Happy Valentines the BORO Style

For the first time in ages I can say I'm back to the land of living without the nasty flu again. A couple of visits to the doctor and sometime to rest and I would say I'm well again yay! Today I'd like to start on a brighter note to wish you lovely bloggers and friends out there a Happy Valentines Day for Monday! I would like to share LOVE all around this Valentines Day with my readers. Blogging has been fun for me and after 2 years I can happily say I have met and made many wonderful friends through blogging. I'm loving it!
At part of my Contemporary Weaving BORO online workshop with Jude Hill. We were weaving hearts in one form or another, and this is mine to share.

This is my Red Heart I did using scraps silk, satin, velvet and vintage silk for the background. The stitching give such a nice texture to the piece. I must say it took me 20 years of quilting to feel totally comfortable using raw edges. I'm glad to say that I have two quilting lives. One for the traditional and one for contemporary. I'm happy working on both concepts. BORO cloths are totally hand stitched.

Silk Study Tour piece. The best part of my travel always includes projects I take along to work on. We used to be away 6 weeks at a time and in some of those trips I appliquéd enough for a quilt. Sometimes I just take fabric and embroidery threads and do whatever idea I have while travelling. In my next trip with the Silk Study Tour I have prepared a basic SST cloth to take with me. I have already put the moon on there. The moon reminds me of Glennis (Shibori Girl). I will add Sakura (cherry blossom) flowers somewhere on there too. I'm not sure the trees will still be in bloom when we get there. At least I have them here on my cloth!

Another BORO woven piece I did for the class assignment. It was weaving without foundation. I don't have the right frame to use for this assignment, so I used a shoe box as a loom. I called this piece 'Namaste' to remind me of Kathmandu, Nepal where the silk tie came from.

I un-stitched it to open up the tie, and made slits in the large part of the tie. I didn't cut it right through; only as much as I needed. I then used mixed scraps of silk to weave with. I then appliquéd with a Buddha figure I cut out from a scarf and stitched all over it. After that I folded the tie back in shape again. Some people in class suggested I use it as a scarf. It's a lovely, soft piece. The stitching gives it a lovely texture. The stitching on the BORO pieces completes the work. 

I have posted these on the class blog this past week so some of you from there would have seen them already. 

Have a good weekend all where ever you are. 

Where was I?

For nearly two weeks I was away to help out when DGS was born. I was glad I went. I got to see him on the first day home, and I got to take care of DGD for a little while just us two. DGS was settled well into his routine. Let's just say I had good sleep at nights, but I couldn't say the same for his parents! 

I came home in the weekend, but I must have caught the flu somewhere on my travels. I'm now sick and house bound for the rest of the week per doctor's orders. 


While I was away, I started a couple of projects. You might remember I mentioned that I'm taking Jude's online workshop. The workshop started while I was away and even though I had access to the internet, I didn't have time to follow it. Jude mentioned that I could make a baby cloth and that is what I did and finished it as well. DIL said she would preferred it rather than a proper quilt which takes more storage. I think so too!

Here is the Baby Cloth I did, I used boro and weaving style quilting. All the materials were boro and re-purposed fabric. The quilt is all hand pieced and hand stitched. I can go on stitching this quilt forever. You might think that it doesn't look like a quilt for a baby boy! Baby grows up fast these days. I feel that DGS can take this quilt and hang it on a college dormitory wall  anywhere in the world!

Another project I worked on was this long neglected netting bag I started when I was more into basket weaving years ago. The technique is not weaving but it's a net, like fishing net. The first couple of inches on the top was made using cordyline leaf striped thinly and twined into string.  

When I finally found it again for the life of me I couldn't face doing that again. It was a lot of twining! In one of the Fibre Forum events I found a ready made twine to use for the rest of the bag. You can't tell the difference right? I thought I didn't have time in this life to make everything! Bought items are sometimes useful, don't you agree?

The original design had changed by this time. I couldn't remember what I was making then, just one of those things you like to learn how to do. With the boro fabric in my thoughts I thought I will Boro it. By the way, Boro means rag in Japanese. How cool, I can use the word Boro as a noun too.  I really like this bag. It's an original design by me. It has a long handle to go across my shoulders while I'm traveling. Did I mention that I booked the Silk Study Tour to Japan in May? 

I'm sure some of you play with these styrofoam balls at one time or other. I picked up a bag full of them at an op-shop while I was away.  DIL was trying to get some new ideas for the handmade market she and her friends sell at. So I made a couple to show her and gave one to DGD using owl fabric (forgot to take a photo of that one). 

Thanks to all well wishers when I posted about the arrival of DGS. Sorry I didn't get back to any of you. It's good to be back visiting blogs again. My life must have been very empty before I blogged. 

Please join me to wish everyone in north Queensland a safe 24 hours as they are about to be faced with yet another disaster -  a Category 5 cyclone yasi due to come ashore tonight. They are very well prepared according to what I saw in the news. Let's hope all are safe.