Doorways.

I was going through some of my old embroidery pictures today, deleting duplicates and generally tidying up, when I noticed how many pieces used imagery of doors or gateways. This below uses an old Art Nouveau window design with machine digitized and embroidered flowers on hand dyed fabric.

    Below is a wall painted with 'Puff paint' and machine embroidered 'slips' of flowers applied.

 Another painted wall and door with free machine embroidery.  This was a photo that I took of an old door behind a church somewhere in France.

 

 An imaginary wall below and a garden beyond with machine embroidered 'slips' of flowers and foliage.

 A painted cotton wall based on my photo of a church doorway in Sienna, Italy with machine embroidered details.

                  Another 'Puff' painted wall with machine embroidered foliage and details.

 

 Two more doorways that I photographed somewhere in Italy with machine embroidered vegetation.

Flowers Through the Year.

 

I'm not sure if the group that instigated the Garden of the Month Challenge expects one for December, but I don't think that I'll have time to do it anyway! This above is the Hippeastrum lily currently in flower in my garden, my reflection on a garden for the month of November As always a click on the image will enlarge it a little for you to be able to see the stitching..

L-R  Here are the flowers from 6 different gardens for the various months this year. A Poinsettia from a park in Brisbane, a type of Iris from a local park, a Lotus from The Blue Lotus Garden just out of Melbourne, a Passion Flower from a Marraweeney country garden, a Blood Lily from the Melbourne Botanic gardens and a Hellebore from the Garden of St Erth in Blackwood, Victoria.

L-R again, a Native Rose flower from the Cranbourne Botanic Gardens which specialises in Australian native plants, a Hibiscus from my own garden, an old fashioned single rose from a neighbour's garden and the Hippeastrum, again from my own garden.

Renovation.

 I decided to try and renovate the 2 collograph plates that showed some promise, leaving the 3rd one as it is for the moment. Here above is the plate with the tree foliage that is too thick and textureless, and the grasses that are a bit sparse. I set to with a craft knife and whittled away at the bulky sphagnum moss foliage reducing it's profile quite a lot. I then glued on some extra seed heads and allowed it all to dry under weights.

            With this one I glued on some more tree leaf texture and set it under weights to dry too.
                    I hope that my renovations produce better prints than the original plates did!

Printing at Last!

 At last I have a few hours clear to try printing the collograph plates that I made recently. Here above is the tree  that I made using bark, yarn and sphagnum moss all inked up and rubbed back to try printing from.

                   Hmm, not too good. The moss foliage is too thick and doesn't have enough definition.

 Here is the same one inked in black which might be a little better.  I've added some blue to the sky too.

 It's interesting that the print has turned out with a horizon line that I hadn't intended.  I might be able to do something with this by adding some more colour, but it's still pretty disappointing.

 I had great hopes for this one, as the texture isn't too thick and here when it was inked up it looked as if it might turn out well.

The inked plate above with some yellow and orange added and the print below.

    
 This one is worth persevering with I think, but I wonder if  I can add more sawdust foliage at this stage, as I think the tree canopy needs more texture.
The prints aren't too bad and I quite like the yellow and orange sky suggesting sunrise or sunset and I also like the way the tree trunks have printed. The lower story of the forest is interesting too.

Gorgeous Lilies in my Garden.

 It's the first time that I've grown these lilies, so I'm not quite sure exactly what colour pink they will turn out to be.

                        Not quite the deep pink that I was hoping for, but lovely all the same.

 These gorgeous lilies have several names, Maltese cross Lily, Jockey's Cap lily and the correct name which is Sprekelia. They look so spectacular, yet are very easy to grow and multiply prolifically.

 This is another new variety for my garden and much more the depth of colour that I was looking for.

These Hippeastrum lilies I think used to be called Amaryllis, or maybe that's the accepted name these days. Anyway they are really spectacular, and again the bulbs multiply nicely.

The Next Stage.

          I've sealed all 3 plates with matt gel medium and also with a light coat of gesso.

         Interestingly the colour of some of the materials has leached through both of these sealants.

After a night under my weighty book press the sphagnum moss has flattened a bit, but it may still be too lumpy to print well. I'll let these dry and then the exciting bit, to print from them.

New Collograph Plates.

 While I was away recently I keep on the lookout for suitable natural materials to try on collograph plates. I came home with several bags of bits and pieces to try. The plate above used sawdust on the light board mountain cut outs, with mulberry bark in the middle ground and finely chopped tree bark for the fore ground. All the material on the sealed plates have been glued into place, but not themselves sealed.

 Again I have used sawdust, this time for the fine tree leaves and strands of bark for the trunks. I have also added some dried oak tree flowers below.

For this one I crumbled some dried sphagnum moss, the sort of stuff that you get from a plant nursery, for the tree leaves, with several strands of worsted yarn for the trunk and branches, and with shredded bark for the grasses below. Unfortunately the dried moss has started to swell with the water in the glue, so I will have to see if I can flatten and seal it suitable for printing.

Mitta Valley.

 This is part of the beautiful Mitta Valley in Northern Victoria. Whilst it can get very hot and dry here, the Spring days that we spent in the valley were warm, sunny and with views of lush green pastures.

 Again my eye was caught by some abandoned machinery, this time a small trailer that had been over taken by weeds.

I just love this tiny garden taking hold in the tray of the trailer, complete with spider web. You can just see the tree covered hill in the background.

 

 

Rural Artefacts.

I have been away from home for a few days, exploring some of the North Eastern parts of the state of Victoria.

While walking the dog around the tiny town of Strathbogie I came across some old artefacts that I just had to photograph, such as the huge pile of rusty farm bits lying in the grass behind a derelict old house. What a bonanza for anyone wanting things for rusting of paper or fabric.

 It was a very hot morning, so even if I had wanted to take any pieces, the thought of snakes lurking under the bits of tin certainly put me off doing that!

This appeared to be the remains of an old fireplace, and someone had added their finds of odds and ends to the stonework.

Rhubarb Flowers ?

It never occurred to me to think that a Rhubarb plant might have flowers, so I was very surprised to find my very old, at least 17 years old, plant in flower.  Some of the flowers have gone on to form reddish seeds too, which are very attractive. The stalks of the flowers are very strong, although hollow and are easily as tall as I am. What a surprise!

A Touch of Paint.

 These two prints are more or less rejects, being too dark and not rubbed back enough. They are therefore ideal candidates for me to practise painting the grasses for future prints.

This one above is really a mess of lines and blur, but useful nevertheless for choosing colours for such an image. I thought that I needed white to give the grasses some sparkle, but in fact it's the orange that makes a real difference.

Gorgeous Roses.

 I don't think that I have ever seen such a wonderful display of roses as I saw in the Benalla Rose Garden this week. I was trying to locate the flower with the most iconic rose perfume, so I seem to have only photographed the red flowers, although there were many other colours too.

 There were all sorts of variations in the form of the roses, from the expected  shapes of the blooms above, to the almost cabbage like flowers below.

 This one caught my eye just as I was leaving, just so pretty with the deep colour on the outer edges of the petals to the white in the centre.

A Good Season for Irises.

 I have no idea what the names of these Bearded Irises are, but they are all equally beautiful I think.

    The previous owner of our property planted all the blue varieties, and I added the yellow one.

More Butterflies.

 I just love butterflies, I love to watch them and to photograph them. These are all photos of butterflies that occur in my garden in the foothills of the Victorian Great Dividing Range, in the Strathbogie Ranges. This above is our Australian Admiral.

 I have only seen the  Glasswing butterfly in the garden during one season, as it is much more of a tropical butterfly.   This particular year they were around in their hundreds, but have never returned.

 This is a female Common Brown.  The male has different markings and is about a third smaller.

                This is just one of several 'Browns', which are quite often hard to tell apart.

A Chequered Swallowtail is also not a common visitor, but here it is sitting on a bright Azalea flower in my garden.