A clutch of goodies.

I seem to have gone green! In reality the yarns shown above are greener than they appear here - the camera has muted them and they are actually lovely fresh greens. Even the Colinette yarn which looks blue in this pic, is a mix of natural shades of green. On the left is a variegated sock yarn, so that one is quite fine. The central wound ball is very soft and silky, slightly variegated with hints of ochre. Top right is a little pack of dyed raffia - not sure what I'll do with it yet. The silver mesh 'ribbon' is rather nice and will make a good addition for collaged cards I think. I would have liked it in gold too but there was none.

There should be a drumroll for this photo! I seem to have produced a design in a sketchbook, in colour too. I am not comfortable with drawing and usually prefer to get straight down to work with fabric and thread, but for this idea I needed to work it out and try to 'see' what I want to do. My inspiration came from Google Earth - I have had great fun exploring my locality and discovered that the noisy, dusty quarry a mile up the road looks fantastic from the air. There are actually three separate workings and I have taken bits from each of them for my design. There is a pool of water in one which is the most amazing deep blue and areas of texture in soft terracotta and buff tones. As yet, I have no idea how I will start on this project but think it might involve painted pelmet vilene cut with a soldering iron, to suggest the different working levels.

My other Google inspiration comes from our town's allotments which are about a mile away in the opposite direction. They are like an intricate modern tapestry seen from above. I see narrow textured strips, perhaps woven together to suggest the individual plots. The green yarns will come in handy for some of them and I may incorporate very narrow knitted strips or even fine canvaswork. Plenty to think about and lots of samples to be made, I'll keep you posted of my progress. It will be straightforward enough to create the shapes and textures, but making them into attractive pieces and finding a way of presenting them won't be quite so easy.

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The sun is shining and it's almost warm out there this morning. I'm off to put some plants in, which we bought a few days ago. Happy Mothers' Day tomorrow to all you Mum's out there and a lovely weekend to everyone.