Dyeing in the Lud Valley with India Flint - Part 2

But wait... there's more... We moved swiftly onto the fabric, stitching all the pieces we used with our personal marks so we could identify them easily when they came out the cauldrons. A genius idea - otherwise there really would have been tears before bedtime!

Considering the similar technique used in the dyeing it was amazing the variety that was achieved. Different fabrics took up the dyes differently sometimes achieving radically different results from the same plant material.

This piece is one of mine, showing again the long eucalyptus leaves from Golden Bay. One of the things I have really noticed since doing the workshop was just how many gum trees there are in New Zealand. They are everywhere! Offering untold dyeing opportunities. I just love the shapes, colour and fragrance they impart on to the fabric.

It was a simply magical 5 days. At the end we wrote India  little note asking if we could do it all again in 2014.... which after due consideration she and Judy said yes to. So in a couple of weeks I am looking forward to a return workshop and another visit to the wonderful Lud Valley.

There are number of my fellow stitchers returning from last year for the workshop - I feel that we are something like the godwits returning after the long winter for another blessed summer experience.

Clearly this is a tale to be continued.....

Messenger from Hogwart's maybe?

He's really starting to look rather settled in. There is some thought that once he's out of the room that a search for the letters from Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry will be undertaken by our boys...

 

He really shouldn't linger near the pie box though - my husband is starting to have dangerous thoughts! Check them out here

Foiled Again!

Today was to be the start of a new collaborative quilting venture with my daughter. We have a quilt we need to get onto for a friend of hers....

 

However when she went up to the sewing room to get started we discovered a visitor in the sewing room - a morepork, which is a native owl in these parts. Even though we live very close to the centre of Wellington we regularly hear them calling at night. They sound exactly the same as their name. 

 

He terrified my daughter and was in turn, I am sure, very frightened himself by her arrival. We have no idea how he got in there or how long he's been there.

As he's nocturnal we are waiting for the sun to go down for him to move on. I don't like the thought of trying to drive him out...

So the new venture will just have to wait for tomorrow, but I pleased to finally have confirmation for the muggles that I live with that I truly am the magical one in the family.