Month: January 2020

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More Assorted Stitching Adventures

As usual, I have not accomplished everything that I wanted to in the last week.  I have kept up with my four 4×4″ squares:

Here is a sneak peek of something new coming soon for all of the hand embroidery lovers:

The background fabric is a dyed vintage damask napkin.  I have dyed hundreds of them and have them for sale at the quilt shows.  They are easy to stitch through, I usually add a stabilizer to the back side to keep them from shifting and bunching.  I love the way that the woven designs are enhanced by the dye, and they add a layer of additional textural  interest to a piece with hand stitching.  The vintage damask also machine quilts nicely.  The damask napkins also find their way into my fabric collages, I use them as a base for adding vintage fancy pieces.  They also work nicely in pieced blocks and applique designs.

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More Little Bits of Stitches

Back on November 15, 2019, I posted about some little 4″ X 4″ squares I had completed.  I have a goal this year to make four of these squares a week.  We are halfway through the first month of the new year, here are my squares from the past two weeks:

Some of them are lovely little gems, others are not so hot.  I’m not redoing any of them, or throwing any away.  These are sort of a stitching journal, and a way to experiment with color and composition.  Not everything that we make will be a masterpiece, and that is part of the creative journey.

On a side note, I am only going to be posting once a week this year in an attempt to work on some other things that desperately need my attention (UFO pieces and the rest of this website, for starters).  Next week, I will share whatever progress that I have made over the upcoming three day weekend.

 

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Stitching Summer Days

Each season out here has its own particular charms that intrigue me.  Right now, it is being able to see the gentle rolling of the land without piles of wild brush and lushly leafed trees hiding the topographical details.  The branches of the same trees are wrapped with feathery blue-gray lichens, unnoticed in the spring and summer months.  When the cold winds whip through the valleys, I stay in and stitch the summer flowers to keep warm thoughts of the growing season in my mind.

There are certain points along the property where I live that I visit frequently to note changes as the season roll through the year.  At the end of my long driveway is one of those points.  Across the road is a neglected cow pasture that fills out in summer with a riot of wildflowers: soft purple chicory, Queen Anne’s Lace, blaze orange butterfly weed, mullein reaching to the sky, jewelweed, and sometimes a bright red Canadian Lily.

SummerFencerow2

Later in the season, iron weed, Joe Pye weed, goldenrods and asters take over with a different palette of colors and textures.  I have already made several felted and stitched portraits of the fence row, and more are in the works.

I don’t know if I will ever tire of stitching these roadside meadows.  So many people speed past them, in a hurry to get somewhere, and they never notice the flower show to the side.  It doesn’t show up on their GPS.