Take some hexagons...

Before Christmas I spotted these card hexagons in a craft shop.  They immediately reminded me of the very little sewing I was taught at secondary school when we made a small patchwork purse.  I bought them on impulse and then had a think about how to use them.  I have a bit of a thing about bumble bees and I've wanted to make some bee themed textile art for ages.  So, naturally, hexagons = honeycomb!

I chose cotton in lovely bright oranges & yellows and really enjoyed using the techniques I learned in about 1982 - and hadn't used since!

I made two flowers by needlefelting all kinds of interesting fibres to a piece of felt, stitching it into a flower shape and adding seed beads to the centre. 

The bees themselves were fiddly to do.  Firstly the brushed cotton black stripes were stitched on to the yellow fabric.  Then I stitched the bees to the background, trapping some shimmering wings in place and using a little stuffing to pad each bee out.  I like the visible stitches around the bees - I think they add to their bumbly fuzziness!

This piece involved a lot of hand stitching, although I used my machine to sew the patchwork and greenery on to the black background.  Et voila...