Practice Imperfect Conference.

Drawing. A montage from a day of experimental drawing at Birmingham School of Art. 

Drawing - experiments with ink.

Return to Making

I've been having a break from my own making for a while, just doing little bits here and there with no real direction. I'd been asked to teach a more advanced class in felt making this September, so decided to do 3D vessels, which meant I had to get my felting equipment out to remind myself of the process as I'd not done it for a while. 

Oh feltmaking! How I'd missed you.  I've wholeheartedly thrown myself back into making fabric from wool and decided to embark on a Certificate in Feltmaking Techniques run by the International Felt Makers Association. 

This morning I made my first piece of felt for the coursework, a square piece using blue face Leicester wool, this had to have straight edges, which I really am not very good at.  

The Blue Faced Leicester looks like this. 

It took two attempts and though it's not perfect, I'm quite pleased with this result. 

The piece on the left is my first attempt. 

Wild Play and woodlands.

Yesterday.  morni. ng I took my two dogs and headed to a nearby wooded area, I felt I needed to do some connecting with the earth. I'd run my first after school club in the woods last week and it has become quite a seminal moment for me.

Being in the woods with children and seeing them interact with their environment, getting on with the serious art of playing and growing is wonderful. I can't think of anything else I'd rather be doing with my life.

So, back to my walk yesterday. I needed to spend time, give thanks and say goodbye to any self doubt. I did a connecting with the earth exercise, (this did involve me laying down, the puppy thought this was a great new game) and then I wandered off looking for things that appealed to me. I gathered a few leaves, some bark and some red clover.

I picked an oak leaf - strength, birch bark - renewal & beginning, holly - assertion & objectivity, red clover - good luck and a sycamore.  The sycamore has no mythology from the UK possibly as it wasn't introduced until the middle ages. 

Thank You

30 Days Wild Challenge

I'm taking the 30 days challenge organised by The Wildlife Trust, this takes place throughout June and encourages people to get outdoors on every day throughout June. I'm outdoors most days but thought the challenge was a great opportunity to record what I get up to whilst being more mindful about it.

Day 1 was a bit of a deluge of rain and wind and I didn't get off to a great start, I managed to get out at lunchtime but didn't really feel inspired to take any photos.

Today (day 2) was marginally better with gusting winds, so Maybe the dog and I ventured out to pick some grasses to add to my forest school flora and fauna id book.

The meadows near my home are in full flower and looking rather beautiful at the moment.

Charcloth

Spent a lovely afternoon yesterday making a small fire to make myself some charcloth, this will help my firelighting go more smoothly without having to resort to using cotton wool. I've been drying my kindling and small twigs for a while so once I'd got a nice little flame going, it was ready to put my tin of cloth on to char. Its the same process as making charcoal, and only took a few minutes. I'm quite proud of the results.

The Purple Shed Studio: Playing with Fire

The Purple Shed Studio: Playing with Fire: Ooooh.  I made charcloth to help with my fire lighting skills today!. I