Queen Victoria as Buddha

I was showing my portfolio of photographs to residents in a Nursing home today and no less than three of the women commented (independently of one another) that there was something about the face of the Buddha that put them in mind of Queen Victoria! I totally get it. And her white lacy headgear only adds to her resemblance to this Buddha-in-snow!

 

 

 

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2529294

new header for the blog!

A year ago I started freelance work providing creative reminiscence sessions for older people in different settings. Mainly these sessions involved rag rug making, but things have evolved during the last twelve months, and since I now offer lots more creative activities, tailoring sessions to the interests and needs of specific groups, it seemed time to dust down the header and change the wording! Yes I still offer rag rug workshops and rag rug reminiscence sessions (more news on the workshop front coming soon) but also a lot more besides. Contact me if you would like details!

So, 'home is where the heart is' - an empty platitude? I don't think so. In the context of Care Homes, how can we expect a person to feel 'at home' in any sense, if we don't know something of what's in their heart? I see creative activity enable people who live in Care Homes to express what's in their hearts, to themselves and each other. 'Home' may be experienced as the sense of feeling at home with oneself. Or it can be experienced as a tight physical sense of loss, that eases a little when shared. Home may be cherished from the distance of time and space, and become a comforting place when someone else helps by listening it into being...and crossing its threshold when invited.

Once, while being driven along a busy road, I suddenly recognized a resident's former home through remembering her drawing of it. To be honest, it wasn't so much the likeness that helped me recognize it, as the feeling in her drawing; of the relationship between her house and the garden. Difficult to describe, but only she could have drawn it.

stories from behind the lens and beyond the frame

ice and snow at Langford Common     ( photo by Sally Light)

 

 Very excited to receive the enlargements of my photographs through the post today and have already taken them to the framers to be mounted. This portfolio is for my next project working with older people and has been funded by a local charity. I've noted before, how looking at photographs can have an enlivening effect on the viewer, and is often particularly enjoyed by those whose physical mobility is challenged. I've noted too, how older generations relish opportunities to air critical opinions, and conjecture about the stories that might lie behind photographs. And that is what this project is going to be about: helping individuals to record their creative responses to this selection of visual images. I'm so looking forward to seeing what they see!

knitted bathing costumes in January

http://www.fab40s.co.uk/Ladiesswimwear.html

God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December.

James M. Barrie

 

(or knitted bathing costumes in January)!

 

Knitted bathing costumes, a ball dress turned into christening gowns, gravy painted legs and a dress fashioned from sock wool, were just some of the amazing images that sprang to peoples' minds when I visited members of the Honiton Memory Café today to talk about Making Do and Mending.

 

My sewing basket, actually a re-purposed picnic basket (and yes I did get some funny looks as I scurried down Honiton High Street on this cold and rainy January afternoon with a picnic hamper on my arm!) was full to the brim with sewing notions and samples of all kinds of stitching that I have collected from the 1930s, 40s and up to the present day. One woman likened it to a Mary Poppins bag, for it does seem bottomless, especially, I notice, when each item prompts so much recall and shared conversation. Today I didn't manage to reach the bottom of the basket, but that's a good thing! 



bird's nest of spun silk

 

I really enjoyed meeting members of the Retired Teachers' Group in Staplegrove, when I went to give a talk on the History and Art of Rag Rug making yesterday. Lots of great questions and also  memories of rug  making. I talked a bit about the use of hessian as a rag rug base and how important hessian has been locally. One woman said that her husband had worked for The West of England Sack Hiring Company. There is an fascinating account of the history of sack hiring businesses ('Sacks for Hire' by Reg Wilkinson with lots of reference to The West of England) here:

 

http://wantage-museum.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/Sacks-for-Hire.pdf

 

Today I visited Calway House in Taunton, to show people the contents of my sewing basket and talk about/invite memories of sewing and mending. One gentleman said that his Grandfather would buy a tangle of spoilt fibres known as a 'bird's nest' from one of the silk mills in Taunton for 6d. This nest of fibres he would carefully untangle, and the gentleman's Grandmother would use the silk to crochet fine doily mats. After the session, recalling how his Grandmother had shown him, he crocheted some chains with me, using my old button hook.

 

http://www.leopardantiques.com/object/stock/detail/233

 

 And from another  person, a tip from the wartime; of how to make the equivalent of strong 'elastic' bands, by cutting off the tops of stockings!

 

 

Nynehead Workshop with the Wellington W.I.

 

I don't know whether it was the glass roofed Orangery at Nynehead Court that effected a bit of a growth spurt, but members of Wellington W.I. who came along to my Hooked on Flowers workshop, cultivated some particularly spectacular blooms today...

Jan working on her second bloom

Karen's rose

Jan's flower
 

Sam's flower

 

What is always really exciting for a workshop leader, is to see people run with your ideas and take them to another level and this is what happened today; double layered shirring no less(!) and the inspired re-use of some pyjama's piped seams to great effect (see flower below). Several of the women commented that Rag Rugging is a 'forgiving' craft and seemed to enjoy the fact that this allows you to get straight down to the creative nitty gritty of getting a feel for the fabrics and seeing their potential with a new pair of (Rag Rug) eyes. One women said as she was leaving, that she was taking home a new passion, which made me feel so lucky to be doing what I'm doing - it's very rewarding.

 Annabel's flower in progress



 

All aboard for some narrow boat rag rugging!

Last weekend I did some Rag Rug sessions with 'Spirited Away' guests, during Float By Boat's 'October Off-grid' weekend. Fantastic fun - great company.

 

 

a florist's felted bloom

Don's proddy and dotty mini-rug

 

hand sewing the back of the corsage

 

Pete's petals

 

 

Nourishing food....

 

  

 

 

Also nourished by peaceful meditations afloat

 and gentle solitary walks along the towpath,

and an entertaining walk full of laughter,

 in the company of my cabin mate Sarah!

 

crab apples along the towpath

 

I never sleep so well as on board a narrow boat moored in the middle of nowhere!  

early morning mist on the canal

                                            

 I've come home with a new favourite poem too

 (Carol Ann Duffy's 'Prayer' read by Tor before an evening mediation).

Fetlocks and a Bishop's Mitre

While visiting a care home in Tiverton last week, to do a rag rug session, I met a woman with the spirit of adventure in her eyes. She told me that as a young girl she had swum around the Isle of Wight and how the shire horses on her parents farm would only allow her near their fetlocks when they needed cleaning, rather than the male farm workers.

Horse, Derbyshire Dales

As for the rag rug session, I don't know why, but my rugs seemed to induce much mirth! Several of us had tears in our eyes by the end of the afternoon. One woman thought my braided bag would make a splendid bishop's mitre and demonstrated, modelling it at a rakish angle.

flower show at CreaTIV!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Great group at the CreaTIV Hub this afternoon. Every one worked really hard and grew some amazing rag rug flowers. There was one moment when I asked people to hold up their first bloom to show everyone else, and I actually got goose bumps! It's so exciting seeing peoples' first creations and how everyone produces something completely different from the rag bag!

 

 

 

 

Took this snap at Taunton Flowers Show yesterday

Inspiration for rag rug flowers I reckon.