We had a very sociable evening making items to sell at our Exhibition Which is happening on 28th June 2025. Among other things we made key rings, name badges, needle books. Pictures below just capture a little flavour of our work on the evening.

We also held the monthly raffle with yellow as this month’s colour. The bags are pictured below: the very vibrant large bag completed by Jayne and the delicate hand stitched bag completed by Hel. Meriel is also hosting a making day at her home on Friday 23rd May 2025, when some members will add to the items that will be on sale, including tote bags and cards. Members will also be hard at work at home completing other projects.

We have a busy time ahead and lots of members have already signed up to help at various points. Some of us will also meet on 31st May for a workshop. The next meeting will be on Monday 9th June, 2025 a talk from Hannah Glossop entitled Luminous Depths which sounds very intriguing. The raffle bag colour is Blue/Turquoise please bring contributions and don’t forget for members there is a lot more information about what is ahead and what part you can play on the notices sent out by Meriel.

We had the pleasure of hearing Bernice talk about her work and inspirations. She likes to use neutral and pastel colour palettes and for that pallet to be limited. Bernice has developed themes for her practice over several years and as a local artist has been inspired among other things by walks along the canal network. She has collected hundreds of photographs of canals and aqueducts. She has also developed work based on maps, this work was inspired by workshops at Little Heath Barn, a wonderful local resource that many of us have benefited from. Breakdown printing is often used in her work and she also cuts up pieces and recombines them as shown below.

Bernice uses workbooks to record her work and the work books and the work itself feed off each other. She makes fabric books and sometimes uses hanging books. She has used painting and procion dye and has a large collection of stencils and has also played with the top layer of serviettes with gel medium over the top. When she had an accident to her hand she also used photographs printed onto fabric when she couldn’t stitch she has also used machine preset stitches.

Bernice is running a workshop for out group Making Fabric Tiles with Venice as the inspiration Thermofax screens will be used as part of the process examples of what we might make are shown below. Given her fascinating talk the workshop should be very rewarding.

We also held our raffle with a large very cute bag from Janet M. And a beautifully stitched bag from Marion H.

We have a busy time ahead with our exhibition and farmers market stall in the summer, and with the book spine project for the exhibition. Our summer competition will be ‘Vintage with a Twist’. Our next meeting on 12th May will be activity based, making things to sell for the exhibition. The raffle bag colour next month is green.

Marion’s workshop was very enjoyable and allowed all of the participants to really engage with the process of making their own bag with some finished pieces and other works in progress at the end. All of us learnt new skills and all had a chance to use their own creativity, with both machine and hand stitching. Marion was a supportive and informative workshop leader. Some work in progress is shown below.

At the end of the workshop we had a show and tell when we all shared our work at the end of the day some of which is shown below.

We enjoyed a fun, well led and well organised activity session. Rowan introduced cold water dying and Jayne colour from flowers, the latter held in the foyer as it is a noisy process involving hammers. Both allowed everyone to complete each process and take home finished articles.

Pictured below is Rowan’s workshop showing it being prepared and in progress and some finished items. What we produced can be used as the basis of stitching in our own time.

Pictures from Jaynes work shop are shown below, again they can be used as the basis for future projects. Both workshops allowed us to have fun learn something new and chat and enjoy each others company.

We also held our usual raffle, the colour was orange this time and the two beautifully stitched bags are shown below, both so effective. The large bag was completed by Meriel the smaller bag by Clare. Next months raffle is yellow.

The next meeting will feature a talk from Bernice Hopper entitled Pathways and Towpaths. Bernice is then leading a workshop on 31st May 2025, making multimedia tiles. The next workshop is before then on 29th March 2025, making Japanese draw string bags led by Marion Plumb. We were reminded to complete our book spines celebrating our favourite books. Some examples are shown below.

Members were welcomed back with very enjoyable presentations from two of our members Janette and Rowan. What a great start to the New Year, both were interesting and inspiring and we got to see much of their work. A real treat.

Janette began by telling us that her major inspiration for her stitching is other people. She has been particularly supported and inspired by BETA members and events. Growing up she had stitch inspirations from her family, her grandmother who was a very skilled knitter and her mother a dressmaker who took up embroidery when she retired and from her sister an accomplished quilter. She sometimes felt she didn’t match up, although she did hold on to her first piece of stitching of a dog pictured below. Janette continued to do occasional stitching and was then introduced to BETA at a sit and stitch session at the library. She was encouraged by Anne Haigh to come to BETA meetings and was also encouraged over time by Margaret Richard’s with her inspiring mantra “yes you can”. She cited other inspirational members including Angelas black work, Meriel’s landscapes and Betty Rourke. She has also participated in Travelling books and her latest contribution is shown below

Janette has continued to enjoy cross stitch and a love of pattern and enjoyed a shashiko workshop and Anne’s cross stitching workshop. She also enjoyed a workshop with Betty using a soldiering iron on felt to make bark pictures. Also pictured below are the tags she completed inspired by Anne Brooks. She has been inspired by online work including on U Tube – Roxy sisters and Corinne. Like several BETA members she has attended Little Health Barn where she made the lovely Angel shown below she completed ecodyeing at our most recent West hope weekend.

Rowan also had inspirations in her family, including a great grandmother whose house she grew up in. From an early age Rowan was cutting out hexagons for her grandmother, paper templates at first then graduating onto the fabric itself. As Rowan grew up she moved more towards painting but she did also made her own clothes, discovering that embellishments could hide errors! She had some textile art input in the sixth form. Later she did some beading, but mostly domestic stitching. A period of ill health led to her stitching in earnest resulting in wonderful work for example the multicoloured fish shown below. She developed advanced skills in thread painting and won one of our competitions with her pansy piece winning. Rowan also hand embellished her wedding dress which she later converted to a tunic.

Rowan is influenced by pagan practice and the mother goddess and showed us beautiful examples of her interpretations of this as pictured below. In common with Janette she also cited inspiration and support from BETA, including a recent wet felting workshop. She used her felted piece to make a base for a stitching, inspired by African tribal art. Rowan mentioned particular inspiration from Margaret Richards for this piece but more generally extended this to all the BETA members. BETA members are of course also inspired by both of tonight’s speakers and the work they shared with us.

We had our usual raffle this evening for beautiful stitched bags made this month by Bev (the big bag) and Brenda the small bag

Dee also introduced our group based piece which will be based on our favourite books with each of us making a stitched book spine, to be displayed on a stitched book shelf. Further instructions will be sent out very soon including dimensions for the each spine. The completed piece with all of our contributions should look amazing. Our meeting is being held on zoom, with a speaker from the William Morris Society, talking about May Morris. A Zoom meeting means we don’t have to go out in the worst of the weather and allows to have a speaker we couldn’t otherwise access because of distance or cost.

Our next face to face meeting is on 10th March, with member led activities: cold water dyeing led by Rowan and colour from flower petals, led by Jane. More chance for us all to be inspired by others. The raffle colour is orange.

What a wonderful festive evening. We enjoyed delicious savoury snack and treats before settling down to a talk from Marion Plumb which introduced us to the history and world of the Geisha which is complex and fascinating. They have been described as living works of art and Marion’s presentation brought that to life, including the beautiful and very valuable robes they wear. She also provided a reading list for those who wanted to know more including a Japanese Classic The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon, written 1,000 years ago and a book Marion described as authoritative about the current lifestyle and history of the Geisha written Geisha by Liza Dolby.

Marion is also running a workshop for BETA ‘Little Japanese drawstring bags’ next year on 29th March 2025 and brought examples of what we might produce at the workshop which you can see below.

We also enjoyed an exhibition of member’s work during the evening that had been inspired or supported by our much missed member Margaret Richards. Members generously donated an impressive number of gift bags for Anawim which we have been doing each Christmas for several years in a tradition led by Margaret. The bags have been delivered and were gratefully received by the lovely staff at the project who also have very happy memories of Margaret.

This months Gold raffle bags are suitably festive and beautiful and were made by Hel and Janet.

Our next meeting on 13th January 2025 is a Tale of Two Members with Rowan and Janette who will share their work and stitching journey. The raffle colour is red please bring a contribution if you can. Hope all of our members have a good Christmas and New Year break.

We enjoyed a relaxing and productive workshop with Penny of pennyjanedesigns.co.uk. Penny was knowledgeable and really helpful and everyone who attended was able to complete a wet felted piece, to take away and potentially embellish at home. Penny also teaches at The MAC and further information can be found on her website. Blow are a couple of works in progress more images will be on our instagram account in due course.

Our Christmas Party is on Monday 9th December with Marion Plumb talking about the Geisha. A reminder to bring a gift bag with toiletries for Anawim if you are able to and a contribution to our mini exhibition, on the night, of pieces inspired by Margaret Richards.

We really enjoyed welcoming Debbie back for a visit and for her presentation about turning pictures into textiles. Debbie has always enjoyed sketching and using sketch books and was enthused by a facebook challenge, some time ago, to do a sketch every day in May. She also became involved in a local urban stitching group, which was fascinating to hear about, as this was new to most of the audience. Debbie found that she was supported by seeing other members work and by their friendliness and what she described as the staggering quality of their work. She stitched with the group in The Birmingham urban environment but also in other cities in the UK.

Debbie was already a stitcher when she joined this group and began to combine her two loves. She printed sketches onto fabric and used quilting and other stitch embellishments to transform them. A knowledge base was relevant to both methods, with colour theory being particularly useful. One of the differences if stitching rather than sketching, is the time committed to the piece, which makes thinking about composition so important. Debbie has also completed workshops at the Midland Art Centre including textile printing and mono printing which have informed her work. She recommends using Inktense pencils that are softer and stronger than water colours and that once they are used with water are fixed. Debbie’s also mentioned the influence of Lynne Chapman, a children’s book illustrator, now doing 3D textile work.

The work below features pieces by Debbie inspired by the urban environment. The piece with a woman’s head was based on the Tenant of Wildfell Hall and another piece by Staffordshire Pottery. there is also a glimpse of a lovely concertina book of sketches.

Debbie sketches all the time and takes a miniature bottle of water with her. If using fabric she will prepare this at home. Some of her sketches take 10 minutes to complete others longer for example the robin pictured above. Paper sketches can be stabilised with bondaweb in order to stitch.

We also had our raffle, silver this month, with lovely bags that are shown below made by Ruth and Roman. Apologies for a recent blog where beautiful bags were misattributed they were in fact completed by Sian and Deborah. The December raffle colour is Gold, please bring contributions. The next meeting on 9th November is our Christmas Party, with savoury snacks and sweet treats make by the committee. There will be no sales table this month. Marion Plumb a BETA member is giving us a talk about Geisha. Marion is both knowledgeable and entertaining this is highly recommended. There is no competition but Members are asked to bring items that have been inspired in some way by Margaret Richards.

Finally as Meriel reminded us in an email, we are making gift bags for Anawim a women’s charity very dear to Margaret’s heart. Details are on a recent email from Meriel but a bag of some sort no larger than A4, containing mainly toiletries, would be brilliant if you are able to contribute.

Tonight we had planned an evening of three activities for all to experience. Sadly one of the planned sessions was cancelled because of the illness of the session leader who we hope can lead a session at a future meeting instead. We went ahead with the two remaining activities Swedish Needle Weaving led by Brenda and a Christmas decoration led by Meriel. The photographs show a sample of of each and two examples of work in progress. The Christmas decoration is an adaptation of the Dorset Button. Everyone enjoyed taking part and having a chance to chat.

We also exchanged travelling books this evening as we have started a new round. Margaret whose death and contribution to BETA, and others was featured in the last blog, left us her remaining stash and a few completed items All could be purchased on the Sales Table. There is too much sadly for us to store between meetings. We have donated some to the Scrap Store to support early years play. They were delighted to receive it. Remaining parts of the stash will be for sale on future Sales Tables. Money raised tonight will go to support the charity Margaret was very involved with Anawim.

The raffle featured bags very effective black and white bags from Diane and Gill and are shown below, as is a bag made by Dee which was won last month but omitted from the last blog.

Our next meeting on 11th November 2024 will feature a former committee member, Debbie Eyre, who will talk about From Sketch to First Stitch which should be informative and inspiring as we see her work and draw on her knowledge and experience. The raffle colour for November is silver please bring items to include

Margaret Richards died recently after a short illness and at home with her family. She had been a long-standing BETA member, joining when we were a branch of the Embroiderer’s Guild. This post hopes to share a little of how much she meant to BETA as a whole and to individual members. We also wanted to celebrate her life by including images of some of the exhibition of her work, which was held following her funeral.

Margaret was a longstanding member of BETA’s committee, organising our periodic workshops and providing wonderful lunches for visiting tutors. Her contribution to BETA and its members went far beyond her significant help on the committee however. She was a power house of energy and enthusiasm, helping with events, planning exhibitions and providing learning and support for BETA members who were less knowledgeable and skilled than her. She held mini workshops, including one spent dyeing fabrics in her garden and another making felt bowls. She was also kind and supportive to individual BETA members, always willing to spend time helping individual members develop their skills, or solve textile related conundrums.

Margaret contributed to the community beyond her work with BETA. She led a U3A group and very significantly was a longstanding volunteer at ANAWIM women’s centre. Their most recent newsletter, following their AGM includes a tribute to Margaret. It features some pictures from an exhibition of the work women at the centre had produced, as members of her textile group. Margaret was rightly very proud of the work she did with the centre and spoke with pride and affection about individual women she had worked with. Margaret was also very good fun to be around and memorably up for fancy dress, as shown below, from a BETA meeting that focused on Mary Quant.

Following her funeral everyone gathered together and we were helped to remember her by a display of photographs and by seeing some of her work displayed on the day. This included work completed by Margaret as a member of Birmingham Weavers. That group was central in organising the day and the exhibition itself.

Many of us were then privileged by taking a piece of her work with us to treasure and to donate to ANAWIM among other charities. Those of us who were lucky enough to know Margaret will value those pieces. She will however live on beyond the physical reminders, held in our own inspiring memories of spending time with her.