Getting my hands dirty

The Contemporary Quiltgroup suitcase challenge was to make a quilt on the theme of "all in a days work". The closing date was 1st December and way back in August that seemed ages away. We went for a lovely walk down the lane to the beach and noticed that the hedgerows were full of ivy flowers and they were full of bees. So, this was going to form the basis for a design for my quilt.

 I had the idea of making stamps to print on some cloth and also to make some silk paper leaves as embellishment before adding the bees. However, things didn't go to plan. I used some procion dye for the silk fibre which I hoped would be lovely and bright, but the colours were a bit muted.

Not really the glowing colours I had hoped for and time is slipping away fast. I did manage to make some stamps using funky foam and have used my lovely new Geli plate to make some mono prints that I hoped would make an interesting background cloth.

Sadly this has just not happened. I have been doing other things with my DH and other family and friends, been on courses etc. I've had such a lot of fun playing with all these toys, getting my hands thoroughly coloured with paint and dye but the elusive design and indeed anything resembling a quilt is as far away as ever.
Does it matter though? Well, in the scheme of things no it doesn't, but I had hoped to be able to get a quilt made to the deadline just to satisfy myself that I could. What has happened though, is that I have actually been working at my sewing machine,  my art table and although there aren't any finished items yet, I'm convinced that is only a matter of time.
So the next deadline is to make something for the Embroiderer's Guild competition on the theme of tree rhythms and I've got until February. I can use a lot of the work I've already done towards the final piece so that will be the next focus.

Here is a mono print made using my Geli plate that I'm using as the basis for my design. This is a print from a log that I took out of our log basket!

It's about time I went and tried to get some of the paint and dye off my hands and got on with some stitching!