Merry-Go-Round - Tutorial

Jump on our merry go round and join a group of artists/crafts-women from around the world as they link hands and tell you a little bit about their lives in craft.

Do look up the answers from the rest of this band of crafters (links to your left).

If they haven't all posted yet, remember we all live in different time zones and check again later...

This month:

A simple tutorial

A few photos to show you how, with just a piece of wire and a piece of salvaged thread or fabric, you can create a colourful butterfly or dragonfly, using the technique of macrame knotting.

Here are a few pieces of salvaged ribbon or thread among which I take my pick.
And here is the kind of brass wire (controlled closely as you can see) you can find in any hardware store. I also use copper. Silver or aluminium would do just as well.
I cut a pice (22 cm / 8.5 in. in this case).
I bend it like this:
then I make a plain knot at what will be the tail end of my butterfly and start the macrame as you can see. One way:
the other way:
until I have enough to create the abdomen.

Then I loosen one of the knots to create the small pair of wings:
Then I knot one more tight knot:
And then another loose knot, for the larger pair of wings, followed by a couple of tight knots for the head:
A little whirl at both ends of the wire, for the antennae:

Pretty psychedelic, isn't it? I think it would do a nice brooch...

With a longer piece of blue cord and copper wire, I created this necklace with what looks more like a dragonfly:

There are as many variations as the kinds of thread or ribbon you can use...

Meet Miss G.

She doesn't have a name yet but it is supposed to begin with a G...

L'Ecole du Chat de Bordeaux

C'est gâce à cette association que j'ai pu adopter Mimi il y a presque six ans.

Si seulement j'avais une voiture (et un jardin !) je lui aurais volontiers adopté une petite compagnie...

Merci de faire parler de cette association :

Vous pouvez aider en diffusant cette affiche, en adoptant, en faisant un don, en donnant de votre temps... ou même en vous achetant un porte-clef ou des cartes postales !

Merci d'avance !

Merry-Go-Round - Since you started blogging has your blogging changed?

Jump on our merry go round and join a group of artists/crafts-women from around the world as they link hands and tell you a little bit about their lives in craft.

Do look up the answers from the rest of this band of crafters (links to your left).

If they haven't all posted yet, remember we all live in different time zones and check again later...

This month:

Since you started blogging has your style/content/feeling about blogging changed?

Well, I'm really not sure.

My blogging has remained generally scant and irregular.

There is that vicious circle: I blog little because I never get feedback except from the merry-goers and there is no feedback because, I guess, I don't blog often enough for people to want to check my blog...

I liked the idea of writing, but making my blog bilingual proved to be too time-consuming. So I blog mainly in English now because it makes more sense with what the blog is about. But that means most of my French friends can't read it...

Other than this, the main changes I can think of are, first, that I tend to write less and rely on photos more, but mostly that I post on my Facebok page more often....

Add to that the facts that my blog posts don't go up automatically on my Facebook page anymore, for a reason that remains totally mysterious to me and that my recent computer problem (most recent one only half useable— reliable one really, really slow...) make it even more difficult and slower to do anything at all.

It still might be that my iPhone is going to change my blogging radically when I've finally gotten the knack of Mail2blogger.... So watch this space!

:)

1,2,3 : test

I've been trying to find an iPhone app to blog here. I finally found one that actually allows me to log in, but it doesn't do photos... I'd be grateful for a tip about an app that works on both iPhone 4 and blogspot... En quête d'une app pour bloguer ici (sur blogspot, donc) depuis mon iPhone, j'en ai enfin trouvé une qui me permet de me connecter sur mon compte, mais elle ne prends pas les photos en charge... Tout tuyau serait bienvenu...

History on the go

Last April, strolling along a street in Paris, I found myself reading this plaque:

"En ce bâtiment,

jadis Hôtel d'York,

le 3 septembre 1783,

David HARTLEY,

au nom du Roi d'Angleterre,

Benjamin FRANKLIN,

John JAY, John ADAMS,

au nom des Etats Unis d'Amérique,

ont signé le Traité Définitif de Paix

reconnaissant l'indépendance

des Etats-Unis"

(In this building,

which used to be the Hôtel d'York,

on September 3rd, 1783,

David HARTLEY,

on behalf of the King of England,

Benjamin FRANKLIN,

John JAY & John ADAMS,

on behalf of the United States of America,

signed the Final Peace Treaty

which sanctioned the independence

of the United-States)

I had never heard of this place and didn't remember ever learning that date... One of the things I still love about Paris (together with all my friends there ^.^) is that can still still be surprised by history just around the corner.

Thanks to my lovely iPhone, I was able to take couple of photos and edit one into this shining example of a monument to democracy in the making.

Right now, the edited version is for sale on a sturdy tote bag in both my shops, but I can also provide a quality print of it on a variety of materials (glossy, mat, canvas) and in various sizes up to A4, in this "highlighted" version or in the original version. Either would look great on any wall— a bit of a Paris wall on your own wall...