Red

Flame flowers of "Malinche" (Delonix regia).

And with cashew nut pods (Anacardium occidentale).

Light & Movement

Following on from yesterday's post... 

At home today. 

I uncovered a secret. 

The way that the shadows move around in my house.

Bold. Repeating.

Origins. A screen window, with a wooden lattice.

Sometimes the shadows and sunlight match to enhance the checkerboard, and sometimes they don't.

Overlaps.

Sunlight stretched.

Diamond becoming elipse. Square becoming circle.

Light becoming lace.

The faux-lace cuff of a blouse. This last image is for Neki.

And I think this post is somehow related to this ???

Finding diamonds

I did just a few more rows.

 I will keep going with this. But am not going to show it again until it's done.

Which could be sometime!

Just to say that - so far - it doesn't look as though the pattern will be lost because of the stitches.

The first sunbeams this morning casting shadows on the kitchen wall.

I love the pattern, the tones, and the simplicity.

I've been finding diamonds today.

I loved Susan's post. 

And I was reminded of an earlier experiment.

Ideas!

Pattern beneath the stitches

Deep breath ... here I go!

Thanks to sweet friends who left thoughtful comments on the previous post, I am en-heartened to try!

It may be overly simple [?]... the idea of just rows of all-over stitching. But this is an experiment to see what happens to a bold design when you ignore that it's there for a moment. 

I'm expecting it to soften. But what I don't know is whether it will be lost altogether [?]

Perhaps not, because of the frayed edges.

I couldn't work more on this over the weekend. I spent the rest of it stooped over with a severe migraine. 

Stress about work. 

Yesterday evening, we had some family fun-time with the photobooth application. This one made me think of being held beneath stitches too.

Hamadryas - Progressing

Neki had the idea that this design could be printed and then stitched on top. That's what I think too. A silk screen print. A stamp even. Unfortunately, neither of those methods are options currently. 

So it had to be the hard way... cutting out each individual form... and building up the colors by layer! 

It's not like I either have a large stash of cloths to choose from. I found some scraps which were kind of the colors that I had in mind, but are not the easiest for this kind of work. Some thin linens, a heavier linen, and a poly-cotton mix, all of which refused to pass with grace through the blades of the scissors, [admittedly, this might have been easier had I not been using my scissors to cut branches recently!] the grain shreading off in all directions, giving everything a very un-uniform edge. But I decided not to let that put me off, and kept at it. Perhaps it will be more interesting because of that?

Now, I have a massive headache, and the first piece ready to be stitched in months. 

But will I?

Here it is under construction... layer-by-layer!

What do you think?

Strange new symbol

I rushed home at the end of work, determined to use the couple of free hours I knew I was going to have - Nilo is spending the weekend with his father, and the man was fishing - doing something creative. I had been thinking all day about the wings from my previous post.

I blew up some very small sections of different parts of the image. Above is just one example of these. This one really captured my imagination. Very rapidly, and before any notions of perfection could establish, [that happens alot to me, it cripples creativity, does that happen to you too?], I scratched out what I saw as the essence of the form.

Inventing a strange new symbol.

  Nothing fussy. A scrap of tracing paper. and a broken fine line pen, to scratch out a possible repeat pattern.

Dragged into Photoshop with some block color added. The lines from my sketch were not strong enough for the paint can tool to distinguish the seperate fields, so it limited the areas where I could vary the color. Which maybe helped to stop me from over-complicating the whole thing! I was really pleased with this as the start of something . Feels like something that I can call mine. Fits with earlier efforts, that might be described as bold. Has a rawness about it that I find pleasing. 

What is this strange new symbol? 

And can I translate it into cloth and stitch?...

I think this was possible today because Morna has a big heart!

Blue & Beige

Blue & Beige. A powerful combination.

Hamadryas. "Starry night". 

Can't remember which species. But it's one of my favorites.

Male ♂

Female ♀

Male ♂+ Female♀

Bad night. Dogs barking and 100 mile per hour thoughts. Not a good combination.

Pink & Red

Begonia.

Pink and red. 

I probably wouldn't think of putting these two together. But nature did it to great effect!

Tababuia Chrysantha

Possibly the last of the dry season blossoms. Tababuia chrysantha.

The rains are coming.

I couldn't choose which image I liked best. I added them extra large for full impact!

What else!

When I'm not at work - which is most of the time - I try to do some of this...

what else...

I'm getting to see a lot of this... light patterns and movement on water.

Sometimes, a bit too much movement!

 We sailed into a storm. It was very choppy and I admit I was afraid!

But well worth weathering it out for this.

And this! The man caught "Manchado" - related to red snapper - in the dark.

 It was delicious!

I was thinking about those ocean skies. But can't decide if I prefer it like this...

Or like this??? 

Something started... that will probably just remain as another fragment of an idea. The sky needs more apricot. 

I grated some avocado pit.

Within seconds of being exposed to the air, it starts to turn that delicious marigold color.

I threw it in the pot with a few small scraps. I am not a patient cloth dyer.

I keep finding little scraps of fabric all over the house. I picked these three up today, and the coincidental arrangement was pleasing.

Any minute now, my eldest son, Eben, is going to arrive, and I haven't seen him for a whole year!

Pink & Purple & White

Orchids @ work.