Views Both Far and Near and I Quilted This!

Hello and welcome 😎 I'm thrilled to share Views Both Far and Near with you. I learned so much and I'm so happy that it's finished. The last few days have been very intense - I'm glad that I don't do this for a living!

Views Both Far and Near

Last week the piece was getting close to finish. It's mostly a blur but by Sunday evening I knew that I would have the embroidery finished on Monday and that I would spend most of Tuesday framing it. I also watched the course that Take Two provides all of its student on photographing our art with a cell phone. That left the photography session for this morning.

Views Both Far and Near 

In the last two weeks you've seen a lot of process photos. Here are a few closeups of the finished piece. In the area where the nut was (I never did find it!) I added various semi-precious stones such as amethyst, since stones are also a part of nature. I also added some fun critters such as the bird next to the clover. I stitched many tiny flowers in the areas that I had covered in stem stitch. Very loose couching was used above the orange proddy flower. It covered the area quickly and looks like fields of plants.

Details of the stitching

A rabbit lurking behind a row of plants 

The top of the piece with shells and a turtle hanging out by the water

In the image below, you can see how the canvas was covered on the sides. It was quite the learning experience!😧

Side view of the piece.

I mentioned in my last post that Take Two also offers a course on how to take photos of our art with our cell phones. It was a great course and I learned so much. I even discovered that my phone has all kinds of editing settings that I had been looking for! It turns out that the default was on auto - so when I explored further, I found out how to adjust colour, brightness, etc.

After the section on lighting, I knew that the best photos could be taken in my dining room in the morning. The wall next to the window has wonderful lighting but is painted a taupe colour, so I stuck a white cardboard to the wall and used the existing nail to hang the piece. The cardboard doesn't have to be centered since I'm going to get closer and crop the image anyway.

A white cardboard sheet is placed on the wall
to get the best lighting

The other thing I learned was that it's best to use your feet to get closer to the art that you're photographing than to use the zoom function on your phone. It's too bad that I can't do that with the wildlife in my backyard! 😀

What I learned

• I learned many things while making this piece. Most of these you can read in my previous posts.
• I did learn a lot while trying to attach the art piece to the framed canvas.
• In theory my method should have worked but when I attached the piece to see if it would work, I hadn't stitched the sides much. I learned that when you add all of that stitching, the art contracts and becomes smaller.
• I did what I could, but it's certainly not to a professional standard. Since I'm keeping this piece, that doesn't matter as much.
• Next time I'll try to face the piece and then attach it to the canvas, if a canvas is necessary.  
• I'll add more photography tips as I keep learning. 😊

Related links

• Time is flying by and I Quilted This!, April 15, 2026
• A very slow-stitching project and I Quilted This!, April 09, 2026
• Updates and Happy New Year!, January 01, 2026
• Many Updates and Free Motion Mavericks, November 20, 2024
• Scraps, Embroidery and Free Motion Mavericks, October 31, 2024
• More Joyful Embroidery and Free Motion Mavericks, October 23, 2024
• Joyful Embroidery with Fleur Woods and Free Motion Mavericks, October 10, 2024
• A bit of this and that and Free Motion Mavericks, September 26, 2024

Linking parties

I'll be linking to many fun linking parties. You might want to check some out. Monday Musings, Design Wall Monday, Sew & Tell, Put your foot down, Off The Wall Friday, Finished (Or Not) Friday, TGIFF, Patchwork & Quilts, Beauties Pageant, Slow Sunday Stitching, Favorite Finish for April, 

Project details

Project created for submission to Nature’s Textures, An online exhibition from Fleur Woods and Take Two

Title: Views Both Far and Near

Size: 10" x 12"

Materials: monk’s cloth, hand-dyed and commercial fabric, perle cotton, silk, linen, and cotton thread, silk, cotton, wool, synthetic, and linen yarn, thread bobbin, semi-precious stones, shells, beads, ribbon, felt, batting, art canvas

Techniques: embroidery, thread weaving, punch needle, coiling, "cuir froissé"

This project, as well as the two below will be at the Fibre Fling 2026 this Friday and Saturday. 

Views Both Far and Near at Fibre Fling

Views Both Far and Near - label

Glimpses of Antarctica at Fibre Fling

Glimpses of Antarctica 

Desert Landscape at Fibre Fling

Desert Landscape

I Quilted This!

Welcome to the I Quilted This! linking party that celebrates quilting on a domestic machine or custom quilting on a long-arm. Feel free to link up and share any recent project, even if you're not quilting it! 

Here are the posts that included FMQ, ruler work and walking foot quilting last week. Thanks for linking up 😊 and consider grabbing the button. 

Kat from Scrapbox Quilts is participating in the Make 6 quilts in 6 weeks Challenge with Villa Rosa Designs. Her first quilt, Cabin Fever is very cute. Kat quilted it in a cross hatch.

Cabin Fever made by Kat - the first of six!

Margo Young of MY Quilts and Crafts finished and gifted two baby quilts. They are so cute!

Baby quilt by Margo

Another baby quilt by Margo

Preeti of Sew Preeti Quilts finished another lovely quilt, Polite Society, for a magazine about using precuts. Check out her post for more of her precut friendly patterns.

Polite Society by Preeti

Gwyned Trefethen is getting ready to FMQ her secret mission. Here is a sampler of the FMQ designs that will be on her quilt.

Gwyneth's FMQ practice sandwich

FMQ loops with open hearts by Gwyned

Terry from On Going Projects finished quilting her 2021-22 temperature quilt. It really looks great! You'll want to check out her post to read all about it.

Clam shells quilted in the borders of
Terry's 2021-22 temperature quilt

It's now your turn 😍

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter