Guys, Thank you all for your kind words about my Mum's two doll's houses. We are spending time with my parents late Feb for Mum's 80th so I will drag out all the lace she has, including the miniatures, and photograph them all. If you are looking for some inspiration for miniatures then alot of the furniture that Dad made was from X-Acto kits - everything precut, you assemble with PVA glue, sand, stain, wax and add the fixings that are included in the kit. If you can find them they are very easy to follow. For the lace work I used both Roz Snowden's books (very inspirational) but also, I found that some of the minature sample pieces in Pam Nottingham's buck point technique book that were intended for use as piece in a broach - they were very easy to make by using Bridget Cook's Practical Skills in Bobbin Lace as a reference point for starting and finishing the pieces. And look at one of them over Xmas I was amazed that I had to look twice to see where I'd started. What I have found with minature lace is that using good quality silk makes a big difference. I had first toyed with using silk when I bought a piece of antique lace for Mum in Amersham. It was Edwardian Beds and was made in silk so that seemed period enough for me to start off researching. Cottons when working on fine pieces seemed too thick and I was concerned that the closeness of the work might cause rubbing of the thread and potentially breakages. Once I had bought a selection of threads from Piper Silks (who else!!) I was hooked and the final pieces looked as though they had been made contemporarily to the Doll's house's period. Dad stopped making pieces for the Doll's House in 2001 when he lost the sight in one eye due to macular degeneration. Six months later, he lost the sight in the other eye to the same cause. As you can imagine, for someone who had painted models to the standard that you saw on the page (the mounted Drummer is now in the Einsikillen Regimental Museum as a gift from my father) it was extremely difficult for him to adjust. We took the opportunity to do things that he had put off for years - Eurostar to Paris to see Napoleon's tomb, the lake district, Eden Project - we travel to big things that he can see (this year Waterloo and the TinTin museum). But with my mother's help, he built Winsor Castle to show off his Britains' models. Mum and Dad now sit together and Mum reads to Dad things that he is interested in ... and my mother is now a great expert on German Fighter Aces of WWII, the British Postal System, Greek Battles of WWII .... it is rather strange as she buys my husband and my father the same books. Then she sits in my house discussing the number of kills of different German Fighter Aces. She was also rather good at Duxford where she was starting to recognise planes and impressed a couple of American Vets with her knowledge. Maybe we could get her on Mastermind next. Macular degeneration has robbed my father of his sight and because during my childhood my father was increasing ill with managable health only really in the past 15 years there were many things we never got to do together. But his ill health gave my father the time to paint and make things. His lost of sight has allowed us to do things together that we never had the chance to. Strange how things go. I have realised that there is no such thing as a disability - in the words of one of the UK charities - I don't see disabilty, what I see is abilty. My challenge now that I have decided to accept is to see just how accessible I can make lacemaking in the UK. L
Kind Regards Liz Baker thelace...@btinternet.com My chronicle of my bobbins can be found at my website: http://thelacebee.weebly.com/ - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: http://community.webshots.com/user/arachne2003/albums/most-recent
