Sunday Sevens – a Rocky Week

On October 20, 2019October 17, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn Sketching, Sunday Sevens13 Comments

Rather than bore you with yet another week’s worth of wet damp pictures, I thought I’d share seven (or so) photos of sketching. I’m a little behind on blogging about it, so I’m starting from when I’d just drawn a fuchsia I was pretty pleased with.

Several people have said to me draw what you love/what you want to draw. This has led to me returning from dog walks like a five year old boy with pockets full of forest treasure. The first forest find I decided to draw was a sycamore leaf that had managed to find a dry ledge amid all the rain…

Reasonably happy with this, the next day I tried to draw a feather…

Unimpressed with my effort I consoled myself by immediately drawing some imaginary rocks…

Rocks

I was happier with these, but drawing from imagination was not improving my skill of observing and drawing what I saw. So next day I decided to copy a photo of a Dartmoor wall.

Having taken quite some time to draw all the stones, I began to shade them and realised it was going to take me all day to finish. I’ve therefore been shading one or two a day since. It’s very soothing, but I may be a while finishing.

Next day I drew another of my forest finds…

This was hard. Sooooo much detail!

After that I allowed myself to get a bit distracted by trees – more about that another day – but a couple of days later, feeling rather tired, I decided to draw the biggest rock I’ve ever seen, thinking it was pretty easy as it was only a circle and a bit of shading…

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Wrong!

In my mind’s eye a full moon was a silvery circle with a couple of smudges top right and a fuzzier big smudge to the left. Once I paid proper attention I realise there was far more detail than I thought. So I had a quick google to find out what all those smudges and blotches on the moon are…

20191010_181914 Knowing what, area is which ocean etc made it much easier to draw. (It might also come on handy for pub quizzes.)

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A couple of days later I had another go…

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After that I gave rocks a rest. Although I’ll keep shading my wall and plan to have another go at sketching the moon and more forest rocks in a while.

And finally, if anyone local can recommend a good drawing course/workshop(s) I’d be very grateful. If you live very local, I have considered the art group in the village and will have an enquire there as everyone has been complimentary about the tutor, but some say I might be better off elsewhere for sketching – so wondering if anyone has any other suggestions. After all, I don’t just have to stick to one group.

Until next time,

Bekki x

Dartmoor Snowflake Mitts Pattern

On October 17, 2019October 17, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn christmas knitting, Christmas knitting patterns, Knitting, Knitting patterns, Patterns14 Comments

On Tuesday I told you about a pattern I wrote up and forgot to publish. Publishing that pattern has reminded me about something else I’d completely forgotten. So today’s post is a near exact opposite story to Tuesday’s, because last Christmas I not only knitted Tilda for Lovely Littlest, I also knitted a pair of mitts for Lovely Eldest… Dartmoor Snowflake Fingerless Mitts - Bekki Hill The Dartmoor Yarn Company

I wrote up the pattern and published it in January. (Yes, I know that’s shockingly quick for me.) However, for some reason I never told you I’d knitted them or that there was a pattern for them. Here’s the link for the pattern if you’re interested.

Dartmoor Snowflake Fingerless Mitts - Back

Hope you like them.

Until next time,

Bekki x

Scrap Happy Christmas – Tilda the Christmas Fairy

On October 15, 2019October 14, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn Christmas, christmas knitting, Christmas knitting patterns, Knitting, Knitting patterns, Scrap Happy28 Comments

Last Christmas I use left over scraps of yarn to knit Lovely Youngest a Christmas fairy for a bit of a joke. However I was rather pleased with her and decided to write up the pattern. But having nearly finished, I got distracted and forgot about it – Yes, I know, you’ve heard that before.

Fast forward to a week ago when I was nearing the end of my current knitting project and decided to start writing up the pattern.

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As I headed to my pattern folder, I happened upon several half written patterns. Looking through them I noticed that Tilda the Christmas Fairy only needed a few finishing touches.

So not only here is Tilda the Christmas Fairy knitted from scraps of double knitting. (The biggest scrap was about 20g of red for the body, legs and arms. The rest much smaller scraps and the dress and berries is a different red yarn.)

Tilda the Christmas Fairy - Copy

… here’s the pattern.

And while I’m here I’ll confess the kitting one Santa sack a day I mention in my last month’s Scrap Happy has got rather abandoned. Blame the sketching.

If you like the idea of using your scraps, click on Kate or Gun(first two names in the list below) and join us on the 15th of every month – or just those months you feel like joining in. Here’s a list of both frequent and occasional Scraphappiers (?) if you want to see what everybody else is doing.

Kate, Gun, Titti, Heléne, Eva, Sue, Nanette, Lynn , Lynda,
Birthe, Turid, Susan, Cathy, Debbierose, Tracy, Jill, Claire, Jan, Karen,
Moira, Sandra, Linda, Chris, Nancy, Alys, Kerry, Claire, Jean, Johanna,
Joanne, Jon, Hayley, Dawn, Gwen, Connie, Bekki, Pauline and Sue L.

Sunday Sevens 2019 #29

On October 13, 2019October 12, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn Sunday Sevens11 Comments

Welcome to my Sunday Sevens – a post where I share seven (or so) photos of my week away from the blog.

It’s been another wet week of near non-stop rain …

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Our usual dog walking paths had already turned into rivers – but this week made then flow ever fast…

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…and paths that had been passable last week had turned into ponds…

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It was definitely a week to stay in and do some work – although I did try a a little avoidance by tidying my ribbon box…

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Being mostly stuck inside meant I finally remembered to start off my damson vodka…

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Of course a little bit of rain didn’t stop me and Harry going for walks…

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And in non-rain related events, Lovely Husband took some stuff to the charity shop and returned with a small gift he found on the book shelves…

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Not sure what I’m going to write in here. Any suggestions?

Until next time,

Bekki

WIP Catch up

On October 10, 2019October 9, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn Crochet, Embroidery, Knitting, Work in progress8 Comments

Just in case my blog is beginning look as if all I’m ever going to subject you to in future is bad sketching and strange looking machine scribbles, I thought I’d better do a quick WIP catch up…

My red sweater is still on the go. Not much progress since last time – too distracted by every other craft. All I’ve done is finish the wrapped pattern and add some ribbing to the top.

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I’m currently contemplating how to edge the top – since casting straight off from the rib is going to create a rather unsightly seam – or rather I keep meaning to contemplate it.

My other knitting WIP – a tea cosy for my friend – has come to a complete standstill. I really should finish it, so little left to do…

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I’ve completed two more squares of my crochet blanket – 12 down, 8 to go.

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I’ve started an embroidery, which was supposed to be a quick project, but I keep sitting down too late in the evening to concentrate on it.

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I’ve already sold out/sent out all of the free motion embroidery cards I made, so I’ve made a huge batch more. The fronts are currently waiting to be stuck to the cards.

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There is also pair of PJ bottoms wafting around somewhere almost finished.

As you can see I’m almost keeping to my promise of not to having more than one project of each type on the go at once – although not making huge progress on any.

Until next time,

Bekki x

Free Motion Embroidery – Shading

On October 8, 2019October 7, 2019 By Dartmoor YarnsIn free motion embroidery, Sewing18 Comments

In my attempt to learn to draw I’ve been watching a lot of YouTube tutorials. Since I’m learning to draw to eventually create images on fabric, I thought I’d try applying some of what I’d learnt about shading to create a 3 dimensional appearance to free motion embroidery.

I started by exploring shading a ball as when I’d drawn one previously

My first attempt was spreading the ‘shading’ lines out further and further the more I moved across the fabric (unnumbered images bottom right). This created more of a cylinder than a ball – even when I used a thread that was closer in value to the fabric.

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I then tried a thread version of cross hatching (1). This was a little better, but certainly not good enough.

The ‘ball’ top left is worked in a variegated thread. Although the ball is unconvincing, it inspired me to sew in patches of each colour as the tread changed (3). I thought this might be a good effect for sky or water. Does anyone have any other ideas of anything it might be useful for?

I would have liked to try shading the ball using several slightly different shades of a single colour of thread. However, since I didn’t have any that were very close in colour, I did my best at making a patch of shading with the closest set of 4 I had – (5) below.

I also played with other techniques used in drawing that might give a 3 dimensional effect….

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(1) and (2) are basically curly scribbling. I’m thinking these might be good for curly fur, wool on sheep, bushes or leaves on distant trees. Any other offers?

For (3) I did curly scribbling, but tried not to let any circle overlap the other. Apart from maybe more curly fur, I’m not sure what I’d use it for. Any ideas?

(4) is my thread version of cross hatching. If I turn it 90 degrees it reminds me a bit of seaweed!

I’d love to know if you’ve thoughts of any other ways I could machine embroider to build texture/give the impression of an object being 3D.

Until next time,

Bekki x