Marigolds and Magpies

Quite surprisingly, I rate marigolds as one of my favourite flowers. Although the marigold has some rather negative connotations, developed in Victorian England, I like to concentrate on the happier, more positive meanings it has...

What do marigolds symbolize?

Commonly referred to as the 'herb of the sun', we associate the flowers' fiery yellow, orange, and red hues with the warmth, happiness, joy, optimism, and good luck. Yet, marigolds also symbolizes darker emotions such as jealousy, grief, despair, and mourning

(https://www.petalrepublic.com/marigold-flower-meaning/

In my recent exhibition "Enveloping , marigolds were featured a lot in my textile artworks, including a few of the "garden Threads" art dolls. I drew my inspiration from my own garden where marigolds have even found their way into my vegetable garden. The marigolds in the textile artworks above are appliqued and stitched.

I coupled these bright orange flowers with the highly contrasting magpies, created with fabric collage.

I have to admit that the magpies really became the star of the exhibition, and the marigolds did fade into the background.

One of the cheeky magpies even made celebrity status by being featured on the advertising material ( with the marigolds) ...

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Giveaway - Gifts for You on My Birthday

Giveaway Gifts T his week is blog giveaway time! Last week I celebrated my birthday. I’ve had far too many to count the candles, but I had a wonderful party on the weekend with my family - with an indulgent birthday cake, favourite foods cooked by my husband and great company. ( In case you were wondering about the writing on the cake , Por Por = Chinese grandmother) I also got great gifts from my family and friends. There seemed to be a bit of a theme this year – with many of my gifts and cards depicting matryshoka ( babushka) dolls and tea drinking. As it is also winter here in Australia , it was easy for me to decide what I could offer as gifts in this birthday giveaway. All the gifts are handmade by me. Gift 1 - two little fabric matryshoka dolls Gift 2- a little bag made from colourful teapot and teacup fabric . The design is called a jester bag, but it is suitable for carrying s...

Fish and Sticks : Art Dolls

This week I've been working on fish and sticks .... The sticks are the message stick art dolls which were very popular, attracting some attention and a few orders at the Wise Women exhibition. Each of the message stick dolls are from the Wise Women series, each with her own personality and message of wisdom, handwritten on a handmade timber tag. I gather the sticks during my walks around my neighbourhood and the tags are made from special bits of timber, some collected by me or my husband or from off cuts gifted to us from another doll making friend whose husband makes bagpipes. These dolls start off very simply with a wrap around a stick, in the general shape of a body. 'Naked" message stick dolls - strips of wadding wrapped around found sticks. Then I usually wrap other layers of fabric, wool, and/or fibres, over which I do some simple embroidery. I sculpt or mould small face masks for these dolls. I really like using "sari ribbon" as w...

Pink Ribbon Giveaway

Today, 26 October, is Pink Ribbon Day. We started the morning at the community centre with my Rotary club, the Rotary Club of Wallsend-Maryland, and cooked pink pancakes and bacon and eggs (their natural colour) at a fundraising breakfast for Breast Cancer Research. I also bought a couple of items of pink merchandise to support the cause. The pink ribbon and pen are part of this week’s blog giveaway. It’s a pink parcel – a pink fabric bag, made from a Laurel Burch print, a beautiful flower made by my mum, one of our Rotary club’s angels of hope and the pen and ribbon. There may be some other little pink surprises which I may add during the week. All you have to do to win this prize is leave a comment, either about Pink Ribbon Day or one of the photos in this blog post. I will put all the names in a container and draw one next Monday, 2 November, 9am Australian Eastern Summer Time. The photos are of things I’ve finished this week. The beaded doll was started ages ago, before I we...

Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

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