Shirley Goodwin - Dyeing2Design

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Family

I don't see Cass often so have to photograph him when I do. He has been staying the last 3 days and is off at the crack of dawn this morning. We did the obligatory mother-son photo.

And here he is with the lovely Lara who flew over from Sydney on Christmas night after celebrating with her family. They are about to go stay with Cass' dad, and then go camping.

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Only 5 more sleeps...

I have been making bags.....

..and recovering the seat cushions for the cane settee, so I can sit in the sun on the deck.

The summer garden is looking good - clematis, day lilies and oriental lilies.....

..and the roses are lovely this year.

I want to wish all my blog readers a safe and pleasant Christmas (or whatever you celebrate) and a happy New Year.

Saturday, December 05, 2009

We apologise for the break in transmission....normal service has now resumed

Sometimes life gets in the way of the things you want to do. Rats. Anyway, I'm back, and I'm in bag-making mode. Not dyed, surface design type bags, as I haven't enough time for that at present - over Xmas/New Year hopefully I will - but bags for gifts. So I'm using furnishing type fabrics and quiet colours. This blue and red spot and stripe combination will go together.

And today I bought a pile of neutral (ugh) soft colours to mix together in various ways - I still have to work out what goes with what.

And I had to buy some of this magenta and brown fabric to make a bag to go with my new summer top, which is a briiiiiiiiiiiiiight raspberry colour. (Don't ask me what it cost!)

Sunday, November 15, 2009

# 2

This is for the second daughter, Melody, who is almost 5.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

In the Pink

Firstly, thank you to those blogfriends who sent me their kind wishes about Roxy. I appreciate your thoughts and hugs.

Secondly, I'm working on some children's quilts at the moment. These are for my friend Jill's children (Jill, stop reading now!). The first one is for Ivy, who is almost 7 and a keen ballerina.

Click on the photo for a larger view. I found a cute ballet-themed fabric for the main fabric.

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Remembrance Day

My beautiful daughter Roxy who died 26 years ago today.

Sunday, November 01, 2009

November and The Red Quilt

Unbelieveable! It's November already! Here's a collage of some more late spring flowers. I love paeony flowers - especially the deep crimson ones- but this salmon-coloured one is gorgeous too.

To my surprise, I've found myself reverting to my first love in quilts - big bold patterns and lush colours. I've spent quite a bit of time dabbling in different art quilting techniques and making all sorts of fabric , but have never been able to settle on a "style".

Perhaps I've recognised that my talent doesn't lie in inventing art quilts but in the use of colour. This is what I really enjoy - mixing my hand dyes with lovely commercial designs. Surprisingly, I also love quite simple quilt patterns too - above is the middle of a medallion quilt (Knot Garden Quilt from Kaffe Fassett's book "Country Garden Quilts") which I've simply called "The Red Quilt". Okay, there's a yellow border in there, but I felt it needed a bit of contrast. Naturally, my quilt looks nothing like the original.

Sometimes it's nice to let someone else do all the hard work designing a pattern. More on The Red Quilt as I work through all the borders.