A good start to the New Year.

I don’t know what the weather is like with you – here it is currently extremely dark and dingy. More like a late November day than the beginning of January. The rain has just started pouring – heavily and insistently. The forecast isn’t too bad here, and hopefully you will all escape the worst of it. Stay safe, wherever you are.

It isn’t too late to sign up to follow me through the year. I wrote a little about it here, but you can sign up at any point during the year. I know we are only a couple of days into the New Year, but so far I have been able to keep my schedule going. I’m starting the day with a rapid ‘design’ exercise and then later adding some drawing and stitching into the mix. I’ve had to start slowly, but as the year progresses and things get back to normal there will be more intensity. If you would like to follow the full story you can do so via this link. There will be details of my creative enterprises and also the occasional tutorial etc. The intention is to inspire you throughout the year, and I have already heard from one person that something has inspired a quick card. I hope you will decide to join me,  the more of you there are the more accountable I will be – and hopefully I will meet all my deadlines. As I also mentioned, the odd photograph will appear here, but there will be no details of what it is all about – just a picture.

As I briefly mentioned, I’m looking forward to 2014. We have new plans for the ‘shop’ which will unfold during the coming year, but now I need to make way for new stock, so here is the start of some very special offers. These are not ‘clearance’ or ‘special purchase’ offerings – but items that I currently don’t have time to package. They are also items that will continue in our range unless I otherwise comment.

Fabric/Thread Bonus Pack

Although they are all Sassa Lynne hand-dyed items I really don’t have time to package them at the moment – so this first collection will include:

2 pieces of vegetarian silk – normally £5.00 each = £10.00

1 piece of very fine scrim – normally £2.50

1 miscellaneous hand-dyed Sassa Lynne thread – normally £2.50

The value is therefore £15.00 but a limited quantity is available for just £5.95 plus £4.95 postage. If you also join the creative diary your postage for one package will be refunded in full making it an even better bargain.

 

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The picture just shows some of the colours available. We will send our choice of colour combination and the quantity is limited although there is more than shown in the photograph. Once they have gone – that’s it, new stock will be dyed – but sold packaged and at full price! You can have more than one if you want, but you will be charged for postage with each paypal payment. Part of the multiple postage charges will be refunded depending on how many you buy. Click the picture or this link to buy.

Vegetarian silk is a very popular fabric. It is very soft and wonderful either as an upper stitching surface or for the embellisher. Isobel Hall uses it for vessels too. I will definitely be using it during the year – and more ideas for its use will appear then for subscribers to the Creative Diary.

There will be more offers over the next while. Watch this space.

Why have I been so quiet?

I have to admit that one of the most irritating things to read on a blog is ‘sorry I haven’t posted for a while……’ . So, I’m not going to apologise for my absence because sometimes life takes over and that is fine, it is far more important than blogging. However, some of my absence has been caused by internet connection problems. For a number of years we have used Virgin Media as our provider, but no more……. Today we changed! Here’s hoping that it’s for the better and that our connection remains constant for all hours of the day. It also means a change of email address, so if you have been writing to me at a virgin.net account I suggest you contact me for the new one. For a limited time you can use   winifredsheadache@gmail.com   as a contact address. Make sure you tell me why you need to have it – remind me of where we met etc – as I may not be the only one checking the mail and I WILL NOT BE RESPONDING TO SPAM! Those of you who know me know that I don’t want to lose contact, so this is a sort of belt and braces means of letting you all know. You can also, of course, contact me via the usual shop address.

So, on to other things. Did you all have a good weekend? The weather was glorious and it was such a pleasure to be able to go out for the day yesterday in warm sunshine. We visited the Hillier Gardens in Hampshire. It was the perfect time to view the Magnolias

6th May 2013, Hillier Garden 023

They were truly beautiful set against a cloudless blue sky.

On Saturday we attended the Embroiderers Guild Regional Day at Wokingham. We saw lots of lovely people as usual, and listened to some very interesting speakers. I’ve heard Debbie Lyddon before, an interesting talk which is highly recommended, but also heard one by someone new to me. The morning talk was from Kirsty Whitlock an exuberant and enthusiastic artist who works in mixed media textiles. You certainly won’t be disappointed if you have a chance to hear them somewhere, and they are both also friendly and approachable people.

Now, I need your help! I have mentioned before that I’m teaching an Embellisher Workshop at Janome in Stockport near Manchester at the end of this month. The class was ready to go, but sadly one of the participants has had to pull out as she has been admitted to hospital. This doesn’t sound as though it would make much of a difference, but she is the driver for 3 other friends, all of whom were planning to attend. Four people pulling out this close to the date means that the workshop will have to be cancelled unless they can be replaced by Tuesday 14th May. Please can you pass the word? Mention it to anyone you think might be interested, and also apply NOW if you were considering coming but had decided to wait until the last minute to enrol. It will be a great shame if we have to cancel. The price has reduced from that of last year, and the venue is wonderful. Remember that you don’t need a machine to participate, all machines are provided, so you can travel as light as you wish as supplies will also be available to purchase on the day if required. Further details are here and by popular request we will be making a little pair of boots amongst learning other things.

I have had many requests for a workshop in the West Country. I know that you don’t like travelling far, so I’m very pleased to tell you that a two day workshop has been arranged for August this year. I’m planning on coming to the Mad Hatter’s Studio in Plymouth which is ideally placed for both Devon and Cornwall. Details are here. I haven’t visited the Studio before, so if you need information about the set up I suggest you contact Sheron. By all means contact me for more information about the actual workshop.

There is more news too, but this is enough for one day, so there will be another post tomorrow, and then, when I’ve caught up, I’ll be back on track as promised.

Missenden Abbey

We are the suppliers at Missenden Abbey on Saturday. Don’t forget to let us know if you need anything specific. I’m teaching at Wey Valley Workshop tomorrow, so an email is the best way to let us know.

I’ve also just listed a number of new colourways of the Sassa threads, they are linked from here, but you will have to keep scrolling down to find them all. All the listings today are unrepeatable collections and two of them have already gone. Click each picture over there to find them, payment is via PayPal.

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