Guest blogger series | It Ain’t Only About The Flies

A crafty type and a lover of mischief, a whim, a ‘Why Not?’. Tania is also a mum of three, a wife, a graphic designer, a juggler extraordinaire (in training). You’ll find her over at Myrtle & Eunice, celebrating her crafty hits, confessing the misses and always bewildered by the pile of dirty washing.

It Ain’t Only About The Flies

It’s not that I’m obsessed with flies, cos I’m not. Certainly, if you happened to refer to the November page of this year’s Whipup calendar,  you’d turn to look at me all sideways and squinty and doubtful-like. But THAT fly – the one composed of a bazillion stitches, was really all about the obsessive joy in (finally!) mastering the french knot. THIS fly, the one above, was all about the sudden fascination with the crafty potential of fly screen.

I almost did my eyeballs in. Crafting with fly screen is like crafting blind. The grids of tiny squares appear to move and intersect, creating a moiré effect. Half the time you can’t tell which is shadow, or which is the surface you’re working on. And it’s a SHOCKER to photograph. Navigate the light, the shade, the shadows cast, the greying effect of the mesh, the disappearing into-backgrounds, then give up in a huff. Put away your camera, live it in real time.

In real time – and you’ll probably have to trust me on this – it is possible to appreciate the delicate intricacies of embroidered fly body hair.

As a crafty type who never knows when to leave well enough alone, I couldn’t help but try my hand at cross-stitching a flying fly…

…which in one fell swat, becomes a cross-stitched, well past-his-prime fly.

It struck me that flies were not the only obvious subject matter. Too busy losing focus to fly screen, to notice teetering laundry piles, a disaster kitchen, and an impressive spider web population inhabiting window frames, it finally dawned upon me. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.

While the bug lovin’ middle kid is chuffed to bits with his fly-eating, window-inhabiting spider,

I have been forced to concede to the Mr’s long-held theory: not one part of this house is safe from the craft.