November Poppies

Poppy collage

It’s not a secret to my followers on my Facebook page that I adore red poppies. I have done so since I was a child. In every one of my 33 years of married life we go in search for poppy fields in and around Northumberland. They are not always apparent and take some seeking out but we have lots of lovely coffee shops, selling lots of lovely cake so it’s not a chore. A very wise relative told me that poppies sleep and lie dormant for many years till the conditions are right for them to appear, so I was amazed that years later learnt that the poppy was the symbol of the Greek gods of sleep Hypnos.

Not wanting to sound like a tourist handbook – we have amazing Northumberland Coastline beautiful meadows and pastures of lush green grass and rich rolling hills. Then there are sheep and lot of them appear on my pictures – well, my interpretation of sheep. I nearly always have some poppies in my pasture pictures even a sliver of red Merino wool will satisfy me.

I could never paint a poppy – so isn’t it amazing that I can drop a piece of Merino wool or a piece of red silk, which has been sourced from many hours of visiting charity shops for pure silk scarves, only to cut them into shapes and hope resemble poppies when dried.

I did nearly have a disaster – when I forgot to wash a silk scarf and all of the dye ran during the final stage of felting. The horror on my face while I watched a red river flowing from my felt as I rinsed it was a sight to behold. It turned out a happy accident and is now one of my favourite pictures. It only enhanced the background and I went on to sell three pictures from one piece of ‘ruined felt’.

Harmony

I have created blue and pink poppies but red remains my favourite so you will keep seeing them throughout my felting journey. I take the red of the poppy and use its energy to feed my love of colour.

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