Tuesday 27 September 2011

Digital Photography Class

I have got a good digital camera, but I must admit that, most of the time, I point and shoot, keeping my fingers crossed that the pictures turn out. Most of the time I am lucky, but sometimes I could wish for more. When I heard that there was to be a photography class held in the Community school, I signed up and just hoped I would not make too much of a fool of myself. 


There are five of us in the class. Two members (plus the teacher) have, what I would call, professional cameras, I am in the middle, and the two others have reasonable, but slightly older digital cameras. Our first assignment for the class was -'juxtaposition of circles and lines'. Phew!! I wandered round the school looking for lines and circles, and it was really amazing how many I found. I deleted loads, but was quite happy with these remaining photos.
 Window blind cord.

 Door handle and lock

 Radiator

 Screws

  Screw

Drawing pin

I enjoyed doing this, but still like my landscapes better. Guess I am not arty enough.
Till next time.
tich

Saturday 24 September 2011

Tana Lawn

 I have definitely lost the impetus to blog regularly. It is not that I have little to share, but that the time just seems to get away from me too easily. Anyway, I am on today!


You will remember, perhaps, that I was given a lot of scraps of Tana Lawn a long time ago - years in fact!
I decided I was going to make a log cabin with foundation piecing, drew out a block I liked and photocopied lots of this design. I only had scraps of the lawn, albeit some of them were a reasonable size. I really enjoyed puttering away at this, and laying out lots of permutations of the log cabin on the floor.
I sewed four of the smaller blocks to make bigger blocks and eventually got this -
Next I had to decide what kind of border I wanted. If I put on ordinary cotton, it would have been too heavy and eventually have made the lawn tear or wear badly. I decided on a piano key design, using the material I had -


The photo below, with my husband's feet sticking out, shows the top completed. It still has the papers behind the border, and these will not be taken out until I get round to sandwiching it, prior to quilting.
I have still got quite a lot of scraps left, so I might make another top in a different design - later!!
Till next time.
tich

Monday 5 September 2011

Summer's End

I can't believe it has been a month since I last blogged, but the time has just flown. Our weather has changed radically since this time last month. Our grandchildren were here and having fun on the beach in August.





The dog was on its lead, because the previous day she had taken off over the dunes after a rabbit and disappeared for two hours!! She came home on her own, happy but exhausted!!


Since then the weather has deteriorated. Last weekend we had our first gales, which is really early in the season. We had a weather warning out from the Saturday night, with high winds and torrential rain until late Monday. We woke up on the Sunday morning to no electricity. It was off from 7.30am till 6.20pm. No ferries or planes could get out, as the weather was too rough, so the repairmen had to wait until it calmed down a bit, before they could get out to repair the break. Only ten houses were affected, but we thought it was the whole island. We had just hatched quail from the incubator and had one new one chick, so the woodburner was on high the whole day to keep them warm, whilst my husband and I went round in t-shirts, trying to cool down! The winds were between 55-60mph, so that was not bad. The wild geese are back early and eating the grain, which has still to be harvested. It is going to be a long winter!


Whilst the girls were here, we had our yearly horticultural show. They entered the visitors' section as usual, and the elder girl got three prizes for-
1. Making something from articles found on the beach (she thought the dried seaweed looked like reindeer antlers.)
2. Shellcraft

 3. Painting/drawing of a Sanday view. (The Wetlands)
Unfortunately the younger girl did not get anything. There were a large number of visitors this year, so the competition was fierce.

Hopefully we will get an Indian Summer later on in the year, but for now I am going to read, as it has been raining on and off all day!
Till next time,
tich