Thursday 1 February 2018

Beautiful wild flower embroidery


My friend Liz had these old Log Cabin cushions on her stall last weekend.  I spy some repurposing of old ties in there I think . . . amongst other fabrics.  Proper old patchwork - using what you have in the house . . .


When it got quieter, I managed to get away with my camera to take photos in the Pharmacy building on site.  I fell into conversation with one of the volunteers, who told me that there was a group of embroiderers, 100 strong, who volunteered and met twice a month to discuss ideas and work on embroidery projects which are then displayed.  These wild flowers were made several years back now, and are a combination of flat embroidery, 3-D embroidery, painted backgrounds, and various skills.

The Hedge Woundwort (top) was one of my favourites, and the wonderful Alchemilla (Lady's Mantle) pictures - two similar plants, but displayed differently.  These plants all have uses in Herbalism.






The humble Buttercup, beautifully portrayed.


Solomon's Seal and Wallflower.


This stunning picture is the Hop - I loved the choice of fabric for the hops.


As you can see, the plants portrayed were divided into sections, depending on what their medicinal use was.



Another lovely picture, showing different parts of the plant.  This one is Carmarthenshire's plant, and they came up in abundance when I dug over some long-abandoned soil at the top of our yard.

Right, as it is taking so long to load a photograph, and the internet is dire - a fortnight on from when it first got really poor, I have no alternative but to phone BT and see if they can do anything.  I have been putting it off and putting it off as I always seem to get the gentleman in India with the strongest accent and I struggle to understand what he is saying.  The problem is NOT my computer, it is the line, but they have to go through all the other checks before that and then you get threatened with a bill of £120 if your equipment is at fault.  I know it isn't, but it's not what you want to hear - they are just trying to get rid of you. 

A friend who I used to phone regularly got rid of her landline for fear of having to pay up, and yet the fault wasn't in her phone (she had borrowed another to check).  She now has a mobile but I can't afford to phone her on that from my landline - it's just too expensive.

So, if it is our equipment, it is also affecting our tv as some nights we can't watch Netflix or iPlayer or Amazon Prime . . .   Oh, and do you remember I got excited because they had put super fast broadband cable out around here - though it fell short of actually connecting to anyone's properties?  Apparently 100,000 houses didn't get connected because they ran out of money (I think it was being funded by the Welsh Assembly). What a complete and utter waste of time then - heaven knows when it WILL be connected, if ever!

11 comments:

  1. Very beautiful embroidery. There is a radio series still available on the BBC website called Moving Pictures. The idea is you listen while looking in close-up detail on your computer screen or tablet at an artwork. The piece I most enjoyed looking at and hearing about was a woollen appliquéd patchwork quilt made in 1820 by Ann West and now housed in the V&A. Being able to focus in on the work and have a passionate expert explain the context was a truly enlightening experience. Would love to join a local Embroiders Guild and challenge myself more. I still have my quartet of meadow landscapes through the seasons on the go. They are on linen held in four inch hoops but I'm trying to keep my stitches quite tiny and dense. The problem is whenever I sit down to do some I spend at least the first half hour unpicking my stitching until I've tuned my eye and hand sufficiently to be satisfied with my work. Your BT broadband sounds a complete disaster and deeply frustrating. I suppose things can only get better. Is it anything to do with the copper fibres that have been laid being repeatedly stolen. We have had instances of this cyber crime in our village. Apparently a bottomless van parks up overnight. A criminal digs down through the road and simply pulls up the copper cable like a bird pulling worms. Then drives on and does it again somewhere else.

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    1. Thanks for that heads up Sarah, I will go and check out Moving Pictures - sounds like my sort of thing.

      Perhaps when you move you can join the local Embroiderers Guild and make new friends and learn new skills.

      "Apparently" (hmph!) my broadband here is 2.1 for the laptop, and 1.8 for the tablet. It definitely ISN'T at night, as a photo takes an hour to load and when I ran a McAffee virus scan this week it took 36 hours - yes, that's THIRTY SIX HOURS!!! - to run. Yeah, sure we've got great broadband. . . . Our wires are all overhead but they run across fields so sometimes get a branch on them, which doesn't help matters . . .

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  2. The wild flower embroidery is so beautiful - so much talent there. I also like the Hedge Woundwort one but they are all so lovely.

    Your BT problems sound so frustrating - do hope you can get something sorted soon. We don't have super fast broadband round here - when BT came in to replace our cables and various "boxes" the engineer said it was unlikely we would ever get it! :(

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    1. "You'll never get it" - that must have cheered you up no end. One of our friends is about 1 1/2 miles away and they are told their broadband won't be improved (it is 10 times worse than my connection!) because they are being left out of the loop due to some of their cables being underground . . .

      I wish now that I had taken close-ups of all the embroideries but there were SO many it would have been impossible to share them all.

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  3. Gopt very excited when I came across some marsh woundwort next to a cricket ground...thought it was some sort of orchid. Idiot.

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  4. Well, it does have a sort of similarity. It's good that you are so interested.

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  5. There was a lot of talent in those pictures. My fingers were fair twitching to get stitching but I have too many W.I.P.s .

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  6. The lady's mantle with the dew drops is my favorite.

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    1. Hi hart. Isn't it just perfect? So well executed.

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  7. Must admit I also love the lady's mantle, love it in the garden as well!

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