Envelope monster

Funny the things you find when you're tidying up!

Hula skirts and peacocks

 These colourful hula skirts caught my eye the other day. 

These bluey-greeny ones reminded me of a magazine article I read last week about a designer who grew up in a sprawling mansion in America.  As all good sprawling mansions should, it had a whole lot of peacocks that lived in the garden and, as a child she decided that the inside of the house would look good covered in peacocks.  She enticed them into the house with kibbles and got them to climb up on the furniture; her parents were not impressed!  I can't remember who that was...she did have a caravan with a claw-footed bath in it and a Rolls Royce with flowers painted all over it...anyway the skirts kind of reminded me of peacock tails draped over furniture. 

I wouldn't mind a caravan for an art studio actually...wonder if I could get one with a claw-footed bath?

Offcuts

 I've been rescuing some of my cardboard offcuts by making these little stamped cards, I'm always in need of little cards to send out with things.  I've also been printing up a storm, trying to distract myself from my sadness at the election result...more on that printing soon. 

And the mountain of huia soon-to-be brooches continues to grow.  I've got many evenings of sewing on brooch backs ahead of me! 

My creative space

In my creative space this week I've been doing a bit of this:

and a bit of this:
to make these:
and this:
for this.
I'm going to make the huia and swallow prints into fabric brooches. The leaf and petal printed fabric is a bit of a practice using my homemade stamps to make patterns...and to make sure it passes the all-important colourfastness test.

How about you, what have you been making? To see what's going on in other people's creative spaces, head on over to the "our creative spaces" blog.

And at the risk of filling up the internet with pictures of cats, I'll leave you with a picture of a super cute cat called Ernie that I met the other day. Aww, that tongue.

Happy Thursday!

Bunny vs cat

The bunny won.And, letterbox defended, proceeded to read the Ponsonby News.

My Creative Space

My creative space today is a bit of a team effort. After seeing some pretty amazing beards around the place lately I drew this funny hirsute and heartbroken guy:

and these leaves:And Mr. Millicent Crow combined them into a poster for his tour with The Broken Heartbreakers this summer:

Coming to a town near you this summer to break your heart and heal your soul.

What have you been making?

To see more creative spaces pop on over to the "our creative spaces" blog.

Happy Thursday!

Poppy petals

The wind has been blowing poppy petals all over our lawn and I've been capturing a few of them; I like the way they're like little wings.
I turned one of them, and this leaf that's from something like a kaka beak, into some stamps. They're carved from erasers like these ones and these ones. Here they are on my favourite brown paper:Next I'm going to have a go at printing them on fabric...maybe for a tote bag? A skirt?

Millicent Crow at the Bread and Butter Letter

This month I've got some of my drawings and prints on the walls of the lovely The Bread and Butter Letter in Eden Terrace - it's a gorgeous shop full of vintage and handmade goodies.

Most of the drawings I've got on display are the originals of the characters in my Denizens zine, done with ink and a bit of gouache. If you'd like to see them in the flesh, the Bread and Butter Letter is at 66 New North Rd, Eden Tce...you might end up leaving with a new dress, or a fox brooch, or a knitted bow tie.

Thanks The Bread and Butter Letter!

Lazy gardening

I've been very lazy with my garden this year, but it seems to have forgiven me.

I love these aquilegia flowers that look like little stars. Hopefully they'll crop up in a painting soon!

This one has been devoured!

My creative space - black and white and polka dots

My creative space today has lots of polka dots and black and white.  I finished this dress yesterday, it's from my old faithful dress pattern, Vogue 1923, from the '90s.  I didn't have quite enough fabric so I had to do a bit of a jigsaw with the back!  It's a bit more A-line than the many many other versions of this dress I've made because I took the pattern up on the shortening line before I started, a step I usually forget.  I just realised it matches my polka dot stockings!  I wonder if I should wear them together.

 I think it's going to be a cheery summer staple.   

Speaking of black and white, look at what was in my letterbox this morning!  There's going to be a whole lot of stamping on fabric going on around here.  I played around this morning with stamping leaves directly onto the stamp pad which made some nice ghostly prints. 

 

And speaking of polka dots, this fabric is next in my sewing queue.  It's a piece of cotton/silk that was the skirt of a voluminous dress in a past life.  I think I'm going to make it into a breezy summer top.  

 

What have you been making?  

To see lots of other people's creative endeavours pop on over to the "our creative spaces" blog.

Hope you're having a good Thursday!