Breaking the Silence

My blog has been silent for much too long, but it has been silent because I've had to choose between stitching and writing time, and I chose to stitch. Unfortunately, some of my stitching time was interrupted by sore shoulders and other minor illnesses, but I have been making progress on many fronts.

At home in Rhode Island with my sewing machine, I made my husband a padded envelope for his new (bigger) iPad. Unfortunately, it took two tries to get one to fit correctly and then I accidentally stitched a seam twice, making it rather lopsided. As a result, I am not showing a photo. But even if it isn't perfect, my husband is using it. It makes me happy to know his tablet is safe from accidental drops and scratches, even if I need to practice more to perfect the art of sewing what should be an easy little project.

But all is not lost. I can sew a straight line, because I also sewed new curtains for our newly painted guest room, using some commercial valences in another room as a pattern. I wanted a light airy feel, so the toppers are cream colored and airy and the sheer is a silk/linen panel. I was told over and over that I should not use it for a curtain because silk rots in the light, but it is just what I wanted, and the guest room blinds are lowered unless we have guests, so I think they will be ok. Additionally, the linen will help hold it together.

The reason I wanted a nice fabric is because I want to stitch shadow work butterflies on the sheers. I saw the pattern in Inspirations, and have been dying to work it ever since. I have only experimented with shadow work once and in a much cruder format that will be needed on these sheers, so I worked up a practice piece to see how best to manipulate curves in the pattern and to determine which colors to use. I tried two variegated threads and white. I think I will use all of them in the curtains. I learned a lot in my practice piece, but it took several nights of work. In the end, I liked it so much, that I added a floral garland and framed it against a piece of tie dyed blue fabric. It is a nice little addition to the guest room while I stitch the sheers, which will, I think, take quite awhile to finish!

This is not all that I've been working on, but I'll save more for later blogs so I don't go silent for such a long time again.

New valences and sheers in our guest room.

Here is the sheer with my practice piece pinned to it to see how it will look when I begin embroidering the sheers.

A close up of the practice piece.

My practice piece framed as an accent for our antique dresser. It is nice to find a use for the hours that it too to stitch the piece! And doesn't it go well with the antique dresser scarf I found that was already embroidered with butterflies?!

 

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More stitch along progress

My month in Rhode Island is over, but I am happy to report that I made a good deal of progress on my Janet Brandt stitch along project. I think up to six people have already finished. You can see their interpretations here. Since I only stitch on this project when I am in Rhode Island, I am going slower. I began in February and didn't finish much, just a few hearts and flowers. Now I am proud to say that I am between 1/2 and 2/3s through with the work and am still having fun. It is doing its job in getting my creative juices flowing too!

Since I will be moving to smaller digs in Colorado this month to save money and get out of a lease, I am going to set up a smaller project there--probably the Inspirations project I mentioned last time. I'm not going to have much time to stitch so a small contained project is what I will need there.

In the meantime, I am quite happy with my progress on what I am calling the tree of life and love.

 

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A slow start

Little projects are what have been keeping me going lately. I'm using them to experiment and get my creative juices flowing after such a dry year. One thing that I had to do was to finish the baptismal bibs that I had promised to do over the summer. I stitched them a little at a time, but decided that I HAD to finish them before I left for Thanksgivingand pushed to finish all six. Since the only "rule" was to stitch the water blue, I had a lot of fun with them.

But the best thing was that the day after I returned to Denver in January, I ran into the coordinator at church. She loved what I had done and got me six more bibs before I left again for a Florida vacation. I thought I might have time to do a little stitching on the plane, but we wound up having a rainy cold vacation and a death in the family that left me happy to have something to keep my hands busy. I stitched all six new bibs in one week.

 

These were especially fun because I decided to experiment with new stitches. I tried Hungarian braided chain stitch and cable chain stitch. I especially like cable chain stitch for the crosses. I also tried a tacked filling stitch for the fish. I've wanted to try that since I saw a painting at the Worcester Art Museum that portrayed fish scales in cross hatches. I like how it turned out, but would like to experiment more.

It is nice to have a little project that can be completed in an hour or two to experience to with and which you know will be appreciated by the recipient!

 

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Easter portraits

When I posted my portrait of Winnie I mentioned that I hoped to do some additional portraits soon. The opportunity came this month, and I was able to finish two portraits as an Easter thank you for my sister-in-law and her daughter-in-law.

February was a tough month for our extended family, so I wanted to do something life-affirming with my embroidery. Since we were unexpectedly in Michigan, I was reminded again of how darling my sister-in-law's first great grand daughter is. She is a spunky little Disney princess and once we left, I was really looking forward to embroidering her.

This time, I played a lot with the photos and for the first time wasn't afraid to rip out stitches and re-stitch lines. I still have a long way to go to become a portrait artist, but I think that there is a noticeable improvement over my last attempt.

 

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Winnie

I promised to show you all some of the Chistmas presents that I made this year. Now that they are all distributed, it is safe to post them. One of my favorites was Winnie, my daughter-in-law's French Bulldog. I wanted to repeat the outline technique that I first tried last year. The difficult part of this technique is deciding what details to keep in and what to leave out. I wish I were a natural artist, but I see improvement each time I trace a new photo, and I think it worked very well this time. At least my daughter-in-law recognized Winnie right away! I have a few more of these projects that I want to try, so you may see more soon.

 

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Stitch-a-long progress

Wow! It is amazing to me, but Janet Brant has reported that at least one person has finished her stitch-a-long! I knew that given my schedule I would lag behind others, but that is amazing. My progress is much more modest, but it is still progress. And, because I am stitching slower, I am taking some inspiration from others to incorporate into my work. Fun! Anyway, here is my progress so far. Slow, but steady.

Stitching progress after 2 weeks.

 

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Stitching along with Janet Brandt

It has been a long time since I posted anything, and in fact, I'm surprised I posted as much as I did in 2015. It was a very dry year for creativity. Toward the end of the year things picked up and I will show what I finished for Christmas gifts eventually. I really needed a kick start to get my creative juices flowing, and Janet Brandt provided it by posting a free-for-all stitch along. There are no real rules, just a pattern for which she is posting her own stitching progress. It is fanciful and fun and there is no pressure. Just what I need right now! So, I downloaded the pattern, drew it on my fabric and bought my floss. My progress will be much slower than hers, but I am looking forward to stitching for the fun of it. If you want to stitch along too, you can find Janet's pattern and posts on her blog.

As you can see, my pattern isn't perfectly copied (it was hard to see the pattern through the dark fabric), but that is ok. I'm not worrying. I'm just stitching! I'll show my progress next week.

 

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Happy Easter

I'm back in New England for April. Spring is tentatively looking around and trying to decide whether or not she is going to stay awhile. She is still not sure. People say that they have seen the tips of bulb flowers peaking out of the ground, but we don't have any bulbs in our yard and even the forsythia is asleep. But the snow is almost gone and that is progress.

So for Easter, here are a few cheery things. First a delightful little bunny ornament hanging on my mantel. It was made by Starr White who blogs at Wonderland Woods about her backyard woods in Alabama, where Spring has definitely visited. She recently opened an Etsy shop of the same name to sell her woodsy creations--pretty little toadstools swaddled in moss. Her worlds are beautiful and I love my little bunny, so perfect for Easter.

Second, a little embroidered bunny next to some bunny scissors. Anyone who knows me knows that I love bunnies and last week I was in a meeting that was scheduled for one and a half hours, but lasted three and a half hours. When that happens, I doodle, and one of my doodles was a little bunny that was too cute not to embroider. I think I will cut her out and apply her to a book jacket when I go back to Denver.

So wherever you are, happy Easter or Passover and my your day be peaceful.

 

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Happy Spring!

Even though the leaves are just starting to come out and the patio furniture is still covered, it is spring at my house. The little embroidery that I teased you with two weeks ago is done and back from the framer early. I'm so excited because it turned out wonderful.

This tiny landscape was was a multi step process--painting silk, stiffening fabrics and threads, embroidering backgrounds, and working with water soluble fabric. It was all new to me, but I love the results. My landscape may be a little overwhelmed by flowers, but that is because I was trying all of the techniques outlined in Creative Hand Embroidery and Hand Embroidered Country Scenes by Sue Newhouse. Since this is a practice piece, I wanted to practice as many flowers as possible.

The finished piece is just 3 inches by 4 inches.

 

I've had these two books for at least a dozen years, but it was working on the Inspirations piece that I did in December that made me want to explore landscapes in a more determined way.

 

Sue's books are fantastic. My piece is a conglomeration of the meadow practice pieces that she has in each book. Between the two books, she goes step by step with you through the process of creating your own little scene. I loved the details on making grass and flower heads with stiffened thread. I had no idea how they would turn out, but they are fun to do and really fun to work with. I also loved embroidering the daisys on water soluble fabric, washing out the fabric and then attaching stems and re-stiffening them. It was a lot of steps, but worth the effort. Now that I've tried the techniques I can't wait to do more, and just one look at the wonderful projects her students have done, which fill her books, provides plenty of inspiration on dealing with tricky subjects.

I've plucked half a dozen landscapes off the internet over the last three years that I eventually want to explore in stitches. They range from what I think are easy subjects to much more complex. I'm looking forward to the challenge and since I bought three more shadow boxes, I'm ready to start.

 

Finally, I am giving a shout out to Michaels in Belmar, west of Denver. I was quite nervous about dropping this piece off to be framed there, but since it was a practice piece, I figured I would try. They did a FANTASTIC job and it was inexpensive since I bought a ready made frame. I'm thrilled! You will definitely be seeing more little world's come to life this year.

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A little preview

I am so excited having just finished my first Corded Brussel-stitched wired slip! This is for a project I've been working on over the last two weekends. It has many new techniques I've never tried before. In addition to my little slip, I've been painting and stiffening silk and threads. I'm eager to show you how it is all going together, but you will have to wait until I am all done! It won't be long. I hope to have it framed by Easter.

I've always liked detached buttonhole stitch. Now I am in love. This was good practice for my First Night partridge in a pear tree--but that is not what it is for.

 

Painted and stiffened silk and stiffened knotted threads. I was surprised at how crinkly the silk feels--like a thin version of a cereal box liner!

 

 

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Inspired by Inspirations and a fish

On the plane home at the beginning of the month, I was reading Inspirations 84 when a little project caught my eye--a pin cushion done in Deerfield Embroidery. Deerfield is in Massachusetts, but I had never heard of this type of embroidery, a Jacobean inspired blue work done with linen threads. What appealed to me about the project was the variety of stitches--14 different stitches done with one, two or three threads. I wanted to play with it, but I didn't really like the pattern. I did, however, like the motif on the saucer in the photo to the right of the actual embroidered piece. The more I looked at it, the more I thought that I could follow the pattern instructions using the different motift. That's what I determined to do.

The pattern from Inspirations is the bird on the left. My inspiration is the saucer on the right.

First I copied the magazine page and blew up the dish until the motif was approximately the same size as the pattern. Then I traced the pattern, substituting two of the pattern flowers for the plate motifs. I bought the same threads as indicated in the pattern and some cotton cloth and went at it, using the magazine instructions to do each section of the fish. I even embroidered the outline using the same stitches. The only thing I substituted was the woven spiderweb shells for the trellis work flower from the original pattern.

My initial tracing.

After doing the stitching, I resolved to try Mary Corbet's scalloped beading on the edge. That was a little disappointing. I don't know if my tension was too tight or too loose, but the beautiful scallops she achieved in her tutorial weren't really appearing on my work. The beads were easily knocked out of kilter when buttonholing them onto the bars. Even so, it was good practice and I generally like the results. Maybe somewhat bigger beads would help.

The finished piece was a good experiment, although a little lopsided.

I regret, however, that I did the project on cotton. It just wasn't strong enough. I have resolved to make a few improvements to the pattern and to work it again on linen--this time in color. But for now, my new little ornament is hanging from my secretary in the dining room and looks splendid. I like my resolution to play with stitches. It takes the tedium away from having to produce to a deadline.

I have already found my next little project--a tiny sampler with a pulled work hem. I've never done any pulled work, so it meets my criterion of trying new techniques. I can't wait to start!

 

 

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Late Christmas

Sunday I wrote about Christmas presents that weren't. Today, I'll write about Christmas presents that were late, although the truth is, we did GREAT on Christmas shopping this year. We were actually done early, and last year's resolution to start my presents in January worked really well. Almost everyone got a handmade Christmas or birthday present this year. But a few things just didn't happen on time.

First, due to no fault of his own, my husband's present for me came in the mail a few days after Christmas. Had we been in the UK they likely would have arrived on time, but I don't really care. I am just thrilled to own this beautiful, handcrafted pair of bent scissors from Ernest Wright & Son Ltd., complete with a certificate from the Lord Mayor of Sheffield. I am a Anglophile and the certificate was really a bit of icing for me.

These scissors are gorgeous! They were featured on Mary Corbet's blog Needle 'N Thread on September 12, along with an amazing video featuring the craftsmen who make the scissors. Of course, anything featured on Needle 'N Thread immediately has a huge surge in popularity, so they were running a bit behind filling orders. Even so after I shared the video with my husband he remembered and ordered me a pair. What a wonderful man!

A second late gift was all my fault. I just wasn't prepared to get home to Denver and have a gift ready for my roommate. BAD! But I wasn't too much of a slacker. I have always wanted to embroider a tiny landscape, and when I saw one featured in Inspirations, I decided to embroider it over the Christmas holidays. What I failed to do, was to frame it. So, when I got back to Denver, I found a frame, had a mat cut, and finished it up for the weekend after my return. The full quote from Isaiah is "The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever." I thought it was appropriate given that the picture is of grass and field flowers.

I LOVED working on this little project. You can bet you will see similar pieces as I try to find my own landscapes to interpret.

The final late gift I actually gave to my husband half done. I hadn't quite finished the handwork before I left Denver and once I had finished it, I didn't have a sewing machine to do the finishing work. As a result, I finished this calendar when I returned to Denver and mailed it back to my husband. I will likely make a new one each year. The panel came from SeptemberHouse, an Etsy shop. The 2015 panels are still available. 2016 panels will come out sometime between March and June.

Finally, an FYI. I am currently on my second annual stitching staycation. Next week I'll let you know how it went and what my goals are for the new stitching year!

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Languishing lovebirds

Last week I mentioned that one of the things I brought back to Denver in my suitcase was a blackwork kit. I alway thought blackwork was beautiful, so I signed up for Tanja Berlin's blackwork "Lovebirds" class in August. Lessons were sent out every two weeks through last week. Unfortunately I didn't get my kit until just before the third of five classes was published. Somehow the U.S. and Canadian post offices let us down. By the time it came, I was so busy with other things, that despite my resolve to keep up with the course, I only finished lesson one this week. Unfortunately, my critique wasn't so good. I found myself rushing to finish and made some mistakes. Not big ones, but big enough. I'll have to work through the rest a little more slowly, and sadly on my own since the class ends next week. I'm disappointed with myself, because the materials and the critiques are great. I just couldn't keep up.

 

Here's what I have done so far. I'm looking forward to working on it over Christmas--which means that these little birdies are going back to New England with me. Too bad they don't earn their own frequent flyer miles!

 

 

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Happy Halloween kind of

I didn't quite finish my Day of the Dead sampler for Halloween this year. Luckily it is just a play piece. There is a lot wrong with it, but it has been fun to work on a colorful piece with no real purpose, deadline or even pattern!

 

My idea started with a desire to embroider a skull and grew from there. Here is my initial drawing. I wanted skulls and flowers and hearts. My idea was to sink my stitches into thick black felt, but I couldn't find black wool felt, so I bought grey. Then I had trouble having my white markers show up on the fuzzy felt, so I cut the skulls out of interfacing to trace around them. I liked the white against the grey so much, I decided to embroider right through the interfacing

 

Here is how far I've gotten. I have to finish the flower and one more skull, then add vines, hearts and a backing. I may put it aside until I return to Rhode Island though, I've got other projects to work on in Colorado and the less I carry back and forth, the better.

At least I can be early for next year!

 

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