Not much work but lots of post

It's over a week since my last confession..... I have worked but it doesn't seem much in retrospect. Most of the time has been taken up with seeing to Mum who has an ear problem - what next!!

The first Craft class went well and I promised to paint some canvas and show them how to make a simple motife to go onto a card or book. It's based on one that was in the Stitch Magazine some time back, I'm sure it will be on the EG website if anyone is interested. I painted the canvas with green and gold metallic paint, long stitch for stems and grass in a variegated thread, french knots and bullions for flowers amongst the grass. I thought the easiest method of putting it onto something was to sew the canvas onto a handmade paper then glue that. I've cut the paper a bit lopsided and it would have been better if I'd wet the edges and pulled them so they leave little fluffy edges. I'm going to do another to take to the class on Wednesday.

Kate North sent me this beautiful padded heart as a swap for mine (below) its made from felt with beads, ribbons and buttons. It came with some pretty ribbon and tissue paper which I'll keep for another project.
I haven't manage to send this off to Kate yet as our local post office had a 'hold-up'. A masked man with a gun held up the counter clerks and demanded money, it was their third hold up of the afternoon. They got away with a small amount of cash but the two ladies behind the counter were badly shaken. Our post office has now got back to normal working so I should be able to get it in the post tomorrow. I might put a tassel on the end before I send it as I like the one on Kates.

Anne Marie Desaulniers who lives in Toronto sent me this 'House' as part of the Textilechallenge group house swap. The theme is my own theme "at the castle gates". Anne Marie has used acrylic painted cotton and Lutradur, heated and distressed, Tyvek rocks. It's really textural the phot does not do justice to it, I love this house.

My last challenge was to make a 'wall scone' it was the Machine-Embroidery Machine-Felting January challenge and I nearly missed it!! I finished my 'sconce' last week but forgot to post a photo until this morning durrr.

Sy & Julie went off to Amsterdam for a couple days, its Sy's birthday tomorrow and this is his treat. They caught the ferry from Hull and we took them down, a 4 hour round trip. As they arrive back at 8.0am on Tuesday morning we've decided to take off tomorrow for the day and stay in Hull overnight. Otherwise we'll have to be up at the crack of dawn. The weatherforecast isn't too good but we were lucky, we had three short snow storms ont he way down and nothing on the way back. At one point though we were crossing a high bridge in the heaviest of the snow storms and we could feel the car being pushed towards the bridge railings, it was a bit scary.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed it won't be too bad tomorrow but I'm packing the thermos and sandwiches and a blanket just in case. We must be mad!!!