Inertia Rules!

Oops!  The news to report is that there isn't any. I'm ashamed to say that the new project hasn't been touched since my last blog post. I've been busy with lots of other stuff but there is also that strange thing about putting something away when tidying up and then it just gets completely forgotten. Out of sight out of mind!

Anyway I can tell that you're all desperate to know what it's going to be ......J✄J.... so I'll tell you. Which of course will save you having to wait in suspense for the next few years. 

It's going to be a nest of three boxes. The structure is supported by coffee stained craft vilene for body, the inside is as shown here, and on the reverse of the vilene is the dusky pinks which will be the outer box. As you can see, so far only the larger box has been covered, I've yet to do the two smaller ones. 

When the vilene is completely covered, embellished and stitched, the sides lift up and the box is formed with ribbons to close tied around shell buttons at the tops. Each box nests inside the other. The idea is that you drop one side of the boxes down to reveal the inner designs, kind of like secret compartments in a treasure chest, and I planned to put little messages inside as well.

Don't watch this space! But I will post photos when it's all finished and ready for sale.

A Sneaky Preview

I've started working on a new project using bits and pieces from my Victorian closet. At first I thought I might be able to finish it fairly quickly but it's amazing how much time it takes to get ideas focused! Auditioning fabrics and embellishments is like a game of put and take and before I know it hours can pass, especially as I have the entire treasure box contents tipped out all over my table and my iPod glued to my ears!! Bliss! #kidinatoyshop

Anyway, I thought it would be a good idea to post up some photos of a work in progress ~ and that will inspire me to keep going and get it finished. It needs a lot more work and lots of stitch embellishment before I can put it together.

Also there are a further 16 'pieces' to make yet before I can start assembling it!  Can you guess what it will be?

A light prefelt base is behind the hand dyed dusky pink silk to give it some body. It was white to start with so I thought I would coffee dye it just in case it showed through. It went a lovely colour and smelt gorgeous. All was well until I put it under the embellisher machine ....... the dried coffee came out as brown powder all over the machine and stuck to the needle plate! Oops! I thought it was rust at first. Anyway it cleaned up ok eventually (it was everywhere) and my machine also smells very nice now :)

So ....... can you guess what I'm making?

A Little Stash of Treasures

Ooh just look what I found in my Victorian Closet today  ~

these are just asking to be made into something new and lovely don't you think?

recycle   ~   rethread   ~   reuse

It's now the final couple of weeks of college so I need to concentrate on finishing my course work. After that I'm looking forward to making some new pretty things during the summer break, and I need to as I'm very pleased to report that I've sold a couple of things in my online shop.  How lovely! Lots of incentive now to restock the shop. 

Sharing The Love ...

I'm always on the look out for inspirational blogs and websites. I love Pinterest too. It's amazing that through social networking tools we can access stories, photos and tutorials from all over the world. How did we manage before! Today I thought I'd share just a few of my favourite things, so grab yersel' a cuppie and hae a wee browse with me:

http://suziqusthreadworks.blogspot.co.uk/

http://tristanrobin.blogspot.co.uk/

http://pinterest.com/agatheringplace/

a nice photo of a Victorian Closet - mine is of course just as tidy

And here's my Pinterest board for Sepia Moods:

http://pinterest.com/lindamckeen/sepia-moods/

I hope you enjoy ~ I find that one link leads to another and before I know it my coffee is cold! (by the way......I always use coffee to stain fabrics, lace or paper instead of tea, you get a nicer colour and it smells great!)

Books

One of the other things I collect is books. These are not kept in my Victorian Closet but are all over the house. I can't resist a good book and am always reading all the time. Now I confess to a new love ~ and that is my Kindle. Just about the best gadget I've ever owned, I love my Kindle!

As part of my spring clean I've decided to clear out many of my old books. This would've been unthinkable in the past, but now I know for sure that I'll never read them again - if I wanted to revisit any I'd just buy them as ebooks. In our household the number of books runs into the thousands rather than hundreds and I think we are very overdue for a cull.

One of the few exceptions that I couldn't bear to part with, and definitely not suitable for Kindle reading, is my collection of arts, crafts and sewing books. I always have these types of books on my Christmas wish list, they are usually hardbacks and always beautifully illustrated, and above all so inspiring. Each one is a visual feast and I can't really say that I have an out and out favourite, I love 'em all!

Clearly my bookcases are in need of a spring spruce up ~ no cull, just a tidy! That is a bunch of Honesty seed pods that has fallen down the back ~ I wondered where they'd gone!

I was having a  rainy Sunday morning search on Amazon.co.uk and I found this book which I thought looked really interesting:

Lace in Translation 

Book Description

Publication Date: 25 May 2010

For "Lace in Translation", the European designers Tord Boontje and Demakersvan and the North American sculptor Cal Lane were commissioned to create site-specific installations recasting traditional notions of lace and its making. These three internationally renowned figures deployed unexpected materials and technologies that range from a hand-woven raffia curtain and laser-cut fabrics, to lace filigree cut into a steel oil tank and burned into grass, to a chain-link fence woven in a Quaker Lace design. 

Here is the link:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lace-Translation-Matilda-McQuaid/dp/0615296432/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1365943468&sr=1-4

I'm not sure I'll buy it, I wish it had the 'look inside' facility which many books have on the Amazon site. Perhaps I could see if the library in Perth would order it in for me, they're usually pretty good.
Does anyone have a favourite art or textiles book they can recommend? I'd love to know what other people's favourites are.

Spring Cleaning

Two weeks holiday from college and the sun is shining! There's still snow in the garden and on the hills, the daffodils have no flowers yet but it seems like a good time for a spring clean and a clear out. After a good spruce up in the rest of the house I started on my Victorian Closet. It was like a game of chess .... everything came out, then got organised, then moved around, then removed altogether, and then it all went back in the closet again!!!  How can I possibly throw anything out. But at least I had a good look at what's hiding in there waiting to be reused.

Whilst rummaging in my drawers I found quite a lot of old buttons. I've started colour matching them and putting them in little jars. I love button jars, they look like sweeties. Here are a few of the white ones:

Then a friend emailed and asked if I had any pink silk ~ answer yes ~ so I've made her up a little package which I'll put in the post for her tomorrow. So that's one thing away! :

Back to playing with buttons now ~ these are the fun parts that I love about spring clear ups.

Onwards and Upwards

Things are good, life is grand! I think I've managed to get things up and running for this project reasonably well now.  This blog is well under way and while exploring the benefits of social networking I've also managed to set up a Facebook page - please pop over and have a look, add Sepia as a friend to network with me! Go to
http://www.facebook.com/sepia.moods

I have a few items listed for sale in my online shop
http://folksy.com/shops/SepiaMoods

I bought the domain name www.sepiamoods.co.uk for just a few pounds and was able to set up a one page web site free of charge while I consider whether or not to buy a full web hosting package. Here is the website link:
http://www.sepiamoods.co.uk/

Moo.com are offering a free sample of business cards in a pack of 10, they arrived this week and I'm really pleased with them. My logo and contact details are on one side and a photo on the other. Very nice! It's easy to upload your photos and the instructions  are simple ~ I'll definitely be buying cards from them in the future.

Vintage wooden cotton reels

Who remembers when threads came wound onto lovely chunky wooden reels?
They're very hard to find these days but here I confess to yet another collection! I've been adding these lovely cotton reels to my Victorian Closet for quite a few years now. I like to re-purpose them and have been making little treasures like this:

The little one is only 2cm tall and is wrapped with printed tape that says "Faith Hope and Love". Sometimes I like to leave the original labels on and this one is a J & P Coats 80 yards of Super Sheen machine twist 40 weight. Who knew! But it had a nice shade of purple thread on it which I wound onto a couple of bobbins and will use in other projects. Sometimes the labels are falling off - if so, I carefully slice them off with a scalpel and save them to use another time. Complete recycling!

This larger reel is wrapped in tape and lace and contains a wee message:

This reel had no label so was topped with a vintage crochet flower and shell button. I will be listing these and others like it in my online Folksy shop - http://folksy.com/shops/SepiaMoods . They come packaged in their own little organza bag and make lovely little keepsakes or thankyou gifts.

The Closet Victorian ~ and you may wonder why .....

...... well, as I've said, I am the closet Victorian ~ who seems to have now come out. My alter ego is revealed!! But I wonder, how did this happen....

When I was very young my grandmother often used to show me the things she kept in her personal treasure chest. She was a very practical and down to earth person so it was always a real treat to look through her collections of photos and souvenirs and hear her memories and stories of times past. She was a young girl during the first World War and her sweetheart sent her the most beautiful embroidered silk postcards from France and a Valentines card too, so delicate and pretty ~ I loved them.  Have you ever seen any of these?

Her photos were all in sepia tones of course and they always seemed to have a bit of warm soft glow about them. Thinking of these, my blog name ~ Sepia Moods ~ seemed quite appropriate for this style of work.

She also had bits of lace and silks, jewellery, ribbons and buttons. One of my favourite things was a walnut shell which had been lined with white padded silk and on it rested a tiny red elephant perfectly carved from coral. The walnut shell was opened by a tiny gold hinge and clasp.

Maybe this was the start of my love of all things pretty and lacy.  I'm also a collector and a hoarder and have all sorts of things stashed away ...... coins and stamp collections, old Victorian newspapers and magazines, beer mats, and many other things including every letter that anyone has ever sent me and lots of special cards.

Thinking of days gone by and times past, here is a little box panel I made using an old suspender (no, not one of mine!!!) and other bits and pieces. It stands on a wooden easel for display:

I do love making things like this! Hope you like it!

From my Victoriana box

Here a few bits and pieces from my 'Victoriana' box. The little green treasure chest I made from a matchbox, and the vintage cotton wooden reel I covered with printed tape and lace:

Next I wondered how a lacy photo would look in soft focus so I added a couple of feathers and softened the photo:

And softer:

I'm thinking of producing these as a range of cards or postcards and perhaps using them as sticky labels as well ~ I always send purchases in beautiful wrapping as I think it all adds to the enjoyment of buying.

Vintage Needlecases

Over the years I've collected lots of vintage linens, doilies, lace, silks, ribbons, buttons and beads. I love to make new things out of the old, recycling and remaking to create textile arts with a vintage look.

Here is a needle case made from an upcycled crocheted vintage cotton table centre.

The cover is softly padded and inside are 'pages' of soft felt to act as needle keepers. The case has been machine stitched and hand embroidered, then embellished with lace, ribbons, beads and pearl buttons, fastened by ribbon.

My vintage style needle cases are available to buy directly from my online store at http://folksy.com/shops/SepiaMoods. There are several available at the moment and although similar in design each will be slightly different. They make lovely gifts ~ perfect for Mother's Day coming up on March 10th! And don't forget Gran!

First Post

Hello! Sepia Moods has joined blogland.

Welcome ~ and thank you for dropping by. I hope to be able to keep this blog updated with photos of new work, mini workshops, and work in progress. I may take a while to get used to blogging and finding my way around so in the meantime please make a note of my new website which will soon be up and running with some of the things you can expect to see here and more.

www.sepiamoods.co.uk

Blogland can be a lonely place, I've seen many where no one posts a response but the stats show hundreds of people have read them. Please do leave me a comment to let me know you have dropped by, I'd love to hear from you. Maybe you have some suggestions for things you might like to see here, or know more about. Or just say hello!