Stitched paper grids

Haven't had time to do much since I started my new job. A few weeks ago inspired by one of Gwen Hedley's books I had a go at stitching a grid on a paper serviette. This is one quarter of one. I machined a random grid and put a few rows of machine pattern in for good measure.

When done I dunked it in a small bowl of warm water and the serviette paper washed away easily. There were clumps of pulp in the bottom of the bowl which I reapplied to the piece in a few places to add more texture.

I like the finished effect but I haven't had time to do anything further with it and incorporate it into a more layered piece.

I have had time to make a few Christmas cards for my family. This one uses quilled closed and open shapes plus some fringed pegs for the snow crystals. I just used ordinary printer paper cut to size on the paper trimmer and stuck them to a metallic blue card blank. It was quite fiddly!

Here is a bit of a retro looking one. All the light bulbs use a whole length of quilling paper. For the flex I wrapped a length of black quilling paper around a long wire - I found a kebab stick was not thin enough. For the rings that join the bulbs to the flex I wrapped black paper around the fat end of the quilling tool a few times and then squashed them into shape with my nail.

The blue tag and sentiment were free with a craft magazine! All mounted onto red striped paper on a red metallic card blank.

Finally I made a birthday card today for my friend's teenage daughter. She likes baking so I chose a cupcake theme. The pocket on the card is made out of a 16cm square of double sided paper. Fold the square diagonally in half with the fold horizontally across the bottom. Then fold each point up to touch the opposite edge of the triangle so that the upper edge of the folded piece is horizontal. Then fold the upper flap down to make the pocket. I made a mini tag to go in the pocket and mounted the whole thing on foam pads on a polka dot covered card blank.

This is another thing I have been doing with serviettes. I got this from the latest Kirstie Allsop series and amazed a waitress in the restaurant where we had our work's Christmas meal by producing one of these for her - didn't get us any freebies though!

To make it open out a serviette and fold each corner neatly into the centre to make a smaller square. Do this 2 more times folding in to the centre on the same side as before. Then turn over and fold the corners to the centre a 4th time. The carefully pull the top flaps on the back round to the front, squashing the corner in with your thumb. Don't pull round fully as it tends to lose its shape. Then gently pull the next layer of flaps round to the front and finally fold the last layer of flaps round to form the outer row of petals/leaves. Be careful not to tear the paper on this single layer. Tease into shape and put on the centre of your poshest dinner plates to wow your guests!

Finally as part of my induction course for the new job working for Carnival UK, we went on board the Oriana P&O ship. Didn't expect to find any textile interest there but I was wrong. Here is part of a large number of panels decorating the White Room - the Marco Pierre White restaurant on board. I am grateful for a reader of this blog who has identified it as a series of 6 large panels by Alice Kettle commissioned in 1994-5 called Glimpses of India.