Cheshire Borders Embroiderer’s Guild Part 2 – Everything Else!

It was only a short drive from Bickerton to Whitchurch where my delightful host Jane Rylands lives.  I could not quite believe my eyes when we pulled up in front of her house, and you can see why:  It is more than 300 years old, timber framed and simply glorious with all sorts of nooks and crannies inside, [...]

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Cheshire Borders Embroiderers Guild Part 1 – Lace

This week I spent a wonderful couple of days with the Cheshire Borders Embroiderer’s Guild in Bickerton between Nantwich and Wrexham, a part of the world I have never explored before.  Tuesday morning was their regular meeting, and I gave a talk about how Friendly Plastic and my textiles have been woven together over the years, and [...]

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Friendly Plastic at The Craft Barn

Last Friday I taught my first Friendly Plastic class at The Craft Barn in Lingfield, Surrey.  It is a magical place.  Not only is the building ancient and quirky with beams and creaky floors, but  the shop itself is full of craft materials, and is one of the best stocked independent craft shops I have [...]

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PlayAway 2012

I can’t believe that I have just spent 3 whole days away indulging myself in good company and creativity at an experimental PlayAway in deepest, darkest Worcestershire. As you can see from the photo below, it was a select group of 6 (Annie Mackay, Mary Whittaker, me, Neet aka Anita Hickson, Wendy Kirk and Adrienne Wood) [...]

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Friendly Plastic Beads and Farewells

Sadly the fun has come to an end.  I took Linda and Mariah back to the station today so they could return to London.  I was sorry to see them go, we had had such a good time, tried out a number of different things in Friendly Plastic and Polymer Clay (Linda gave me a quick [...]

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Hotel Chocolat, Primark and Friendly Plastic

It is absolutley fabulous to have Linda Peterson and Mariah, her daughter who are over from the States share my studio and collaborate on new ideas for Friendly Plastic.  We have been working on a number of ideas, but most of the drizzly dark day has been taken up with perfecting our technique for making Pandora [...]

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February Friendly Plastic Class

Do you fancy a bit of messing about with Friendly Plastic on February 11th?  I only ask because you can have a play about with FP in  my company at Coles Sewing Centre (formerly Husqvarna Studio) in Nottingham.  We will be making a Little Book of Secrets using a nifty folding technique and some fun [...]

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Fine Lines and Website Issues

It has been hard to get back in the studio after Christmas and New Year, not least because all every time I pick up something, particularly a Craftynotions product, it reminds me of Sarah, and then I spend my time thinking and not doing.  However the other reason for not getting cracking is the totally chaotic [...]

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Boundless Beads and Just Jewellery

It was only a couple of weeks ago, but it feels more like months that I was teaching two classes at Coles Sewing Centre (formerly Husqvarna Studio – same people, same everything, just a different name) In Nottingham. The first day was dedicated to learning how to make a variety of Friendly Plastic beads, round [...]

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New Stuff!

Everything is back to front at the moment, I should have been telling you about the recent classes, and all the lovely stuff other people have been making.  But that will have to wait for another post as I simply have to tell you about some fabulous new things on the Rare Bird website. One [...]

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