further adventures in anamorphic art...

so I didn't get the distortion quite right and the shadow is way too dark, but not bad for a first attempt...

...plus playing around with effects in photoshop to see if I can get some hints for getting it better next time....

Granny's blanket (WIP) - getting there ;-)

getting things in perspective - anamorphic art (WIP)

I'm a little bit lottle bit fascinated by anamorphic art at the moment -  Street art and optical illusions both tick the right boxes with me, so rolling them into one can't miss really!
Julian Beaver (see vid below) is probably one of the best, and best known, artists doing this sort of thing...

...then the other day I saw this video...

...and got quite excited by the distorted images that they were working from and I'm starting to understand how it works a bit better now.

There is an instructable here that shows you how to manipulate an image using a computer, but I'm a bit old school when it comes to art and I'm much happier with a pen, pencil or brush in my hand than a mouse, so I drew out some grids myself and made a start...

 ...needs a lot more shading yet, but hopefully you can see how it works...

Granny's blanket (WIP)

Inspired by this lovely lady and her wonderful granny blanket I decided to crack on with the blanket I'm making for my Gran today...

The flower in the middle was originally intended for my Leap Year Blanket, but it's quite bulky compared to my other squares so I thought it would make for a nice centre piece for this instead.
I'm only aiming for lap blanket sort of size, but it's still got a way to go yet!

Hoping to get another few rounds done this evening and tomorrow :)

my new favourite square...

prep

in empty places, dragons grow...

in empty places, dragons grow...

a story without words ...

"On the next page is the story I created at Corinthian Avenue. It's an empty page, no words at all. It's like Steepy's back, waiting for tattoos. It's like an empty sky waiting for a bird to cross it. It's as silent as an egg waiting for the chick to hatch. It's like the universe before time began. It is like the future waiting to become the present. Look at it closely, and it can be filled with memories, with dramas, with dreams, with visions. It's filled with possibilities , so it isn't really blank at all."

from My Name is Mina by David Almond

filling in my tax return...

...this is what focusing on filling in my tax return, preparing for a batik workshop, tidying my house and not allowing myself to get distracted looks like....

...attention span of a....

;-)

A break from crochet...

...not me...I am officially addicted to it now ;-) but I thought I'd share something a bit different here today in the form of a couple of blogs I enjoy and find inspiring and retreat to when the outside world is less so...

UPCYCLIST

and

COLOSSAL

check them out

you won't be disappointed

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sad foot, happy foot and why crochet is winning hands (and feet) down over knitting

sad foot :-(

 happy foot :-D

Despite learning to knit when I was quite young, I've never really got beyond the basics - I can cast on and cast off, do plain and purl stitches and can do stocking stitch with them, but unfortunately not ribbing as I get in a tangle with which side the yarn is supposed to be and when, and I can increase and decrease - but I can't decipher knitting patterns (they send me into a similar state of panic as 'filling in forms' does!) and I hold the needles really awkwardly (I'm one of these that has to put a needle down between stitches) which makes for quite slow progress and cramping fingers/hands so that I can't knit for very long at a time. And other than stripes (although I do like stripes), patterns are pretty much beyond me. When my son was younger, I did knit him a few hoodies and jumpers, but the bigger he got the more completely impractical it got because he would be grown out of something before I ever got around to finishing it!

The idea of knitting a sock (or a pair of them even!) is not something I would contemplate, but having got my head round the basic crochet stitches, and persevered with the reading the patterns thing, I downloaded this pattern from Ravelry and had a go. I struggled a bit with the instructions for the heel, but the rest of it was pretty straightforward and what not knitting with patterns has at least taught me, is how to improvise and play around with stuff until it looks 'right' at least.

Once it 'clicks', crochet is just so very much quicker than knitting and so much easier to do patterns with that would be far more complicated to knit.

Still loving it, and if you're just learning, stick with it - the results are well worth it.

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...should probably go and make another sock before my other foot gets cold ;-)

Doodling in Math Class

A friend sent me a link to this cool video on youtube...

Which reminds me that my son asked me a while ago to show him how to draw Celtic knotwork designs so guess what we're doing tomorrow ;-)

Finished!!

Although I think it would look better with a darker cushion pad inside it, but otherwise pretty pleased with it
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growing some more...

growing...

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can you tell what it is yet...

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spiral

Leap Year Blanket...

Having gone for the total immersion method of learning to crochet I have a few more than eight squares already, but I'm quite sure there will be days I don't get any done too ;-)

If you fancy doing a leap year blanket yourself, there's a lovely facebook group 

>>>here<<<

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I'll stop boring you with crochet pictures soon but...

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learning how to follow a pattern...

..that doesn't have any pictures to guide me...

...and how to make it up when I can't ;-)

flower for my Granny

Logomania

being inspired by Chen Hangfeng's exhibition

hooked

no doodling or skoodling today because I FINALLY got my head round crochet!! ;o)
which made me very smiley because on the very many previous attempts to do this, my brain and fingers have declared war on myself and each other and I've got absolutely nowhere

I even managed eventually to understand some instructions for granny squares this afternoon... as a small child I had a multi coloured granny square blanket crocheted by our next door neighbour... granny squares remind me of her and of her concertina pantry door, and eating peas from their pods, and waffles in the morning on the way home from taking my sister to school :)
looking forward to getting some new yarn tomorrow that isn't so very chunky and so very bright red
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these are a couple of sites that I found helpful
Learn2knit.co.uk
How to crochet
but I have to say I probably looked at at least 173 more to work out the granny squares ;-)