Goodbye to blogger for a while

I've finally decided to say goodbye to blogger for now. I've read blogs that end suddenly with a final entry years ago and no explanation, and I find that a bit creepy, so this is an explanation of why I'm not posting here at least for a while.
I just haven't had the urge to blog recently. I am doing more and more teaching which I'm really enjoying, also lots of music and morris dancing and creative stuff. I spend my online time answering emails, trying to get my website more together and I have a facebook page where I post images of booky stuff that I do

https://www.facebook.com/NinaFennerHandmadeBooks

I may come back here one day, but for now it's goodbye to those of you I've never met, and I look forward to seeing you in person to those who read this and who I see in real life.

Finally a few pictures from the last few months

just to show I've been having a lovely time...

Workshop with my local embroidery group

A dragon skin book!

Binding a commission for a friend

Pollen laden bumble bee

Sorting my button collection

A medieval-inspired book

Coptic binding

Knitted cafetiere cosy for a friend
(vince playing guitar in background)

That's all for now, have lots of fun x

Art Every Day? (well, most days)

I feel I've done lots of creative stuff, but I don't have pictures of all of it.

 Here is some of the stuff.

Printing cards with Mary this afternoon

A fun and productive card printing session

I made this book years ago

It's a circular book

Perfect for mandalas

I pencil my designs in first

Then draw them in with a marker pen

I'm off to a yoga retreat tomorrow for 3 days

It's at a place called the 'Mandala Yoga Ashram'

I thought I'd take this little book along

…and colour in my mandalas, when I'm not doing yoga!

I had my 50th birthday last week

With wonderful chocolate cake

And a walk on the beach (I'm easily pleased)

The week before a group of us made wreaths

This is me wearing my wreath,

and then symbolically casting it into the river

That evening a friend brought us a roadkill deer.
I gutted and skinned it
It was a weird contrast!

And this week my paintings will be hanging
in the corridors of the
Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital

I'll be back at the weekend, all yoga'd out.

A book of winter pleasures

I made about 5 of these as christmas presents a few years ago. I meant to make one for myself but had run out of enthusiasm by the time I'd made 5 of them! I was very pleased with them but they were quite time consuming. It would make a lovely workshop one day.
This is the one I made for my mum, she gets it out every autumn and has it on display over the winter then puts it away in the spring. Posting this makes me realise how lucky I am to have a mum who appreciates my creations.
One page isn't shown which has a silhouette of a pair of feet and says 'putting your feet up in front of a fire'

The patterns of fallen leaves

The silhouettes of trees

Looking forward to snowdrops

"Things to enjoy in winter"

My "Scraps" book in progress

I've been spending more time filling books than making them recently. This one is my "scraps" book. Actually it should be called my 'precious scraps' book because most of these scraps are from particular places, people or events, or are images that remind me of such. Some of these scraps I have had for years, some are from a few days ago. There is a sketch dated 2010, and some pieces I know I've had since art college days over 10 years ago, and a bus ticket from last week. I love doing this book, I could sit and do it all day, but life keeps getting in the way. I hope I finish it before I get obsessed with something else!

After several unsuccessful attempts I managed to do this flip through of it. The book isn't finished, but I like the fact that you can see pages in all stages from finished to barely started. There's a funny bit at the end where I'm scowling at the laptop trying to work out how to stop it. I could have edited this out, but I like those quirky 'I'm not perfect' moments!
Clicking on this image should run a you tube video.

The book contains some of the following:
photos (mine and other peoples), pages from books that I've taken apart, bits from colouring books, sketches I've done, notes, bus tickets, my decorated paper scraps, and others scraps from workshops I've run, paint, songs from wedding and other ceremonies, bits of cloth, a few images from the internet, napkin scraps, magazine and newspaper clippings, photocopies of book pages, stamped and punched scraps.

A Commission

I have done a few commissions in the past, some I have enjoyed doing, some I have not.
Laura Denning who I met a few months ago emailed me to ask if I would bind some work for her. I waited two weeks before replying, half hoping she would have found someone else, but saying that yes, I was prepared to consider doing it. She brought the work round and we discussed options. I have learnt not to offer people too many options! A technique and price was agreed upon and I have to say I enjoyed the process and was really happy with the finished books and so was my customer.
They were two books of sun prints, both covered in sun print paper. They looked so lovely when they were finished that I am inspired to make some books like this with my own decorated papers.

stitching

stitched

spines glued with some very well matched cloth
as I realised it would show between some of the sections

covers made

cover detail

outside

inside ...  beautiful

spine detail

Happy customer, happy me

Here is her website with information about the exhibition at Dartington Hall

http://lauradenningartworks.weebly.com/index.html

New books in my new workspace

 My work room back in action, still got some furniture painting to do... not yet though..

I've been playing with new book structures with a view to teaching workshops and creating some book art.
Little books that fit in matchboxes

Matchbox book

A bit of printing with some handmade stamps. I stuck bits of foam onto slices of wood with double sided tape, they work really well.

 And some wierd and wonderful folded book ideas

Lotus fold books

I was asked to teach this lovely book structure a month or so ago, and I'm glad I was. I've taught it to a couple of groups already now, but I haven't actually made many of them myself yet, so I thought I ought to get on and have a play.

 I call them lotus fold books because they are made up of a series of pieces of paper folded into a simple origami type shape that looks a little like a lotus flower. Depending on how you stick them together you can get a variety of different books.

 I was experimenting with different colours and combinations and came up with some weird and wonderful shapes. They almost need a video to fully appreciate them, they are very beautiful when they open up.

I haven't put anything in any of them yet, but I think they would be lovely with little quotes or inspiring images.
I also picked up a pile of miscellaneous paper doilys from a charity shop because I can't resist anything vaguely stationary-like, and I've folded up a couple to make into another one of these books. Should look pretty amazing!
My next book project is to sew some more coptic books as I'd like to teach these too, and I haven't made any for ages. Here's a close up of a coptic stitched book. Pretty isn't it?