It's poppy season! WOYWW

Good afternoon folks! Thanks for dropping by to catch up with the activities from my work desk this week.

So here's the desk today...

Regular visitors may recall that I love to felt poppies. So you can imagine my delight when I saw was my first little cluster of poppies this year. OK, so it was just on a roundabout on the ring road but it immediately prompted me to pull out the red fluff and needle felt some poppies.

These are a work in progress. I started with a wet felted background onto which I've felted a variety of green wool and other fibres to create a background. Onto this I've felted red blobs then free machine embroidered over the top to create more texture and detail. To this I'll be adding embroidered daisies and beading all the poppies to give them centres.

Shropshire has some beautiful fields full of poppies so I shall be looking for opportunities to photograph them.

On the subject of photos, here's one I took from my lounge window of the summer solstice sunset last night. Whatever was going on behind those trees must have been pretty spectacular - such gorgeous shades of pink, purple and blue.

Visitors to last week's blog post will know I had a 'meet the maker' event planned at Shropshire Hills Discovery Centre on Monday. The centre sells my pictures and the aim was to give visitors an insight into how my work is created. Here's my 'work desk on tour'...

I had a lovely afternoon. Lots of people stopped to look at what I was doing and I had some great feedback about my work. I even did a demo for a group of 15 primary school children who were visiting the centre. Children ask the most interesting questions, don't you find?

"How to you get red sheep wool... do they dye the sheep?"

"How many times have you stabbed yourself with that needle Miss?"

"Do you like my spiderman wellies?"

All good fun and a few enquiries about WI and craft group talks so it was a worthwhile day.

Anyway, that's all my news. I must dash as we've just bought a bicycle seat for Ben to ride on my hubby's bike and we want to take him for a spin before it rains (again!).

Thanks for stopping by, I always really appreciate your comments.

Happy crafting,

Max x

WOYWW - It's raining felt...hallelujah!

Hello there, dear reader!

Welcome to my regular ramble about the life of a textile artist. Here's a snap of my workdesk to mark 'What's on your Workdesk Wednesday' (WOYWW) a weekly global gathering of fab craftsfolk.

Here's my workdesk today...

I'm mounting and finishing some pieces of embroidery which I initially envisaged as bookmarks but having finished them I've decided they're destined for more than being tucked between the pages of a book.

I've had a busy and productive week of needle felting to replenish my stocks at the three outlets selling my work in Shropshire. I started the week with a load of part-finished work and (thanks to lots of help from mum) finished the week with 35 framed pieces of work.

Yesterday I drove round the county dropping work off so now I'm starting from scratch again!

My little sheepy collages are proving popular so I made sure I made several of those.

I made a few tiny sheep landscapes too, then found some great little frames in Ikea which fit them perfectly.

When I dropped off my work yesterday I was told a touching story which I'd love to share with you.

Two of my needle-felted poppy pictures sold at The Bog Visitors Centre, Stiperstones, last week. The lady who sold them was also there yesterday when I dropped of new stock and she told me this...

A lady and her husband came into the Visitors Centre a few weeks ago and she really loved the needle-felted poppies. This weekend her husband returned to the Visitors Centre. Sadly, the lady had passed away. As she'd loved the picture so much, he bought it to remind him of her love of poppies. Later, her daughter had visited the centre to buy a different needle-felted poppy picture I had there.

It's always great to here that people appreciate my work, but touching stories like this mean the world to me! I really hope those two pictures bring comfort at a time of sadness.

On a cheerful note, it hasn't just been 'all work no play' this week. We've had lovely sunny weather in Shrewsbury so Ben and I got out and about in the local park. Every parent worries about shading their little ones from the sun so it was with great relief I discovered Ben wanted to be a 'cool dude' in both sunglasses and hat!

Here's to many more sunny days!

That's all folks, thanks for stopping by.

Happy crafting,

Max x

WOYWW - new home celebrations

Hello all, welcome to my 'What's on your workdesk Wednesday' post. Bit late in the day as I've been for a long overdue hair cut!

I've had a busy week with several different textile projects on the go.

I've produced more needle-felted pictures (dumflings) as I have the exciting prospect of supplying a few shops in the coming months! These are all ready to bead and mount...

I've also taken time to dabble with some new ideas this week. A number of my friends have moved house recently, or are due to soon, so I have made a few embroidered 'new home' cards. These have been both free-machine embroidered and hand embroidered.

Finally, I've enjoyed watching my little man find his feed as he gets ever closer to walking by himself...

(Note: the vase is on the table, not balanced on Ben's head!)

Hope you've all had a good week too. I'll hopefully catch up on your news when I swing by a few desks after the little man has gone to bed.

Happy crafting x

WOYWW - Needle-felted miniature gardens, a trip down memory lane and fairground fun

Morning all! Well it's been another busy week at Tilly Tea Dance Towers. Birthday planning continues with gusto ahead of Ben's first birthday, Ive been listing all Ben's baby clothes on ebay and I've finally got round to moving some of my stored items out of my parents house (more about that later). Despite these jobs I've still made time for some dumfing (a.k.a needle-felting).

Here's the workdesk this week...

Now that I am once again absorbed in dumfing, I decided that I needed to stock up on my supply of embroidery threads.

Ok so to be totally honest I was casually browsing the shelves of TK Maxx and spotted this package of brightly coloured skeins and felt that 'have to have it' warm glow we crafters get when we see something nice. You've got to admit it does look tempting. The question is, will I ever disturb the lovely neat rows of thread to use any of it!!

The dumfing I started last week is also on my desk, now embellished and ready to mount. I bet I've got every mount except the sizes I need!

New dumfing has taken place almost every evening. I had almost forgotten how good needle-felting is for helping you to wind down.

I have used the large background piece from last week's desk to start another poppy picture which will be free-machine embroidered, and I've done a few more miniature backgrounds which will be hand embroidered and made into cards or small pictures.

I'm sure by now you will have noticed some extra little friends loitering around my workdesk this week.

These are my 25 year-old Sylvanian families which have been reunited with their loving owner having been boxed up for decades. The intervening years have been spent lodging with mum and dad and, as they've been moving house, I felt it was time to relieve them of their duty of care! I'm not quite sure what I'll do with my vintage Sylvanian empire just yet. The little man may inherit some, whilst other bits might find a new life via eBay. Whatever the future holds for these woodland furries it's been lovely looking back over my childhood!

My last little pic is from earlier in the week when I took Ben on his first carousel. The boy loved it! He definitely has his mum's love of rides so no doubt we'll have many a fun time in the years to come whizzing around Alton Towers, Disney World etc.

Ill be popping over to Julia's Stamping Ground and look forward to catching up with other crafters taking part in WOYWW.

Happy crafting x

WOYWW - Needle-felting fun and a peacock

Morning all! With the bank holiday I feel like I've lost a day and WOYWW has come round mighty quick this week.

I'm delighted to say I've been able to make time this week for a little light dumfing (a.k.a needle-felting). With all the busy book and sensory toy making it's been a few months since my last felting session. I guess it's like riding a bike...you never forget, but I have to say I felt a bit rusty as I prodded away with my dumfing tool.

So here's my workdesk. . .

I've managed to do a bit of everything but not managed to finish anything!

There are some hand-felted mini gardens which I got as far as hand embroidering and beading....

I'll be running workshops on these later this year and early next year so I'm keen to make a range of different flowers to demonstrate.

There's a selection of wet felted background pieces which I have worked on with the dumfing machine (the most satisfying crafting activity I know) ready to add foreground flowers. I've used three different colours to try and steer myself away from just doing poppies, which I love.

Finally there is a long strip of poppies which I have free machine embroidered but not yet beaded. The poppy picture in the foreground is a felters's answer to a crib sheet - one I made earlier!

My last little show and tell is not my work at all but a snap shot of Benjamin's work desk following a little (mess-free) painting activity we did this week.

He seemed somewhat puzzled as to why I was encouraging him to squelch and prod a plastic pouch selotaped to the floor but he stuck with it. Here's his finished piece. Though the poster paint has cracked on the canvas, I think you will all agree it is clearly a peacock in motion!!

Thanks for dropping by. I look forward to visiting a few workdesks today via Julia's Stamping Ground

Happy crafting x

WOYWW

I've cleared the kitchen table to make room for a dumfing session. I've had several ideas on the go so I've dedicated the day just to dumfing bits and bobs that can be free-machine embroidered or hand-stitched at a later date.

My first dumfing task is to work on a piece of countryside-ish felt.

Eventually this piece will be cut up to make one large picture and three or four smaller dumflings. They will be free-machine embroidered and beaded by hand to create the poppies and foliage.

Next I've produced a piece of cream/ivory dumfing. This is wedding season so I'm producing enough bits to make cards for all my friends and family who are getting married in the next few months. Any surplus will get made into wedding congratulations/thank you/invitation cards to go into my etsy shop or saved for christmas when I'll pimp them up with twinkly bits, star sequins etc for the festive season.

I use snippets of silk, chiffon and vintage lace

 Each snippet is needle-felted to a piece of felt.

I try to create an all-over textured surface with a few more detailed areas using the lace. These can be further embellished with free-machine embroidery at a later stage.

Finally I've made a start on a new batch of pink dumfling babies. I was really cheered on by everyone who liked these miniature whisps of felt, chiffon and silk so I thought I'd get a few more pieces ready to hand-stitch on an evening when the TV is not so good.

Hope you've enjoyed visiting my work desk today. Looks like it's mealtime so best pack away the work desk for now! I really need to get a permanent crafting space sorted don't I?!