The First Swap

Our first swap took place at Regional Day on 21st May.  Six people took part but lots more came to look at the display which featured the cards to be swapped together with lots more cards made by Paula McEwan and Sheila Craig who have really worked hard to help get this swap off the ground.  Thank you both of you.

Seeing all the lovely examples has certainly got me inspired and I have several ATC's now on the go.  I will post some photos soon and hope lots of you are also busy stitching ready for next year.

Time to Swap

The date of the first swap is fast approaching - Saturday 21st May at the North East Regional Day.

It is not too late to join in if you have cards you would like to swap - just get in touch with me, Pat, before Friday 20th May and I will add you to the list.

If you don't want to take part this year but are coming to Regional Day then please come along and say hello, have a look at the cards and find out more about it for next year.

Another Member joins in

Paula McEwan has agreed to join our little group with cards to swap and has promised 10.  Here is a photo of some of them - I can't wait to see the rest.

Three new ATC's

I call them Dividemeup

I'm sorry about the flash distorting the colour. I painted some stiff interlining with acrylic paint then overlaid it with a piece of green 'tissue' which has gold threads running through. I then added small pieces of tissue, blue wrapping paper, painted bondaweb and a few scraps of a project I did a while ago (I never throw things away). The whole thing was covered with a soft gel medium and when dry a few lines of stitching added with a white backing added later. I made a mistake with the first one I did and tried stitching without bonding first. So small pieces of Bondaweb did the trick and kept the backing stable enough to stitch. This means I can write on the back of my ATCs.
Oh yes I forgot to say that I made two postcards at the same time. So from the same piece I work I now have two postcards and three ATCs.

Dividemeup postcards

Amended ATC

After looking at my ATCs I felt that they needed a bit more bling. So I added a small medallion made from Friendly Plastic.

Four ATCs

Well I've completed 4 ATCs. I was taught this technique of deconstructing and reconstructing fabric called Fractured Colour at an EG Summer School several years ago. I do love the technique. The fabric was white cotton coloured with painted Bondaweb.

Hello

Thank you to Pat for letting me post on this Blog. My name is Sheila and I am in the North Shields Branch of The Embroiderers' Guild although I live in Monkseaton.
This post is just to let you know that I have started my ATC project but I don't want to say too much about it - at the moment. However you can watch my progress on my other Blog Sheilasembroidery Rambles. To give you a taste - here is the project so far.

I'm looking forward to seeing more people join this group and seeing all the lovely ATCs we produce.

At Last....

A little while ago I promised to post a picture of my first ATC and finally here it is - plus two more!  It took me a while to get going but, as often happens, just starting is the hard part and once you get going you can't stop.

The first two are Winter Landscapes 1 & 2 - hopefully there will be some more - and the last is 'Sleepy Ewe'.  The top landscapes is a fabric made from silk cocoon strippings overlaid with painted bondaweb and some threads bonded on top with chain and whipped running stitch.  The second one has a painted bondaweb background overlaid with tyvek and chiffon with a variety of line stitches and couched threads. 

If you would like to join in but need some inspiration you might find this book useful

It arrived in my Christmas Stocking and is full of ideas and inspiration for ATC's as well as covering the basics of consructing a stitched ATC or postcard.  More details here

I hope to see some of your creations here soon.  They really don't take very long once you make a start and are a good way to try out different ideas.