Hereford Open Studios.

There is a lovely textile exhibition at Weavers Gallery in Ledbury this week and I saw it yesterday.   This little stumpwork piece caught my eye as soon as I entered and represents one of the local mills and some of it's workers.   I think that is right - I was very short of time as our lunch order had been forgotten and we sat for ages before being served, using up precious time which could have been spent making notes of the artists' names and with details of their work.   As it is, I was in a flap in case we went over our parking time and can't remember who did what or why!   The piece above was mounted on a stretched canvas approx.9"x9" and I hope if my photo enlarges you will be able to see a bit more detail.  I love it and think it is delightful.

This piece is entitled 'The stones of Lindisfarne'.   I love these densely stitched stone shapes.

These two pieces are part of the same work and mounted side by side in a long box frame.  The dark shapes are small pieces of slate with holes drilled in them so they can be stitched down onto the backing.

This is the first page of a wonderful fabric book dedicated to the city of Worcester.  I just love it.

This is the beautifully stitched cover.

And this is another page.

This beautiful hand-dyed felt scarf was in a glass case which is why the picture is a little blurred.  The colours of all the exhibits are much richer and stronger than they appear here.  

Next time I visit an exhibition I will be more organised and take my brain with me as well as the camera.

I spent ages trying to find a pattern I liked and in the end was persuaded to buy this one as it was right for the wool I had chosen and easily adaptable to give me the result I was looking for.   Each one I liked had the wrong neckline, or fancy sleeves or some other feature which wasn't suitable.   I didn't want a big collar, or a deep ribbed welt, or a fitted waistline and I my jacket to be longer.

Can you believe that this is what I ended up with from that pattern?  It looked much better over the Tshirt top I wore under it yesterday.   This morning I was chilly and had a sweatshirt on which makes it look bulky.  The colours are much nicer in reality too and it's very comfortable - best of all I actually like it!   I asked for my head to be cut off by the way.  I don't think I have a career in modelling ahead of me - maybe I should have just hung it on a hanger and photographed it that way.