Well not really, but I didn’t know what else to call this post. This is my pumpkin in the flesh:

And this is my rendition of it in acyrlic paints:

I was quite nervous to start off with. But since it said in the course notes not to be and not to imagine that you have to produce a wonderful piece of art, I took heart and got stuck in. I actually enjoyed doing this activity even more than filling in the gap in the photo. I expect the practice in mixing colours helped and if you really start looking at something quite closely then you really do notice all the differences in the colours and shades.

I, of course, got so involved in what I was doing that I forgot about half of the activity until it was too late and I had already cleared up and washed up my paint palette. Luckily for me I have an understanding tutor - so I can eat the pumpkin now and don’t have to sit in detention and catch up on the work I should have been doing

The pumpkin is a bit small for pumpkin pie though. It would be more of a pielet!

This weekend I had my first attempt at painting with acrylic paints. Painting has never been anything that I’ve felt particularly drawn too. I remember that I enjoyed collage work much more in the art classes at grammar school. And at primary school my favorite type of painting was splatter painting So this C&G course is making me try my hand at some new activities.

The task was to take a photograph, cut it in half, paste it onto paper leaving a gap of 2 - 3 inches, and then fill in the gap. I knew I wouldn’t get it right first time, having never done anything like this before. So I decided to go through our digital photos and choose one. That way I could print it out as many times as necessary. One of my favorite photos is of a cornfield in Northern Spain. It was filled with wild flowers - poppies and cornflowers and others. Obviously the corn wasn’t treated with all manner of chemicals there. The photo turned out to be quite a challenge though, as there is lots of detail in the cornfield, so I wasn’t really sure how to tackle it. I had two attempts.

Here’s the first:

The horizon turned out well as did the poppies and the cornflowers, but the background was too pale and it wasn’t a good idea to use two colours for the cornfield.

So then I had a second attempt using a uniform darker green background for the cornfield:

Better, but maybe the green is now a little overpowering? I ended up doing 3 colour washes: first green, then a bluer green and then some yellow. After that I added the stalks, ears of corn, poppies and cornflowers. At some point you just have to say enough is enough. Any more and it will just get worse not better. So I’ve sent off the photo to my tutor to see what she has to say.

Funnily I was talking to my Dad on the phone yesterday, when my niece arrived to visit him. So I was able to chat to her too. She is currently doing a PGCE in Art for Secondary schools. I was telling her what I was up to. The next activity is to paint a fruit. I have choosen a pumpkin and she had to do the same as a resource for a lesson. She had chosen a pumpkin too, so we will both be sitting in front of a pumpkin and painting I’m sure her’s will be better than mine as she is quite artistic and has far more practice.

I’ve not posted for a few weeks now. I’ve not really had that much to write about. My time has been spent working on the activities for Module 1 of my C&G course. So I’ve been collecting product information about acrylic paints, watercolour paints, pastels, pencils, inks etc. That was actually more interesting than it sounds. Some companies really provide a lot of useful information about their products, including describing different uses for them.

The second activity was to start collections of images showing primary and secondary colours, complementary colour schemes and achromatic images. Complementary colour schemes don’t seem to be very popular in the media. But violet is definitely one of this season’s colours

Which brings me to my third activity, which was to research some aspect of colour. I chose the colour purple for my topic. Here are some bits of information that I collected together:

• The original purple dye was made by crushing the mollusc Murex brandaris.
• It took 12,000 molluscs to extract 1.5g of pure dye, worth more than its weight in gold.
• The dye was purple-red and known as Tyrian Purple.
• Royal purple was a dye made from lichen or madder, when the supplies of Tyrian Purple dye dried up with the fall of the Western Roman Empire. It had a bluer tone.
• Purple is supposed to boost artistic creativity
• In 1856 the English chemist William H. Perkin discovered the first synthetic chemical dye mauveine while searching for a cure for malaria. It was the first aniline-based dye.

And here is a poem I found which I didn’t put into my paper. I like it enough to quote it here though.

Warning by Jenny Joseph

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat that doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I’m tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick the flowers in other people’s gardens
And learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practise a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.

After a bit of soul searching and some very helpful comments by people on my blog and in the City & Guilds Textiles yahoo group I’ve made up my mind. I’ve enrolled to do the City & Guilds 7922-03 Patchwork and Quilting Certificate with the Kemshalls. One of the deciding factors that made me choose the course at DesignMatters was that it is entirely online. Even the assessment is done electronically. You send in photographs of your work and not the work itself.

I now have access to the course work and had a quick browse through the first module last night. So the first step on the journey has been taken. I am looking forward to making a start, but it is also a little bit daunting. I’ve committed myself to at least 2 years work parallel to my normal day job. When I look at the work that others have produced for their certificates I just hope that mine will turn out as well. Wish me luck!

Yesterday evening we installed my new sewing table in my studio. It has been a long process getting the remains of the oil off the table top. It was getting rolled into sticky messes by the buffing pads and I was getting sick of washing out 6 pads after each new attempt at polishing. So yesterday Sqeze went out and bought a new orbital sander. It was an extra expense to the cost of the table but speeded up the process no end. He first of all sanded off the remaining gunk and then polished the surface using the same machine. I now have a wonderful smooth surface on the table.

Here a couple of photos of the finished table. I must say the machine sits quite a bit lower now and feels quite different when you are sitting behind it. But I sure it will be much more ergonomical to use. I used to get knotted shoulder muscles if I sewed for too long before. I hope that will be a thing of the past with the machine sitting lower now.

I like to have some sort of needlework to do in the evenings. Something you can pick up and put down again. Something you can do in front of the telly. It’s usually knitting. Winter time is knitting time for me. But one of my old patchwork cushion covers is showing the passing of time and needs replacing, so I decided to do some needlepoint. And this is what the postman managed to stuff in our letterbox along with all the usual Saturday post - 2 magazines and various boring old bills:

I ordered it from Ehrman Tapestry. The kit I chose just happens to be featured on their homepage at the moment. It’s inspired by Klimt, which is why it appealed to me. I really like his work. Ehrman’s had the best choice of kits that I found on the web. It is also a British company and ships from the UK so there is no hassle with the customs and paying import duty. They have a wide selection from well known designers including Kaffe Fasset and Beth Russell. The kit I chose was designed by Candace Bahouth.

The quality of the printing on the canvas is high and the wool feels nice. The only complaint I have is that no-one seems to send a photo of the finished design any more. I like to refer to a photo sometimes. I solved that problem by printing the photo from the web site. They have all the designs as large photos too.

So now I have something to keep my hands occupied when I’m in the mood for some mindless viewing on the box

I’m hoping that there are some readers out there who may have some opinions they would share with me. As regular readers will know I have been taking online classes on a regular basis at the Quilt University. I have taken some excellent classes and had some excellent teachers, but I am finding it increasingly difficult to find classes that are going to take me a step further towards becoming a more accomplished and professional quilter.

A recent article in Harvard Business Review Jul-Aug 2007 “The Making of an Expert” got me thinking again about what my next steps should be. Apart from practice, practice, practice - it takes 10 years of it to become an expert and then you have to do the right kind of practice - the authors also stress that to become an expert you need a mentor who will offer you honest feedback. This is something that I have felt to be a bit missing from the courses at QU. These are more classroom situations where you are naturally only one of many students.

So once again I have been considering taking an online course for the City & Guilds Patchwork and Quilting Level 3 Certificate. The course content sounds interesting to me. I think it would probably stretch me and I hope the teaching situation would be more of a one to one contact. The courses aren’t cheap though, so I find it difficult to make up my mind. If I invest that money will I gain sufficient benefit to be able to push myself into being something more than just a hobby quilter or will it just turn out to be an expensive hobby?

I have many years experience at sewing and other handicrafts and consider myself to be reasonably accomplished. I don’t have any kind of formal art/design education but have done some self study. Would this course be the right one for me? If anyone out there has experience of the course I would be interested to hear from them. Any other opinions are also welcome.