It's Meeeeee!

It's meee!

This lovely little watercolor portrait was sent to me by Observer of Human Nature from over on instagram, go give her a lookie-loo, her water color paintings are amazing and detailed and I am so grateful!                                                                                                   This came before Christmas and at the time I was not able to give it the full attention it deserved,                                                                                                      so I put it aside                                                                                                                                               Aaand promptly forgot about it in the press of seasonal things and doings                                          (I feel so ashamed!)                                                                                                                                           But as soon as things calmed down a bit I found it in my sketchbook and OMG! It's a little masterwork!     

It's so pretty! And ORANGE!!!!! Squee!                 I added a peach and cream ribbon rose,                                                                                                      I may add more!                                                                                           

A covered Tape measure

Or how to make a cheep plastic tape measure look awesome!

 I started with a robins egg blue Shirred silk

and embroidered about 2 dozen french knotted circles 

Whew!

 It was part of my travelling project, whilst my DDH drove us all around the Midwest and Canada this summer,

 I needed something to keep my hands busy till It was my turn to drive.

WHAT? You only see 7 here!

Yep, those are the best looking ones  

the rest will show up on something else at some point

I cut a circle +2" all the way around and tacked them down to a piece of muslin for a little more stability and strength in the latter stages

When I was done I sewed around the outside edge with a very loose straight stitch and pulled the ends, smoothing it out, until I got two circles about the right size and Iron it around the edges.

I used a piece of ribbon about the right width tho go around the whole thing and sewed that to both sides, don't forget to turn your Edges and leave openings for the tape and the chain (unless your's doesn't have one) I finished it off by covering the tacky plastic pull for the tape

And Bob's your Uncle!

Crazy Quilting Journal Project 2023 Block #1

So here we are on another CQJP adventure!  Yay!

This part is going to start with the 5 panels for a 1920's style Lapmpsahde box.

And, hopefully, finish with a few blocks for a tumbling blocks quilt 

Sharon Boggins has started her own challenge to follow along with and shes making patterns available each month. so there may be some of that too.

Here is my block so far in the planning stage.

The bird motif in the middle is one of my own, I think,

 It's in one of my sketchbooks

I try to draw out an idea first but sometimes the idea comes after I sew a block and have a better idea of where the seams will go 

That is subject to change at anytime as well

 

as what i draw doesn't always fit on what I have sewn, c'est la vie.

I have learned it's best to be flexible

The bird so far

and one seam mostly done

The block so far

A new Jacobin Embroidery Project

So when I start a new piece like this 

using a dark fabric my marking pens won't show up on,

I will draw/trace my pattern on a piece of  thin tissue, 

then outline the pattern in a contrasting thread on the piece, 

using 1 strand and a loose straight stitch, that is easy to pick out as you go

I use the tissue from clothing patterns because I have a lot of it

 but you can buy pattern tissue from the store. 

For those of you Following along on Instagram

will already have already seen the progress on this piece

The books I use for the stitches however, Beyond Tatiana Popova's wonderful Crewel Embroidery book, She is From Ukraine and It would be wonderful if you all could support her by buying either one of her patterns, books or one of her kits.

If you do please buy through her website and not amazon as more of the proceeds go to her and not the corporate overlords for another stupid yacht.

The other books I use for stitching patterns I have not shared before they are 

Crewel Birds and Crewel Twists by Hazel Blomkamp, 

Crewel Embroidery by Shelagh Amor, 

& Creative stitching by Sue Spargo, 

Which you can find anyoldplace.

A hoop or stretcher is a must when you are going on this little adventure 

you really do need to keep it taught  so I recommend a hoop that has an internal ridge to keep the fabric from slipping

Or stretcher bars with tacks or rollers and side pullers you can tack it to 

Otherwise your beautiful, time consuming                                *It took me f*&king hours!*                                                 Work will be irretrievably puckered and we don't want that!

On to some of the specialty threads I have been playing with

They come from Oliver Twists by Jean Oliver

She has specialty thread mixes that are to die for! but the website is vast and you do have to hunt things up, so don't go broke looking around because there is a lot of tantalizing stuff there to play with! 

I suggest looking for "one offs" and "Tidbits" 

And so here we are at the end of what I have to say

I really need to fix that feather!

 

Jingle, jingle

                                                               Happy Holiday's Everyone!

How I transfer a pattern

 Note; This is how I do it. 

I learned these methods by first what I was taught by my mother auntie and grandmother,

Then my own trial and error over 50 some-odd years of Embroidery, beading and sewing.

I am not THE expert but I am a competent sewist in many forms of needle and thread.

I don't know hwy I felt the need to qualify my skills but I did, so there you go.

I start off with a sketch and tissue paper.

I like to use leftover tissue from dress patterns

there are packages you can buy with sheets of plain tissue though they are thicker than the stuff that comes in dress patterns.

Trace and pin to your project

next step it to sew the outline with 1 strand of whatever thread is going to show up on your fabric

Then fill as you prefer

this works difficult fabrics like velvets, dark fabrics and a myriad of  techniques from gold work to simple embroidery

then there's my favorite pen the dritz or clover brand water souluable blue pen

I mark both sides of all my seams, it looks ugly 

but it washes out with a bit of water so go for it!

I also use a ruler or any handy straight edge or curve for marking as I like my stitches to be as straight as I can manage.

They are wonky enough already!

Pink Jacobean box

 No I haven't a better name for it right now.

And as usual I forgot to take pictures until I was mostly done

so here's a picture of the back!

I used a pink silk satin scrap from my stash 

which should have been bigger but whateves

we'll figure out the how when were done right?

So the jumping off point were a bundle of specialty threads

in greens and oranges that caught my eye which have been languishing in my stash for eVer

It's a skein of multiple kinds of silk thread called Oliver twists one offs by Jean oliver

Which I supplemented with PatinaRG brand rayon cording,

some random Chinese silk cording and  watercolors by Caron, Threadworks, DMC etc. bits and peices

I then covered a cigar box with paper inside and most of a fat 1/4 outside

and some cute washitape to finish the ratty ends

And as you probably guessed my scrap was too small so I had to add a 2" border of the bottom fabric around it to get it to fit

after mounting it on a backer board, a piece of card board cut to fit the top, I noticed that the edges were wonky!

Aghhhh!

A bit of 1/4" Velvet ribbon to the rescue!

I hand sewed that around the wonkiness to hide the transition from silk to cotton because it was really, really wobbly!

I got it as straight as I could but you will notice

once I point it out.........o0

That when you look at it straight on it 

bows out in the middle

Which goes to demonstrate, if you stand back far enough no one will notice!

Except you

Because you are your worst critic!

Stop that! 

It's beautiful!

And done!

Oh, yes, there are a few beads thrown on there for sparkly

You knew I couldn't get away without a bit of  added pop right?

It's not worth doing unless it unnecessarily complicated

and fussy

I might be getting the hang of this

Feeling my scraps

 I will argue here that Crazy quilts are the ultimate in scrap quilts

I might even go further and argue, Crazy quilts are the ultimate in crumb quilting

No fabric matches in any square 

is also harvested from old thrifted clothing

and is no larger than 2"-4" wide and 2"-6" long

Embroidery on a seam is no longer than half the size of the square.

In my case, I'm most comfortable with 10" squares so no seam is longer than 3" to 6"

Buttons are used with abandon, in blobs, sprays and scatters

As are beads and sequins

Embellishments are usually made from lace motifs 

Jewelry parts that are broken or have lost a mate

Every square uses no more than 3" of lace

The same for Gimp, Ribbon ends, braid and soutache

Lots of silk ribbon embroidery

Not that I'm biased 

I'll make a scrap Quilt out of anything

Applique

English paper piecing

Stuffed animals

Costumes

Quilts  

Even decorating my home with them

When life gives you scraps

Decorate

After a certain point Scrapping becomes a way of life

 relieving plainness or monotony by adding beauty of color or design or as is the usual all of them at once

Took a little trip

Time for a selfe in denver

Up Grandad bluff

 It finally rained here in the GNW! Hallelujah! And boy did we need it!

 Everything is greening up from the crunchy yellow and brown sear we had all this summer, though I'm sure the new complaint will be,

 "It's so gloomy out!" at today's sit-and-sew!

So what have I been up to this month? Quite a bit.

Camping

We took an extended car trip to Colorado and Wisconsin, to visit my side of the family, which was lovely! 

We filled our days with lollygagging and dawdling, talking and visiting and tons of sight seeing!

DDH over lacrosse

On the way home we stopped at rushmore on our way to Crazy Horse, 

which is IMHO a better, more worthwhile use of your time and money.

Crazy Horse

And seeing the hard work that is being done by an all volunteer group of dedicated people is inspiring!

Rushmore is the wort kind of Tourist trap, the kind you feel ripped off by. 

The obligatory rushmore

Again, My own never to be humble opinion

Though we took a nice selfie together!

Resting at Bears ears

Bears ears was also a lovely stop.

We walked around the entire base and took in the sights and the people who came to climb, sight-see and heritage walk.

On the way home we drove through the hot, in some places it was 106*! No matter how high we put the air in the car at that point you could still feel the hot trying to seep in!

Erstwhile travelling companion

It was so hot the poor car skellies hairdoo got seared!

We were gone for 3 weeks of Relaxing and then needed to go right back out again,

Off to Canada this time, for my best friends daughters wedding, that trip too was lovely! 

On the road again

Until we were coming home, into the teeth of  all the  icky brown smoke from surrounding wildfires.

 They had been raging on for months and are very hard to put out when there is no rain to help.

So we are home again and I have quilting to do, I have 3 community service kiddy quilts, 2 commissions and soo many projects to finish

but more on that later.