Showing posts with label Beginner's Guide to Freestyle Embroidery. Show all posts

Sunday, August 15, 2021

More slow stitching challenge

I'm happy to say that I'm still doing well with the #100dayschallenge on Instagram. Yesterday I finished my first week! If you haven't been following on Instagram, here is a recap and more details.

Stitching the Hexies, Diamonds and Spiral

So far, I've been stitching with yummy thread on an improv piece with free motion quilting (FMQ) in the centre panel. My #100dayschallenge has been to stitch the centre panel. This week I've played with some very special hand-dyed threads from Maiwa, in British Columbia. They have craftspeople in Bengal who hand-dye silk, linen, cotton and wool with natural plant-based dyes. As well, they have their own brand of thread, Honest Thread, that is also hand-dyed. You can read more about them in my previous posts (see links below).

Days 2 to 7 stitches

Days 4 and 5 - Fly and Cross Stitches

I played with both the fly stitch and the cross stitch within the border of the diamonds. I experimented with the size, and for the fly stitch in particular, the order in which I made them. Generally instructions for the fly stitch are from top to bottom (or else that's what I've always assumed!). I found that for me, this was the most difficult way of making them for a consistent outcome. I'm much better at making them from side to side, or even better, from bottom to top.

Fly and Cross stitches

Both of these stitches are made using Honest Yarn's lace linen thread in Lac. It's one of my favourite colours 😊

Day 6 - Coral Stitch with Chain Stitch Variations

This hexie started with a line of coral stitches. I left it for a couple of days because I had no idea where it was going. After checking out my embroidery stitching books, I decided to play with a chain stitch and one of its variations.

Coral stitch inside the hexie

Before jumping into the chain stitch however, I added another echo of coral stitching. The first line was made with 2 strands of Bengal linen in madder, while the second has three strands of the Bengal linen in marigold. It's nice to see the difference between a line of stitching using 2 and 3 strands.

I wanted something a little brighter 😊 so I used my hand-dyed #12 perle cotton to make the chain stitch. Next came the fun part. I added a berry stitch, which is a variation of the detached chain stitch to make the petals and then some French knots with some lovely golden #5 perle cotton.

Coral, Chain, and Berry stitches with French knots

Day 7 - Battlement Stitch

Doesn't that stitch sound grand and aggressive! I suppose that it could look like fortifications, but it's just rows of buttonhole or blanket stitches stacked row on row. If I had actually planned this, I would have made the first row (2 strands of Bengal linen in marigold) further away from the edge. I then had to squish the second row into it (2 strands of Bengal silk in madder).

Battlement stitch

Stitching slowly coming along!

Day 8 - Feathered Chain Stitch

I pretty much exhausted my usual stitches after a couple of days, although the stem stitch hasn't made it's way in yet...but I'm sure that it will eventually. So I've been looking at my three wonderful books of embroidery stitches. I'll talk a little about them after this stitch.

I really like the chain stitch. It has so many possibilities and can look very different depending on the thread used. I decided to try out the feathered chain stitch as a filler for the top spiral. I had to practice this one because remember, I'm accuracy challenged, so trying to make an accurate(ish) zig zag of stitches does not come naturally. Even my straight lines are only straight(ish)! This stitch is not difficult - it's really a long-tail chain stitch that follows a zig zag path.

Feathered Chain Stitch

For this stitch, I used a variegated Eleganza #8 perle cotton from Sue Spargo's collection (more about some new threads in a future post 😊).

Embroidery Books

I have three embroidery books that I LOVE and highly recommend. The first, The Beginner's Guide to Freestyle Embroidery, is the one I used to re-learn to embroider as an adult. On one of our family trips to the South-west states, I did most of the samples in the book. I've mentioned this book before in previous posts.

Beginner's Guide to
Freestyle Embroidery

I use the e-book version of Joyful Daily Stitches - seam by seam by Valerie Bothell to find interesting stitch combinations. It's created primarily for crazy quilting and has a lot of fun stitch combinations, something that I'm always struggling with.

Joyful Daily Stitches - seam by seam

Finally is a new book by Sharon Boggon, Creative Stitches for Contemporary Embroidery. I found Sharon's amazing website, Pintangle, a few years ago. I has a great Stitch dictionary. Sharon also hosts Take A Stitch Tuesday (TAST) which I followed on and off for a couple of years. I've used this book for many of the stitches in the #100dayschallenge so far.

Creative Stitches for
Contemporary Embroidery

What I learned

I really love learning new variations of the simpler stitches. Sharon Boggon's book is really great for this and I will be using it a lot.
I think that this #100dayschallenge is more about posting on Instagram every day than it is about stitching every day - and I'm ok with that. I don't see the point of stitching every day if I'm really not in the mood. I'm much better at stitching every couple of days and preparing for two or three Instagram posts. It's what works best for me!
As I mentioned, I got more thread (sigh). I'll either show it off as I use it or will include it in the next challenge post.
I had better go stitch today's Instagram post - it's now Sunday! 😲

Sunday, April 18, 2021

Week 3 of #AtoZchallenge2021Quilt (Art)

It's getting harder to keep up but I sort of did. I managed to forget to post on Friday (although I was sure that I had but didn't check...) Oh well, it's not really going to make any difference in anyone's life so I guess it's fine.😊 For those of you who haven't been following along, the #AtoZchallenge2021Quilt (Art) is hosted by Frédérique as part of the larger #AtoZchallenge2021. For 26 days in April, with Sunday's off, we post about our subject - mine is art quilts. So every day I post the letter of the day on Instagram and them link up to Frédérique's linking party. So, here are my posts of the week, from J to O.

J is for Journal

I posted my big Stitcher's Journal that I had created from old embroidery pieces that I had done when I took up embroidery after at least 20 years off!

These are samplers made from the book, Beginner's Guide to Freestyle Embroidery by Christina Marsh. If you are beginning to embroider and like simple books with lots of projects, I highly recommend this one!

Nature Lover's Journal

I've also made many, many more journals since taking the workshop with Ali Ferguson through the Stitch Club at TextileArtist.org. These are so easy to make and can hold all kinds of fun things, from stitchy treasures to your thoughts of gratitude.

Gratitude Journal

K is for Knots, French

You may remember this piece from last summer when I made "Ça va bien aller" for my daughter. It’s based on a workshop with Haf Weighton through TextileArtist.org. If you look at the center of the daisies, they are full of French Knots. You can read the story behind it in the original post whose link is in Related links below.

"Ça va bien aller"

L is for Leaves

The piece is called Swirling Leaves and was made for the Hello Fall Blog Hop hosted by Carla of Creatin' in the sticks. The leaves are all hand-dyed fabrics and I had a great time FMQ it.

Swirling Leaves

Using variegated threads for the leaves

Photo shoot in the garden

M is for Mark Making

Marks and Stitches was made following Gregory Todd Wilkins' workshop with TextileArtist.org. We started by painting panels with various colours, stencils etc. From there, I chose one panel to embroider and bead. It was a wonderfully portable project that I took while we did a mini trip last summer.

Marks and Stitches

Eight painted panels

A great way to play with different embroidery stitches

N is for Nature

Clover at Dusk was created without a workshop or challenge. It was pure inspiration. As I was walking at dusk with Chevy, we went by a sea of clover in the grass. Behind it were wonderful changing leaves cascading from the fence and a few blinking fireflies to add to the scene. When I got home, I sketched it from memory and went back the next day to see it in daylight. It's a good thing that I went the next day because by that evening, the owner had mowed the law and all of the clover flowers were gone!

Clover at Dusk art quilt

O is for Old (reuse and recycle)

This is a Flower sampler embroidered with plastic strips from plastic grocery bags. It was made following a workshop with Susie Vickery through TextileArtist.org. The background is an old chenille throw that has had many different uses, including the most comfortable pillows on the couch. The chenille was perfect to stitch through.

Flower sampler embroidered with plastic strips

Embroidering on chenille with plastic
required a hoop

What I learned

As I've been going through my posts, I've seen a few interesting patterns.

I use the word "more" too often in post titles.
I often forget to take pictures while I'm making projects.
At the beginning, a large number of my art quilts were created in blog hops and challenges.
Once I started taking workshops through TextileArtist.org, most of the art quilts originated from there.

I am very glad that last weekend I got ahead of planning my posts. It was too lovely not to work in the garden this weekend and I am exhausted!

Sunday, November 18, 2018

Symphony in Stem Stitch

My piece is ready for the Out of the Box Fibre Artists group's exhibition at the Stittsville Library in December. I have never placed a piece in this venue but when the organiser said that it should be art with a quote, I got an idea 😊 Why not make something with one of the embroidery pieces that I've been working on?

Finding the right words

Google was made for finding suitable quotes (among a few other things of course!) On the Goodreads site I found the perfect beautiful quote by John Keates:

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever"

Symphony in Stem Stitch

I've been working on this project for over a year. It's the second embroidery using free motion quilting (FMQ) motifs. It's been a lot of fun to create since it's very improvisational. I just started by doodling some FMQ motifs with a Frixion pen. I would embroider it using a stem stitch then add more doodling and keep at it. If I didn't like what I had drawn, I would simply iron it off.

This is the first picture of this project that was posted on this blog (see Related links below).

Embroidering colourful FMQ motifs

First stem stitch embroidery -
Étude in Stem Stitching

Adding FMQ motifs a little at a time

The image to the right is the first stem stitch embroidery piece that I started. I used much more muted colours. It's still a work-in-progress (WIP).

I started this to practice my stem stitch after taking a Craftsy course with Jessica Marquez.

This image has the binding attached and ready to be sewn to the back.

It just needs the binding to be sewn to the back

It's such a great feeling when a piece comes together the way I imaged it. It doesn't always happen, and sometimes it's really not a bad thing, or so I tell myself. 😊

What I learned

When I had almost finished the FMQ, I squared off the piece, marked it and then quilted it along the line. I then cut it a ½" past the line. This gave me the chance to finish the FMQ along the edges without going over it much. I don't mind loosing a little bit of FMQ when squaring it up, but if I don't mark it before finishing it, I tend to go over the edge - a lot!
I finally used my quilting ruler to FMQ the line around my piece. I used Angela Walter's "Shorty" ruler. I was pretty impressed since it's difficult to FMQ a straight line. I will definitely use it again.
I had no idea what I would do with these embroideries but I love asking the question...."What if?" So in this case, the question is "What if I FMQ an embroidery? What would that look like?"
I must say that I'm very pleased with the results. There is a lot of potential here for interesting effects for art quilts.
Now to make the label and packaging for the piece before tomorrow!
I was happy to see that my practice with stem stitching payed off. When I decided to finish this embroidery I could do the stem stitch without referring to my favourite embroidery book (see Related links) or the Craftsy class. Of course I haven't done any other stitches in a long while, except for a few French knots, so it may turn out that it's the only stitch I can now do without looking up! 😊

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Fireworks for July's Landscape Art Quilt

Here is the result of my Monthly Landscape Art Quilt Challenge and the 2015 Lovely Year of Finishes...Fireworks in July.

Fireworks in July (14" x 8")

Canada Day is the 1st of July. I must admit that I haven't braved the heat and the crowds to see the festivities and the fireworks on Parliament Hill in a few years. After my rather muted June landscape, I was ready for some colour and sparkle. Here's my journey.

Parliament before the appliqué

I found a couple of photos of Parliament and cut out the shape in a grey fabric. I put a black fabric behind it to make the grey stand out.

I did some thread sketching of the parliament building with grey thread on grey fabric, which, not surprisingly, didn't show up. I was, however, able to use the stitched outline as a guide for sewing with metallic thread in the bobbin.

Thread painting with metallic thread in the bobbin

After starting over the sky on my last landscape art quilt, I was more careful with this one. I cut out the colours I wanted in long, wavy strips to blend them into each other. I didn't want to deal with the buildings or landscape around parliament, so I just made it black. It's great to be making a representation, and not trying to copy the real thing.

I've learned that in a landscape quilt, it's important to minimize the details and get to the essence of the image. If you're not sure what to cut out, just ask yourself "What am I really trying to show here?" In this instance, it was the parliament building, the sky and the fireworks. Nothing else was necessary.

Embroidered and beaded fireworks

I embroidered the fireworks using as inspiration my favourite embroidery book, The Beginner's Guide to Freestyle Embroidery by Christina Marsh. One of the projects actually includes fireworks. I used the shapes of the fireworks but not the same stitches. For the two largest fireworks, I appliquéd fabric as a background and then embroidered over them. I really like the glittering stars of the yellow firework.

I then FMQ by echoing the fireworks and following the curves of the sky.

The last step was beading the fireworks. I didn't have any mauve beads, but the ivory beads on the mauve fabric look mauve as they reflect the colour around them.

I used a new technique for finishing the art quilt. Instead of binding it I created a facing for it. Here's the link to the tutorial by Terry Aske. It worked out well. I'll probably keep using this technique whenever I don't want a border and binding.

Fireworks in July Landscape Art Quilt

I took some lovely pictures of the quilt one morning outside of the building at work. I thought I was finished, but I forgot something...the Canadian flag! I've looked for a couple of days, but I can't seem to find any small Canada flag pins. The flag will be at the top of Parliament as soon as I find one!

What I learned:

The wavy strips for the sky worked really well. I joined the strips using narrow ends. I learned a lot from my first attempt last month!
Using metallic thread in the bobbin is really easy and gives such a lovely result.
I liked using a facing instead of binding the piece. It gives it a clean look. Thanks to Terry Aske for the tutorial.