Day :: Seven

Great excitement here today because my DVDs have arrived at last!

If you have ordered one they will be in the post first thing tomorrow morning.

But until then, another taster of what's to come...

This clip is dedicated to Angela because despite all her best efforts to teach me, I still don't know how to use the needle threader on my machine!

Day :: Six

Towards the end of the summer I signed up for the creative sketchbook course with Linda and Laura Kemshall. I thought it would be a good complement to my degree work and keep me drawing and working in a sketchbook which is something I tend to let slip. The course is well designed and well written and the combination of workbook and videos make it easy to follow.

But despite my best intentions I never really got beyond the first few pages.

As you already know, I was struggling to keep up with the stuff I had to do, never mind the stuff I wanted to do, so the sketchbook was put aside... not quite forgotten but certainly ignored.

So it has been a real pleasure to be able pick it up again in the past week or so.

Progress is slow but I'm managing to work a little and often.

I've been given excellent support from my tutor Laura...

And more than a little encouragement from seeing the super work that Jill has produced.Who knows... I might even make it to the second module by January and get to work in colour!

Day :: Five

On Friday my friend Catherina and I ventured north, up the M6 to Birmingham to visit the exhibition Lost in Lace, held in the large architectural space that is Birmingham's Gas Hall. There was a nagging concern that driving 100 miles to see an exhibition could be a bit of an exhausting waste of a day but we were not disappointed. The work in the exhibition is stunning. Each installation is by a different artist and plays with ideas connected with the holes, spaces, boundaries and structures created by lace. The scale is what impresses first.

Elena Manferdini, Inverted Crystal Cathedral. 2011

On entering the hall, the visitor is greated by a huge inverted cathedral created from wire and crystal, stunning in both its scale and beauty. Around this centre piece are numerous other breath taking works such as the wall of lace created by Annie Bascoul, using traditional Alencon needlelace techniques but on a massive scale

Annie Bascoul, Moucharabieh +Jardin de lit, lit de jardin, 2010

Another favourite piece for me was a whole room filled with a network of black wool, trapping the ghostly dress forms within, sinister and menacing, almost like spider's webs.

Chiharu Shiota, After the Dream, 2011

There was so much to see, all of it interesting and thought provoking,  it would be difficult to pick a favourite but I was particularly drawn to the beautifully executed work of Piper Shepard. Inspired by traditional lace patterns she hand cuts fabric, painstakingly removing the negative spaces to create her own lace fabric. For this exhibition she had made large black hanging panels inspired by traditional point de gaze lace held in the collection of the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.

Piper Shepard, Lacing Space 2011 (detail, work in progress)

This exhibition alone would have been worth the journey but we also enjoyed the accompanying exhibition Concealed and Revealed featuring traditional lace from the Birmingham Museum's collection as well as exploring the lively German Christmas market in Birmingham's city centre. And then purely by chance, whilst grabbing a quick sandwich we bumped into a mutual friend, Ruth Issett which was a lovely surprise. All in all a fabulous day out and I can definitely recommend the exhibition if you get a chance.

Day :: Four

I think a lot of these advent posts might be about food.

For me the making and sharing of food with family and friends is something special and a mark of celebration. And Christmas is wonderful time for bringing friends together and sharing food.

Don't get me wrong... I hate the excess that can be associated with this time of year. It is a mystery to me why supermarkets have "seasonal" isles laden with tins of chocolates, barrels of biscuits, packets of nuts, crisps and other unecessary items. Why on earth we should need all these additional, extra large containers of food at a time when we already have plenty, much of which will go to waste... in our dustbins and on our waistlines... I will never understand. It feels obscene when so many in the world go hungry. But taking the time to cook something special to share with friends is a real pleasure for me.

And this pomegranate and clementine pavlova was the perfect example of food to share...

most of all because it meant we spent a lovely evening with some very special friends.

Day::Three

Ever since we've lived in this house my Mum has made us a garland for the door at Christmas time.

I don't usually start putting up decorations until mid-December but as she delivered this year's garland last weekend it seems a shame to keep it hidden from view in the garage.

I always think it makes the house look lovely and welcoming.

Thank you Mum!

***

For those of you who've sent cheques for a DVD I apologise. It would seem the date I was given for their arrival is a movable feast and I'm now being told they will be here within the week. The envelopes are ready and they will be posted out as soon as they are with me. It does mean the pre-release offer of £18  will remain in place for another week should anyone still be interested.

Day::Two

 I finally got around to decanting the sloe gin that I made x number of years ago. It has been lurking in a jar at the back of a dark cupboard for longer than I can remember

The colour and clarity aren't bad.

But I have to admit, although the flavour is okay it does leave a certain dryness in the mouth that is bordering on unpleasant!

But as I had already filled up these cute little bottles from Lakeland I figure they'll still end up in Christmas stockings. It'll be fine mixed with some tonic, ice and lemon!

Day :: One

Last year I set myself the ever so slightly bonkers task of a blogging advent calendar. Sheer madness at this time of year, yet when I look back over the 24 posts from December 2010 I am amazed at what I actually managed to achieve throughout the month. It was almost as if having to have something to write about each day made me get my backside in gear and get on with things... so I thought I might try to do the same this year... and then I thought don't be daft Gina... but I made the mistake of mentioning it in class today and someone said how they enjoyed reading a post each day in December (you know who you are!)... and so I thought why not! (I know... dozens of reasons why not but hey ho!)

Well, I'm willing to give it a try and I will start with an image of our advent calendar that I have probably posted each December that I've been blogging. No apologies for repetition, because for me this signals the start of Christmas. I sat up into the early hours of Nov 30th/Dec 1st finishing this appliqued calandar many years ago and it has graced our hall every year since. I love the slightly deranged looking angels.

My boys may be bigger, two of them are no longer at home but still the little bags get filled with chocolates and the countdown begins... and it's official... I am bonkers!!!