Jo on Tour 2016!

Tickets and workshops are now ready for booking at the Festival of Quilts 2016 website!!

And this year I am one of the tutors!!

Yes, I am teaching a 3 hour workshop as part of the Quilt Academy programme on the Thursday (11th August), and as it is my first time it would be lovely to have some friendly faces in my class!

I will be teaching Biscornu with embroidery...

You can book a place here.

And in other news - There will finally be a Modern Quilt category at the FOQ this year!! So start thinking about which quilt you are going to enter or start planning to make one!!

Last year I did quite a bit of 'travelling teaching', even going as far as Sweden! This year I am staying a bit further to home and my only other 'gig' will be in Jersey this June!

I am teaching a workshop for the newly formed Jersey MQG, and then a one-off workshop for my Feathers Quilt at the Harbour Gallery, St Brelade on Sunday 26th June. You can buy a ticket direct from our website here.

I am taking my best friend Liz to Jersey with me and after the weekend of teaching (luckily Liz also quilts!) we are having a few days holiday to celebrate our joint big birthdays - can't wait!!

But before that we have the excitement of the Knitting and Stitching Show in Edinburgh!! So if you are more local to me then don't forget to book one of the amazing workshops, check them all out here.

I will be teaching this cute yo-yo flower hoop in a workshop every day, learn how to make yo-yos, and how to needle-turn applique in this easy and fun class. I will also be demoing Biscornus ever day in the Creative Living Theatre.

And if you haven't bought tickets for the event yet then you can get a £2 discount by quoting MODERN when you buy them!!

Hopefully I will get to see some of you while 'on tour' this year!

Text Embroidery and some more Matchstick Quilting

I've been busy launching our new myBearpaw prospectus over the last week. These are my workshops and evening courses from mid April till mid June. There are 5 new classes, four of them are for quilts and projects that I have made previously like this House Quilt and the Snowball Craft Bag. But I did make one sample for a new class - the text embroidery hoop above.

The idea is to learn some basic outline and filler stitches while embroidering your favourite slogan or just playing around with letters and text. 

I am very happy with this piece above and am already working on at least one more. I will try to publish some patterns of these soon too. The quote is by David Bowie. I am still pretty heart broken about his untimely passing so this was a nice way of sewing a personal tribute.

If you'd like to join me for this class you can check out the details here, and view the whole prospectus here.

Last weekend I taught my Dishes Quilt class for the first time. I made some extra blocks as class samples using Jennifer Paganelli's stunning upcoming collection 'Color Brigade' (which she has very kindly sent me for a commission). 

I made these into two panels and then finished them with matchstick and hand quilting as I'd done with the original Dishes Wallhanging below

This time I used Manchester Linen in Pepper (instead of Stone) and so managed to use my original test block (made with Jen's earlier line 'Circa') in one of the panels. The 'shelf fabric' is from the amazing 'Carkai' line by Carolyn Friedlander.

I turned the two panels into this pretty tote bag! The lining is by Heather Bailey, a fabric we had in our sale, but then I realised I loved it too much to sell it and took the rest of the bolt home with me!!

Despite being somewhat in love with this bag I am actually giving it away! 

Apologies right now for those of you not on Instagram as you won't be able to take part in this giveaway (but hopefully you have still enjoyed looking at the pretty bag!).

I just passed 5000 followers on IG and to celebrate and as a thank you I am giving away the bag, a fat eighth bundle (24 fabric) of the complete new Joel Dewberry collection 'Wander' (not out for a few months actually - another kind donation from the lovely folks at Coats UK!), plus...

...I will also be knitting a pair of socks for one lucky winner!! 

I recently took a ball of our new Arne and Carlos sock yarn (by Regia) for a spin and made this pair for my son. I may have mentioned before that sock knitting is crazily addictive and now I just want to make more! But I am running out of people to make them for - hence my very generous giveaway!

If you do have an IG account why not pop over and enter - you have till tomorrow evening?!

Or if you don't already then maybe you should consider joining? There is so much fun and inspiration to be found over there!!

The Great Tapestry of Scotland

I've been wanting to tell you all about this exciting project since I first became involved back in May, but there hasn't really been much to see until recently. 

I first heard about it on the radio one morning in Spring on the Today programme. James Naughtie was talking to Alexander McCall Smith about a project to make a tapestry of the whole history of Scotland which would be stitched by groups of volunteers. Here's what Alexander has to say about it on the official website:

“The recording of events, both great and small, on cloth is nothing new. The most famous example, of course, is the Bayeux Tapestry, which is one of the world’s best-known works of art. More recently, the completion of the Prestonpans Tapestry in Scotland has reminded us of just how effective this method of narrating history can be. When I saw that tapestry for the first time, I was struck not only by its beauty but by the story behind its creation. That led me to raise with Andrew Crummy, the artist, the possibility of creating a tapestry that would illustrate the whole history of Scotland. To my delight, Andrew agreed to take on the task. Alistair Moffat, one of Scotland’s finest historical writers, was then approached to join the project and come up with a list of historical moments that the tapestry would cover. As we had all expected, Alistair’s list is both balanced and exciting – a series of snapshots of Scotland from its earliest days to the recent past. This is a collaborative project. The work will be done by volunteer stitchers working throughout Scotland. Although the overall artistic vision will be Andrew’s, and the telling of the story will be Alistair’s, the creating of the tapestry will be the task of many hundreds of people who will invest in it their feeling for the story that they will be illustrating. When the work is finished, we shall hand the tapestry over to the nation, to be displayed to the people of Scotland and visitors to Scotland. A great project is about to be launched. I believe that it will bring happiness and delight to many people.” ALEXANDER MCCALL SMITH

Straight away I knew this was something I wanted to be involved in and wrote an email to the organisers suggesting I could host a group in my craft studio. A few weeks later Gillian Hart got in touch to say could we arrange a meeting with other volunteers in my area (EH10) to start working on a panel. We arranged a date and time and I got the craft room ready with plenty of chairs.

My craft room doesn't really hold many more than 10, but the door just didn't stop opening that night and it was standing room only when 17 stitchers arrived! 

We were given panel number 5 (which you can see in the top photo), "The Wildwood and it's Fauna 8500BC", which had been drawn with the design by other volunteers. Dorie Wilkie and Gillian gave us very clear instructions about wool, stitches and how to look after the linen panel and left us to sort ourselves in to a working group.

What we didn't realise until later was that this was the very first panel to be handed to a group so I think we all felt quite honoured!

After much discussion that night and in subsequent group emails, we settled into a group of 13 and arranged our first meeting (the 2 photos above) to work out how to proceed. Here we are sorting the wool. It is Appleton's crewel wool and we have been given all the shades we should need, though we can, and have, asked for other specific colours. We are called the Edinburgh Tapestry Tenners (because of our postcode).

Seeing as the main inspiration for the whole project is the Prestonpans Tapestry we decided to have a group outing to St Mary's Cathedral where the tapestry was hanging for the summer. I think we were all bowled over by the beauty and artistry of the stitching in these panels.

I took some photos for future reference and to share. The tapestry depicts the battle of Prestonpans in 104 Metre wide panels. You can read more about it here.

We are very lucky to have a lady in our group who worked a whole panel of this tapestry herself. I'm not sure how well we would be getting on with our panel if not for Katherine's advice and experience.

After this trip and one to the museum to research the period when our panel is set, and a number of meetings in the craft room and each other's houses, we have started to really bond as a group.

We have a wonderfully diverse range of different ages and backgrounds in the group, but all the ladies are alike in having led fascinating lives!

Apart from embroidering the panel, we are also keeping a journal that each of us writes in when we take a turn at stitching. I had my turn quite early on and wrote a very brief biog. As the book got passed around the tales seemed to get longer and longer and more fascinating too. When I got the book back on my second turn and read about everybody's lives it was like reading a really good novel!

I had originally envisaged us all working on the panel as a group, however it soon became clear that this wasn't going to be possible as we needed to use a hoop. But Joy and Liz did manage to work on 2 different areas at once here in my craft room. They are working on the outlines here.

In August Andrew Crummy, the designer, came to one of our meetings to answer all the questions we had about different bits on the panel, what he had intended, and how we should interpret them.

Andrew was very patient while while we bombarded him with questions. You can see the panel in the photo, and around the edge of the design are empty 'boxes'. These are for each group to make their own contributions to the panel. This was one of the reasons for our museum visit, as we hoped to suggest other fauna and flora from the era to decorate this border. We had all thought that Andrew would need to draw these himself, and were delighted to find out that we could design these areas ourself! There is the right number of spaces for everybody in our group to have one each. I will tell you in a later post about my ideas for my bit.

The tapestry is back with me for the third time this weekend. Everything we need is in this plastic box, a large picture of the design, the journal, the wool, and a wonderful resource folder put together by Nikhat and added to by the whole group, full of ideas for stitches and reference material.
The tapestry is rolled on to a cardboard tube, covered with cloth and stored in this purpose built case, made by Joy.

We are just starting to stitch inside the outlines now. The spears were stitched by Katherine, and Joy has started the fox. We have till next June to finish it. Then all the panels have to be stretched and stitched together before everything is hung in the Scottish Parliament.

As you can imagine, with such important work for the nation at stake, we are all a little nervous about stitching on to the panel. We have each chosen an area or a few areas to concentrate on and we have been making sample pieces to try out our stitches.
These beautiful fauns were made by Joan H. Joan is working on her City and Guilds Embroidery at the moment, and is very proficient. But some of the group have not done much sewing before, and this was part of the intention of the project, to involve as many ordinary people in the work as possible. Working in a group means we can all support each other and share our skills. I have already learnt so much from the other ladies!

I had started to work on samples for the woman on the right hand side of the panel, and was intending to start stitching her hair this weekend. But at a meeting that I missed last week, it was decided that the auroch should be got on with first. The auroch is an extinct big cattle/bison type animal, and I had also volunteered to tackle this part of the panel. In fact I was very excited that there was an auroch in the panel. Most people won't have heard of them, however if anyone else has been reading the books I have been reading this year they may be more familiar with them! More about my current big, non-crafty, obsession in a later post, but leave me a comment if you know what I am talking about!

So earlier this week I did some very small samples for the auroch (they do look pretty pitiful after Joan's but I only had a couple of hours to spare!). I think I know which one I am going to go for but you will have to wait to see how my auroch takes shape to find out which.

Here are some other sample I did for the woman and her clothes. I was particularly pleased with that bit of 'furry' stitching I did (even if Jonathan was quite rude about what it resembled!!). Anyway fur and hair will have to wait for now so that I can concentrate on the auroch. He is the cow type animal with the big long horns on the right hand side.

Well I hope you have enjoyed this little story, and will tune in again when I have more to show you as the panel fills in.
I am still very pleased and excited to be involved with this project, even if it is taking up more of my time then I originally anticipated. But I just love the idea that one day I can take my grandchildren (as yet unborn!) up to the Scottish Parliament and show them the panel our group worked on and say, "look Granny stitched that auroch!".
If you'd like to read more about the tapestry here's the website.

Cedric the Badger

Meet my new woodland friend, Cedric the Badger. Cedric's had a difficult birth but he's here now and ready to be stitched. Yes I have a pattern all ready for sale on our website!

This was the sneek-peak preview you got a few weeks back when I did a tutorial for the Raised Rose Stitch.
I made Cedric as a birthday present for my Mother-in-law, who lives at a house called Badger's Drift, and I was waiting for her to receive it and for my IT consultant (ahem) to sort out the PDF pattern before I showed him to you.

Badgers are really hard  to draw. I tried to do a badger as one of the mini woodland portraits I made for the FQ Retreat Sample Swap, but he just kept turning out either evil or very sad so I gave up and did an owl instead!
But, undettered, I had another go. I thought you might find my early sketches entertaining!

For a while he kept veering between a corgi and a pig! One of the things that makes them difficult is that they have black eyes in a black face and the other is that they are always very low to the ground, more like furry slugs really.
I kept at it and eventually got a badger who looked like a badger and, hopefully, won't scare any children!

If anybody buys this pattern don't worry if the face on the pattern looks a little weird. Because the face is made from mainly black and the pattern is white it has the quality of a photo negative (remember them?!). I hope that makes sense. Just go with it and he will get more badger-like the more black you use.

I have used split stitch for the badger stripe and nose, this is the first time I have used this stitch and it is an excellent filler. It is basically like a backstitch but you stick your needle through the middle of the previous stitch to 'split' it. It takes a while but I think the results are worth it.

I am enjoying using variegated perles at the moment. I like the way these look on the ivy and the tree trunk. And I've used a variegated orange mixed with yellow on my rose bush. I just love doing those roses now!

So, a new character to add to my woodland gang. If you would like to buy the pdf pattern click here .
I have to thank my sister, Jane, for coming up with his name. I think Cedric suits him perfectly, he seems to me a slightly cautious, polite and proper badger. He is slso clearly watching something or someone from behind that tree. I wonder what it is?

Embroidery Pattern launch with FREEBIE!

 You have been asking for these and I have been promising them, and at last I can announce...

... that my embroidery patterns are ready to buy!!

Thanks to my IT consultant (*cough* husband), who has been working hard on this all week, you can now buy a pdf of any of the designs on this page from our website.

The pdf features the pattern both right way and reversed, instructions for 2 different methods of transfer and stitch instructions with exact DMC colour codes so you can obtain the exact look shown here. Of course it would be lovely to see some of my designs in your own chosen colours!

I plan to do a tutorial on the blog very soon to accompany the Sampler Tree pattern above, showing some of the more unusual stitches like the raised rose and the wheel. Meanwhile anyone very keen to get on with this (and quick!) can email me for any extra help required and I will send you links to on-line stitch diagrams.
The other patterns only use very basic stitches such as back, running, satin and French knots, so should be easily tackled by anyone who can hold a needle and thread.

My little Woodland Portraits are available on their own or as a set and prices start at just £2.50!

And as I special thank you to all my blog readers for the support and encouragement you have always given me for my projects, I am giving away one of these mini woodland portraits absolutely FREE!
Yes, you can 'buy' Boris the Bear Woodland Portrait Pattern pdf with 100% discount on our website using this code mybearpaw. Just head on over here, and click to buy! But don't dawdle because this offer will only be available for a limited period only (at least a week, so don't panic too much!).

I chose Boris as he works so well with the name of the blog and so can be a bit of a mascot! I hope you like my 'try before you buy' offer but I hope that doesn't stop you from 'buying before you try' with some of the other patterns!

AND if you want more embroidery pattern action Blueberry Park are hosting a giveaway to help launch my patterns too! 5 winners can choose the pattern of their choice and 1 lucky winner will get a pack of 10 DMC perle cotton 8's! Head on over to Karen's blog for more details and to enter!

As some of you may have noticed, this blog is changing slightly. I have my dear, sweet, lovely IT consultant working on a re-build, so expect a few more changes before we've finished!

Sampler Tree Embroidery with extra owls

I have been having a week off work for a wee holiday, just 'staycationing' at beautiful Shangri La Farm. But seeing as I have picked the wettest week of the year for it, I have been inside sewing most of the time!
This has given me time to catch up on ARRR8 and Cherish Circle commitments and also to start and finish 2 projects for classes in the Autumn.

First up a 'Sampler Embroidery'. My Embroidery and Embellishment Workshop has been very popular so I wanted to offer another embroidery class. Because of another project I am involved in at present (that I will write about in a separate post) I have been learning lots of new embroidery stitches and wanted to design a Sampler to show them off. I was very inspired by this beautiful Hot Air Balloon by the extremely talented Nicole (yet another person I didn't get to chat to at FQ London!) and wanted something similar.
So I chose a tree. Anyone who has been paying attention to my previous embroidery designs will have noticed that I love to draw trees, leaves, flowers and anything 'organic'.

So this is a tree full of different 'stitch flowers' and 'stitch leaves'. We have fly, chain, seed and satin stitch leaves, star, daisy and wheel stitch flowers, fly stitch twigs with bullion knot buds and raised roses from an old embroidery leaflet that I found whilst searching the net.
The tree trunk looked a little empty when I'd finished, so I popped a tiny owl into a hole. It was lovely to work on something so colourful and varied. I know I am always saying this but I do really love embroidery.

I have one more class without a photo to advertise it on our website, and that is a half day in the Autumn to make Fabric Owls. Back when this blog first started, over 3 years ago now, I made a fabric owl from a pattern I found here at a blog called Lollychops (I have just been reading over that early post - I didn't even know how to do links!). This was the sort of thing I wanted to do for my class, but I have started from scratch with the pattern.

I wanted to make the owl a cross between my little crocheted owl and this owl doorstop. I've used furnishing fabrics from Romo and Mulberry. We used to do Interior Design when we had a bigger business (before the recession nearly ruined us completely) and I still have loads of scraps and pattern books to use up. These fabrics are all 'dry-clean only' so only good for projects that don't need to be washed (but you wouldn't want to put one of these fellas in to a washing machine would you?).

The fabrics are beautifully soft so they are perfect for a cuddly owl. I love fly stitching so much that I added some to their tummies as feathers. This was the trial one, but I thought he was a bit squat so I decided to stretch the pattern a bit for the next one.

I like him too but I think I prefer the first one now! What do you think? Short or Tall? I think I will offer both options at the class.
If anybody is interested (and local enough) you can find details of these 2 classes here.

One more thing, I was absolutely chuffed to bits when I opened my copy of Mollie Makes on Thursday to discover Tasha's report on FQ London Retreat with yours truly in one of the photos! Fame at last!!