Deary me no!  It's just what I have been doing has ended up in the bin! 

After my last flurry of creativity with acrylics I got very distracted.

Now I am a huge fan of the Kemshalls, so as a little birthday present to myself I treated myself to a season of their DMTV videos. 

And to be fair to Laura, it was she who kick started me jnto the little foray in acrylic painting. 

But then I got hugely distracted with techniques that they were demonstrating and which I don't need but thought I'd try anyway. 

So I had a go at their acrylic skins - writing with acrylic paint onto plastic and, when dry, painting acrylic medium on top. These you then peel off the plastic and use in mixed media. That's the theory anyway. 

I cannot tell you how much I hated my foray into acrylic skins. And mine didn't so much end up in mixed media as in mixed refuse! 

Sorry Laura, not your fault but not for me. 

Then I got distracted with an old half finished quilt I decided to cut up, again inspired by something Laura did. I had all sorts of grand plans to mount the various bits of chopped quilt onto box canvases. Another disaster!

Even my latest sketch book page is not a thing of beauty. 

On top of all that the day job has been full on. 

Oh - and I've got a commission I need to start work on. 

One of those "duh - it's so genius ideas!"

I like to think that Annabel Rainbow is a bit of a quilting friend. We have only met a couple of times, but when we have I have had a lovely, warm glow. 

Now Annabel is a mean quilter! But none of those twee blocks from her. Oh siree no! Her quilting is a bit radical. She paints incredible ( and in a way, slightly subversive) portrait quilts. 

Go and explore her 'Life Quilts' gallery here. 

Now Annabel works with the equally lovely Laura Kemshall to produce Through Our Hands. 

And they've persuaded the Festival of Quilts organisers to have a very simple portraits gallery at FOQ this year. 

And this isn't any old gallery. This is where the genius comes in. You (yes you!) can do a portrait to hang in the gallery. And there are no rules about the medium you use. It will be very interesting to see the range of styles. 

Ok, you say, but why is this such a brilliant idea. 

Well - first of all, it's in aid of Save The Children. And second of all, you won't get your portrait back. Instead there will be a shuffle and you'll get a random portrait back - you could end up with something from a famous artist. 

But, I'll stop waffling on. Rather than me banging on go over to their dedicated Blog to read all about it, and maybe sign up. 

When it's cold and dark I find my studio very unwelcoming. It's a conservatory off my bedroom. A lovely size and fabulous light but freezing cold and when it rains it's like being in a snare drum. 

Consequently I have been finding it tough to get in there in the evenings. By the time I have walked the dogs and made supper the evening is in full swing and it's too easy to slump on the sofa watching some junk on tv. 

And this is where Instagram has come into its own. 

A few artists post frequently and seem to do something daily. And I have been really inspired by Alisa Burke, Julie Fei-Fan Balzer and Laura Kemshall. 

Alisa Burke posts frequent little sketch book videos filling her little journal with flower sketches. 

Julie Balzer went mad in December with a little daily stamp carving. 

Laura Kemshall recently posted a blog post about how her studio was in turmoil and how a little portable arts caddy was a fabulous way to grab a few minutes on the coffee table. 

Inspired, I grabbed my holiday art bag and a new sketch book ( I seem to have a little stash of new art books - how did that happen?) 

I'm keeping it very simple. A little water colour palette, a koh-I- noor inks palette, a tin of Inktense pencils and a pencil case ( which in all honesty needs a bit of an edit). 

The book is A5 with good quality paper able to take water. And I'm keeping it to 20 minutes. 

And it has been a brilliant exercise so far. 

Thanks so much for dropping by, and if you are doing a 'sketchbook page a day' or something similar pop the link in the comments so we can all pop over and share the love.

Talk about procrastination. I have dithered and dithered for what must have been years - should I sign up to DMTV?

I have been following the blogs of both Linda and Laura Kemshall for some time, and spent a lovely day last year in Laura Kemshalls 'garden shed'!  Also, and quite a few years ago now, I did a course with them on 'The Painted Quilt' at the Bramble Patch. It resulted in a painted cushion cover.

In fact, I credit the Kemshalls as being one of the main influences that 'got me going' - got me away from traditional Patchwork and Quilting and into art quilts and modern embroidery and onto my present journey.

So quite while it took me so long to subscribe to DMTV I cannot say. But there was a moment sitting at my desk for the day job when I just suddenly 'did it'!  I am not sure quite what lead up to that moment.

And I have to say, it is such a worthwhile investment. What is so fantastic is that you get 'two for one', because, while they might be mother and daughter, they are of course different artists and have different styles and ideas.  And they have several ideas running at the same time.

So far I have got some fabulous things to pursue - Laura has been working with mono prints using cartridge paper and then stitching into them (a lady after my own heart!). And she has a nifty technique for registering the paper and print block so you can print in more than one colour.

And Linda has been doing a series on altered books.

Now last year I started a couple of Altered Books (in fact that was my adventure in Laura's garden shed - or rather her converted cricket pavilion) but for one reason and another I never really got into them.  I am not quite sure why not - I never really 'connected' with them.

But Linda's videos have sparked my interest again.

Now, I was about to rush out to find a lovely old book to work into, and then it struck me that rather than alter a book, I could alter a map.  Last year, after my Dad died, I cleared a few bits and pieces out of my Mother's loft and this included a box of old maps.

Too good to dispose of, I shoved the box onto a shelf.

I could, of course, have just kept the map as a map, but instead I decided to make a 'book' from the map using a cut up bonio box for a cover.

I also used part of the map for the inside the cover - the endsheets.


I cut the map long it's folds. Not every fold, but rather letting the folds dictate how the pages might work. The books pages I created by doubling up the map paper and stitching the pieces of map together, back to back.


Some pages, or signatures in book binding terms, are 'triple' and fold out. That was really so as to make the most of one single map ( I actually used two for this book).


 I stitched several signatures together to make a folio, simply by machine  stitching along the fold in the paper.

Then I used ribbon to hold the sections together. I did not stitch through the ribbon, rather I 'caught' it with a longer stitch. The ribbon stays flexible, but is stuck down under the endpapers onto the hard cover.  I like this bookbinding method.


Before assembling the whole thing, I covered the sections cut from the bono box with brown paper and gessoed it.

Then I used Chalk acrylics rollered onto the gessoed cover.



And finally strips of the map, stuck down with a good adhesive matt medium.




 My altered map/book is now ready to be altered some more.

Dear reader, I'm in print and with some exulted company to boot.


You can get hold of your own copy here.

http://issuu.com/laurakemshall/docs/tohmagwinter2015/1 

But let me explain.

If you pop back here from time to time you will know that I got involved in the Bucks Open Studios back in the summer. You can read a bit about that big adventure here. 

We had a very successful event, but the key thing for me was that my work was out in the public domain.  It felt like a big, bold step.

But I have also read so many discussions on blogs, in magazines etc. about textile art not being considered a mainstream art medium. I got quite excited about how Open Studios could be such a good way to put textile art along side more traditional mediums.

So I wrote an article.

And to my surprise it was published by the lovely Annabel and Laura.

So you will find my witterings in there.

But don't just read it for me - deary me no! Have a peruse and see all the other excellent and inspiring artists covered. I briefly skipped through it over lunch yesterday but will return for more today (thats the nice thing about Isuu - so long as I have a computer to hand I can have a browse).

Recently, on her blog, Laura Kemshall posed a little teaser.

Pop over and have a look.