Monster...

Donna Wilson is one of my favourite Designers and for my birthday I received one of her 'Make your own Monster kits' which I was delighted with. Now my birthday was about 9 months ago...did I mention I had been busy...I just recently decided to take it out and turn it into a Monster.

One of the great things about these kits, and one of the reasons why I love Donna Wilson is that she provides you with a selection of scraps from her studio. Last bits of material, scrap bits of felts...better giving it a new life than just throwing it away plus it make each kit completely individual.

One of the pieces is pre-stitched into a Monster shape, you just have to trim it down turn it inside out then start playing around with ideas.

I decided to keep mine fairly simple and just played around with the felt pieces. I added a bit of stitching for detail and attached the majority of it together with gold old bond'a'web.

Once finished he was looking good but a little thin...in need of eating some stuffing (thankfully also provided).

All stuffed and stitched up he is finished, just needs a name...

That's a lot of paper work...

So I have been a bit rubbish at my blog again recently but I feel my excuse is valid. I spent the past year doing my PGCE which involved stress, tears and a lot of paper work (as you can see and this is not including the 2 huge bags full of paper I dropped off at the recycling bin!). The past year was very testing, there were moments when I was ready to admit defeat and quit it all and moments of great joy, pride and the feeling of...'man, I love this job'. I finished it all over a month ago now, I finished with an outstanding grade with masters, could not be more proud of myself! But most of all I finished really happy with my career choice, the past year was hard, really hard but it was definitely all worth it. I discovered how much I love teaching, I can not imagine doing anything else and lucky me managed to also get a job at an amazing school. I worked there for 3 weeks in July, got to meet all my new students and get a bit settled in before starting properly in September. Right now it's the summer holidays (big plus to being a teacher) which means I can finally relax a bit and hopefully get back to making stuff, although all I really want to do right now is make things for school to help the students...did I mention I love my job!

Loney London Bike #5...

Vulpine Cylcing Fete...

The lovely Nick and Emmalou of Vulpine put on a brilliant event celebrating the world of cycling and art as well as raising some money for charity. The very talented Andrew Mackie was invited along as he took the product shots for the Vulpine website. Having just launched his own website this was the perfect opportunity to show off some off his great work. 

Proud moment...Andrew's stall (however small it was) looked great and he received a lot of positive feedback, all in all it was a successful day! Big thank you to Andrew Tracey for the branding and printing and thank you to Katherine Harrison for the iPad loan!

Please check out Andrew's website: www.andymackie.co.uk

I had a massive Spaced nerd moment when Tyres (Michael Smiley) turned up, kitted out in full cycling gear! I was too embarrassed to go and say hello and by the time I finally plucked up the courage he was tucking into a hog roast, bit rude to interrupt really. So, I missed my chance but managed to take a sneaky picture!

As well as lots of lovely bike stuff there was some very talented creative types showcasing their great work. This illustration caught my eye from the moment I got there and lucky me managed to buy a print just before he ran out! 'Pigeon' is just one of a series of illustrations by the very talented Philip Deacon entitled 'things i've run into'.

Please check out his blog for more work: www.philiprints.blogspot.co.uk

Big thank you to the wonderful Vulpine!

www.vulpine.cc

Lonely London Bike #4 The Boris Edition...

Where'd everyone go?

Spring...

It's Spring, although you wouldn't think it with all the rain! But it is April I suppose...April showers and all that.

Bristles...

Sometime good things happen by accident...I was taking pictures in the workshop and put my camera down on one of the benches to rearrange something, when I went to pick it back up I noticed I had placed it right next to a brush. The image showing up on the screen looked pretty cool so I set my camera to macro, got really close in and took this picture.