A4 Art Exhibition and more Gelli Plate prints

 With some encouragement from a fellow member of Break O'Day Stitchers, with whom I had shared some of my collages, I sent off two pieces of A4 art to be part of the A4 Art Exhibition which is held at the Herring Island Art Gallery.

A4 Art Exhibition Invitation 2026

After the physical exhibition is over then the artwork is displayed online. Once the online section is finished then any unsold artwork is returned to the artist. Fingers crossed that someone might like a little piece of my art but if not then it will have been fun just having in hung amongst the other 628 artworks.

Both pieces were inspired by my gelli plate printing and collage work. I am still having a ball exploring what can be done with stencils, masks, natural objects and paint with my gelli plate. I have created quite a few art postcards and pages in my hand made ideas book.

Knotted birds with another collage fodder flower on this piece of printed paper

Knotted birds, ascemic writing and overlapping collage pieces

A bit if fun with a cutout folding section here. I used texture paste for the leaves.

With the fold out section open

Have you ever entered some creative work into an exhibition? How did it feel? Did you sell any of your work? Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts.

Creating with Paper

 A very long time between posts. Lots of creating has been happening but the chance to blog without it taking forever has only just been resolved.

The purchase of a Gelli plate late last year has lead to the creation of many pieces of paper for collage and card making. It is so much fun to add paint and layer up the paper. The end result is often unpredicatable and that just makes it more interesting.

One of my early card creations using gelli plate paper and texture paste.
Leaf card © 2025 by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

A designed by me stencil used with the gelli plate as a card background.
Feather card © 2025 by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

There are so many different techniques out there for using this art supply that it can quickly become overwhelming. I like to use mine with stencils I have designed and cut with my Cricut, found objects, masks and now have a very big stash of collage paper.

I have used the paper for making some collage books. the first book was called Come into My Garden. Along with collage papers I created flowers with cut outs and also composed a poem to go with the book. My poem is by no way fine writing but was fun to create. It is a diamante which does not stick completely to the format as it does not contrast opposites but goes from the specific to general - flower to garden. Creating each page was fun and learning about collage fodder was an added bonus.

Some artist trading cards have also been created using the papers along with more collage fodder ideas.

Artist trading card.
Trading card © 2025 by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Collage poster
Collage Poster © 2025 by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Another book has just been finished and this one has knotted paper birds throughout. The knotted paper birds led to me experimenting with doing gelli prints on the back on some Japanese paper scraps. I love how each idea leads to new experiments and different results.

Have you tried Gelli plate printing? What would you make with your papers? Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts.

Creating LED tealight holders

 More experimentation has been happening with two different types of washaway stabiliser. I was able to watch a video tutorial created by the very talented Meredith Woolnough who creates amazing artworks using washaway stabiliser and free motion stitching. Her video tutorial was part of an online retreat called Making Zen. I chose not to pay for unlimited access to all the videos so had to make sure I logged in at the right time to watch Meredith create a thread bowl from her ORT collection. ORT stands for old raggedy threads and is the accumulated ends cut from our stitching works. The thread bowl is created over a mould and I have successfully used both a polystyrene ball and a small plastic bowl as my moulds.

ORT bowl by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

The above photo is my first attempt at the process. For this one I used free motion stitching to hold all the scrap threads together and was pleased with how it turned out. On the video Meredith also did one with hand stitching as this fitted very well with the slow stitching theme of the retreat and so I started experimenting with a few different ideas...

I combined what I had been doing earlier in the year with what I was now learning to explore creating silk fibre LED tea light holders.

Tea light bowl creation by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

I start by teasing out some silk lap fibres into a thin layer and add this to the top of one piece of stabiliser. Add a top layer of stabiliser and hoop this before drawing on a design ready for stitching. Free motion machine stitching or hand stitch are able to work but give quite a different end result. Three or four experiments in and I started to perfect my process. I couldn't stop at one as each little bowl can be such a unique creation of colours from both the silk lap and the threads used to stitch it together. I bought my silk lap fibres from the Thread Studio and just love the different colour combinations that Dale sells.

Tea light bowls - daylight view by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Hand stitched bowl by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Machine Stitched bowl by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Pinks by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Ocean Blues by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

The night time view was totally different as each bowl showed the light shining through the stitching lines and the thin layers of silk fibres while the colours disappeared.

Alight by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Bush Colours by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

Night Lights by MrsSOnline is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 

A very addictive pastime indeed. I am still creating a few at a time. I will need to stock up on some more LED tealights to add them to each little creation as it is made.

Would you use free motion machine stitching or hand stitching to create a little bowl? Which colours would you use? Please leave a comment sharing your thoughts.