Happy New Year 2015!

(photos from Daily Mail website)

 As seems to be a bit of a tradition, the first post of the year is one where I review last year and see how I got on with the things I wanted to achieve. I kept it pretty simple and did reasonably well (with the exception of the first one).
Make more felt - hmm, this wasn't achieved at all, so I must do better with that this year.
Read interesting books - achieved (total of 86, up from 63 in 2013) and will be continued.
Be creative - achieved but could do more! I'd like to learn a japanese braiding technique (kumihimo) to add to my jewellery making.
Get rid of/donate things I do not want or need - I am a hoarder, so this is one I struggle with. However, I am going to improve and for the last few weeks have been consciously removing at least two things a day from the house.  I just need to carry that on!
So, not bad, but will do better in 2015.

Happy New Year to you all and I hope it is a healthy and prosperous one.

Textiles from ages past

I am feeling very guilty just at the moment, as I haven't been devoting much blog space to textiles (whether my felt pieces or other textile-based interests).  We went to visit Mum and Dad yesterday and Mum has a wonderful collection of pieces of old material as well as a Regency dress and various other pieces of clothing and accessories such as socks, gloves, parasols and bonnets from various times, probably mainly Victorian.  So, we had a very happy afternoon rummaging through these wonderful things and I foresee a few blog posts about them. 
Above is a really pretty silk (I think it is silk, but it could be a silk/taffeta) with machine embroidery on it.  I'm not at all sure on date, but my gut feeling is 1800 onwards.

 The back of the material is nearly as pretty as the front!

A close up of the flowers shows the delicate shading of pink and yellow/orange. The materials have all been shut away in an ottoman chest, so have retained their beautiful colours.
This is a great advertisement for hoarding - if Mum (and previous members of her family) hadn't been such hoarders, we wouldn't have these lovely things to look at and enjoy now.
(I have a feeling that my friend Charlotte, who has recently moved to Holland, will particularly like the Regency dress post..coming soon!)

Tiles

Being married to a hoarder, coming from a hoarding family and so being a hoarder myself can have some benefits. There is the danger of becoming swamped in "things that might come in handy" or "things we just had to save from destruction", but I couldn't live in a minimalist house anyway - it's just not my style! The benefit of finding lovely items like the (possibly) Victorian tiles above outweighs the negatives. The muted colours and floral pattern are right up my street, even though, as yet, we haven't found them a suitable home.

The writing above is found on the back of one of the tiles and I'm not sure whether it is a signature or pattern name and number. However, it all adds to the interest in a fairly utilitarian object. I would love to have a mixture of tiles as a splashback, although they would probably have to have similar colours in them to make the different patterns work together. Alternatively, they could be like a dot plant in a flower border - the central piece around which everything else is placed.

I wonder what else Chris will find?