The finished bag

Here it is, with no time to spare! My entry in the Hillary's Blinds  Country Crafts Competition

The bag is finished I have a couple of the intermediate steps to show first.

The earlier steps are in a couple of other posts.

The lining with a little pocket stitched in place, I've attached some stiffening material to the gussets of the lining. This is a tip for people who, like me, don't plan very well, stitch the stiffening in before you join the gussets to the front and back of the lining, stitching it in afterwards was not quite impossible!

Here's the lining showing the stiffening tacked in

I've put a little beading onto the largest flower on the bag's flap so here's a closeup of it.

The bag has a magnetic fastener, these are really useful and very easy to fit, I've put a double layer of stiffener behind the section fixed to the bag itself to give extra support.

The bag with the lining stitched in place

A view inside the bag to show the pocket.

After a lot of hand stitching and top stitching here's the final thing with a little flourish on the handle, this was inspired by watching a programme about the royal ballet, I wanted to suggest a tutu. I cut out one of the largest poppies and backed it 4 layers of red chiffon, recycled from the wrapping around a box of chocolates I was given for Christmas one year. (Never throw anything away!)

 I'm really pleased with it, I sort of knew what I was going to make as soon as I chose the fabric, I'm glad it worked, lots of work and a few mistakes, very difficult to un-pick such a loose woven fabric but I had to do it several times!

Very enjoyable to do and a lovely fabric, thanks Hillary's

Next step in my Hillarys Blinds entry.

Here's the front of the bag I'm making for Hillarys Blinds Country Crafts Competition

I'm doing  a bit of beaded embellishment. Should be nice when it's finished, but I'm working in my usual 'make it up as I go along' way so it's a bit slow.

Hillarys Blinds competition

I've entered a competition run by Hillarys. They're giving away 100 x 100cm squares of fabric and giving a prize for the best craft project made with them. The competition is called Hillarys Blinds Country Craft Competition
My piece arrived the other day and I've been mulling over what to do with it.

 This is the design I chose, there are three others to choose from.

Here's my scruffy workspace, it's in the process of being turned back into a bedroom, hence the stepladder, I've picked out some other stuff to use in my design, watch this space.
The cat is supervising of course.

Labyrinth Workshop

Spent a very happy day today, at St Anne's chapel in Barnstaple, working with environmental artist Linda Gordon, making a labyrinth to celebrate the North Devon Biosphere's 10th anniversary.

We started with an illustrated talk by Linda about the history and significance of the labyrinth and it's prevalence in so many ancient cultures. Following from that we drew a classical or Cretan labyrinth to instructions provided by Linda, a lovely meditative activity itself, this is a picture of a badge I bought years ago with a classic labyrinth on it.

 A drawing in my little A6 sketch book.

Having mastered, sort of, the art of drawing a 7 path labyrinth we went outside onto the grass and into the sunlight. Linda had laid out a cross of string to define the size of the labyrinth, she had worked out that each pathway should be 2ft wide so we laid the central cross of sticks with 4ft arms. To lay out the labyrinth you need this central cross, and then 4 'half squares' with a dot to mark the 4th corner of each of these 'squares', The picture below shows where these lines are on my hand drawn version. If you were making a proper labyrinth you would measure carefully and make an effort to keep the paths even. You can see that I definitely didn't do that!

The labyrinth is constructed by joining the lines starting with the top of the central vertical line joining to the top of the next line over, either right or left I suppose, whichever feels correct to you, I've gone right every time, maybe because I'm right handed. Linda's instruction indicated right but the one on my badge seems to be left handed.

There's a whole load of sites out there to find out about labyrinths, there's even an international labyrinth day.

We used sticks to build our labyrinth in the grass with Linda's patent measuring stick keeping us on track. Once we had it all laid out with a single line of sticks, we added more to bulk up the lines and give them more presence on the ground.

The finished thing looked really great and seemed to really belong there, among the daisies and including the odd jackdaw feather that had been found as we built.

Here's the finished labyrinth, I couldn't get high enough to fit the whole thing in on my little camera, but here is most of it, in the background you can see Linda leaning on her measuring stick, with one of the other participants. As you can see it was a gorgeous day and the sun dappled the ground through the lime tree canopy. amazingly the centre of the labyrinth seemed to be under the centre of this canopy, created by two large lime trees.

After lunch in the sun, we all walked the labyrinth, this is what it's all about, making the meditative walk around the paths. Once in the centre I noticed a great view of the sky, with the roof of the chapel framing it with the dancing lime leaves, so I walked in again with my camera and took a photo.

I love this picture, it's an image of me feeling calm and happy! Something that is quite rare these days, my life this last year has been pretty grim in places and I'd like to think this day is some kind of turning point for me. I intend that it will be.

I thought I would take a picture from ground level to show the labyrinth in it's setting, but it's almost invisible! I quite like that, it's a very ephemeral piece of art and the fact that my camera can't see it is really fascinating. Shows how good the human eye is compared to a camera!

The feather sticking up at the right there, is the entrance to the labyrinth and you can just make out some sticks in front of the tree on the left. I could see it clearly, how come the camera can't?

Here's a closer view looking across the labyrinth towards the centre from the right hand side

Thanks for a great day Linda, I've got plans for a small labyrinth in my back garden now, and I'll be doing something along jewellery lines I think.



This picture is from the news section of the biosphere website, me, with hands in pockets, Linda in the centre with a young fan and another participant walking the labyrinth.

Just as an aside St Anne's Chapel is about the oldest building in Barnstaple and a fascinating little place which is adding to the town's cultural life considerably.

Arts Project

I've set myself a project, following my appraisal at work where I was asked what I was personally doing to improve the green credentials of Devon (2nd largest county in the UK!) I spotted a whole load of out of date brochures for a local arts company,

 

Beaford Arts,in the recycle bin. I've decided to do something with them, so I've torn them up and they are soaking in a bowl on the floor. I'll either make papier mache or even some hand made paper. I've kept one set of pages back and a few of my favourites twice. I'll add some extracts, individual words and bits of images on the surface of whatever I end up making. I notice, looking for the website to link to them, that the brochure is printed on recycled paper, I like the idea of endlessly recycling things, changing their use and appearance  each time and probably losing a tiny bit each time.

I'll probably pulp it tomorrow, I expect it will end up as paper, depends how I feel tomorrow, I've only really got one day to make paper, if that's what I decide to do, as I'm working part of every day next week. Oh yes and I'm going to a clothes swap party tomorrow afternoon. We'll see how it goes, no time for housework tomorrow!
PS I've kept the staples, or some of them, they came out still closed as I tore the brochures in half and picked them off the torn edges, maybe I'll add some to the paper too.