah:

Not bad for a first attempt.  I think I should have scrunched or tied the fabric more tightly maybe and definitely the wire grid is the way to go.  I also think I could have left it outside to get the fabric and dye really cold rather than rushing the process.  More playing another day I think and I can certainly see myself using these pieces for a little project.

Frozen Webs

 These spiders could do with insulating their homes....

Even though we are very cold today and more snow is forecast there are plenty of signs that Spring is on the way...

Today I'm staying indoors and tending DH and the fire.  I've borrowed an idea from Angela and have a bowl of eco-dyeing sitting on top of the woodburner.  It's the last of the poinsettia flowers and leaves, a little remnant of Christmas infused into cloth.  It currently looks like a large fabric bruise but I'll wait and see.

Keep warm (or cool if you're in the Southern Hemisphere) and have a great weekend.

Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival 2012

I have been reading some great blog posts about the Tokyo International Great Quilt Festival 2012.  Enjoy lots of quilting eye candy and read about the crowds:

I love Bryan's account here: 
http://japanesetextileworkshops.blogspot.com/2012/01/tokyo-quilt-festival.html


Julie has shared four posts and lots of pictures here, here, here and here.

Carin has shared some of her photographs, Framed Quilts here and some highlights here and here

Jessica shared her experiences and some great quilts here:
http://www.sewhomegrown.com/2012/01/tokyo-international-quilt-festival-2012.html

I really appreciate bloggers taking the time to post about these international events, it means we can all share them in a little way.  Thank you for a little piece of Japan.

Lynette Anderson has been blogging about her visit to Japan and her experience at the Tokyo festival.  She also met up with our man in Japan, Bryan.  Read about her trip and enjoy lots of photos on her website here:  http://lynetteandersondesigns.typepad.com/lynette_anderson_designs/
and enjoy Bryan's report on their meeting here.  I can just picture the scene!

I have been reading my Tokyo Lonely Planet and surfing the net and making copious lists in preparation for the few days I will have in Tokyo in April before I join the Japanese Textile Study Tour.  It's getting very exciting.  I am aiming for a mix of textiles, history and culture, gardens, food and shopping and will try to share it via this blog.  I think I may need to sleep for the whole month of March in preparation.  I have also spent a long time today, while waiting for the snow to start and throwing logs on the fire, reading your wonderful blog posts and I hope I have now caught up with all the lovely comments you leave me, I appreciate them massively.  I must now away to rest, Sam's party has left me rather weary - maybe I'm too old for ball pools and padded activity centres!  (Just after this photo I crashed to the floor on my derriere by the way!)

Happy Birthday Sam

My DGS Sam is four years old today!  Al and I went to his party and then back at his house I tried to take a photo of the young family.  It was a nightmare to get all four people looking good, especially as they were all so tired but here we have birthday boy, Sam; my DD, Saz; her lovely BF, Rick and his DD, Ezri.
I have failed completely with my TAST2012 stitch for the week.  It was Cretan Stitch and as tomorrow there will be a new stitch I think I'll try to combine the two in a little project this week. 
Al is having a little op. on Wednesday (on his toe) and we don't know how he'll be afterwards, I might be on nursing duty!!  Hopefully I'll still have time and energy to sew.
We've had a little snow today and the forecast for the week is cold, brrrr, winter is back.  Tomorrow there is a blank in the diary so my plan is to catch up with blogs and emails, if I've seemed to be ignoring you I hope to be in touch tomorrow, watch this space as they say.
I've been doing a lot of reading and research into places to visit in Tokyo while I'm there in April.  Carin sent me this link:http://www.amusemuseum.com/english/index.html It's definitely on my must-do list, enjoy.

Amazing What Spiders Can Do

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/gallery/2012/jan/23/golden-silk-cape-spiders-in-pictures?intcmp=239

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2012/jan/24/spider-silk-cape-show?newsfeed=true

The first link is to more pictures, the second link is to an article from the Guardian newspaper about this amazing cape that is on exhibition at the V&A Museum in London.   Enjoy.

Still Waters Run Deep and FNSI morning report

Quite a productive evening and a very enjoyable one too as DH didn't go out after all and so we both sat by the fire while I stitched and he read, very companionable.  This followed a lovely lunch with DD, DGS and DSiL to be!!!  It was only my second meeting with DSiL to be but it was apparent that things are going well and moving quickly, good for them I say. 
Back to FNSI.  I did some Feather Stitch for the TAST2012 project but, rather than a new piece this week I added the stitch to my existing Malta cloth (a piece I started after doing Jude Hill's cloth weaving course several moons ago).  I think it works well, evoking the patterns in the stone of Malta's buildings.

 I finished my "fat quarter frenzy" quilt which has now been christened "Still Waters Run Deep" and is destined for one of the guest beds at the bach in Norfolk.  I'll take it with me when we open up at the beginning of March and hopefully we'll soon have family and friends joining us and sleeping beneath it.

The rest of FNSI was spent knitting and that's what I'm going to do now.  DH has just made a pot of coffee, it's raining outside and blowing a hoolie, there's a casserole in the slow cooker and at 1.20 this afternoon they're showing Breakfast at Tiffany's on television so that sounds like a plan to me.  Have a good one whatever you are doing.