These cross-stitch birds are a delight to stitch, they don’t take too long either. Last time I posted about them I had stitched A B and C on holiday and I’d just started D.
Having finished my slot and tab book I’ve concentrated more on these birds. Over the last couple of weeks I finished C, which I think is a goldcrest. I’ve seen them very occasionally in the garden but I hear them a lot on the back lane behind us. They have a very high-pitched whistle. They are Britain’s smallest bird, so they’re not easy to spot.
I’ve also stitched the letter E which has a gorgeous swallow sitting on the letter. Seeing the first swallow of the year is a good sign that summer is well on the way. Many swallows migrate all the way the South Africa for the winter.
I’ve just started the letter F which has a chaffinch on it. The birds are all going in another book, I need to work out the final size of the pages of this book as I’m planning to make it by whip stitching the pages together so I need to do a back-stitch square round each letter. Obviously I don’t want to find I have 26 squares to do at the end!
At the December meeting of Skipton Stitchers we have a lovely tradition of making a hand-made Christmas card to swop. Anyone who wishes to take part just makes a card, writes a Christmas greeting from them inside, adds it to the pile at the meeting and takes one out.
It does mean I have to think of a quick card to make each December as invariably I leave it until the day before!!
This year I decided to do some teabag embroidery. We had a workshop on it earlier in the year, it’s basically stitching on a used, dried teabag. I had previously collected some teabags, dried them out, made a little snip in the back to empty the tea out and pressed them. All that I needed to do was add some iron-on interfacing to the back to give a bit of strength… and think of something to stitch.
I had a little perusal on Pinterest and spotted a few to give me ideas. The good thing about stitching on teabags is that they’re only small, so it doesn’t take much to cover it. I had a look in my ort jar and found a few scraps of lace.
I arranged them so they looked like a snowy hill. I think this bit took the longest as I kept trying different pieces of lace and different positions. I was particularly pleased with the top piece as it looks like trees on the top of the hill. I stitched them on with some basic sewing thread. I cut a triangle out of some Christmas fabric, fussy cutting it over a tree so I already had a basic pattern on it. I stitched the tree on with fly stitch, a few straight stitches made the trunk. All that was left to stitch was a tiny gold sequin on the top.
I mounted it on some cotton paper and stuck that to a red card. My card was ready. It didn’t take long at all and I’m pretty pleased with it,
I think we’ve only one more word prompt to go with this stitch-a-long with Anne Brooke then I can decide how I’m going to put this book together, I have a few ideas, we shall see. I posted half the pages a few days ago, here’s the other half…
I rather like this first page, the background fabric of eucalyptus leaves is what gave me the colour scheme initially. Words on this page include trapped (the shell circle) running, petal, which was made with circles gathered up together, lumpy (a pile of French knots), cup (a domed piece of stitching of which I can’t remember the stitch name!) and the most recent one which was stuffed.
I really wasn’t sure when I saw the video for stuffed as Anne’s were quite bulky to give some 3D texture to her piece, but mine are going into a book so I don’t want anything too bulky. Anne made hers round a cotton ball, I remembered a little packet of mini cotton-wool balls and I actually managed to find them. They were red but that didn’t matter too much. I used a length of sari silk as it was nice and fine, I made five in a row and stitched them near the petals.
The other side of the eucalyptus fabric could possibly do with a little more adding. This was one of the earlier pages I started. Words on these pages include hidden (a ring of felt under a circle), spike (a woven stitch) meander (a couched thread) and jump (some short lengths of beads jumping over the meander), rib (straight stitches close together) parallel (bugle beads), tassel and encrusted which is the circle of beads.
These were the very first pages I stitched, with layers of fabric and loops with loopy French knots and the thistle head which has cut loops. Although there’s only two words on this page I think there’s probably enough. The page on the left has hummock, slit and dotty, I feel it needs a bit more around the slit, maybe a bigger circle, perhaps in cross-stitch.
This is the last page to show you, with cross, silky, rolls, fringe, holey, wrinkle and furrow. I think there’s probably enough going on on this page even though there are a few spaces.
So I’ve a little stitching to do to finally finish this stitch-a-long, but not much. I’ve a bit of a deadline for finishing the book as I’m doing a workshop with Anne in March and I did tell her I would take it along. I’ve enjoyed this SAL with the word prompts but I’m ready for a change now, once a week for a year is a long time!!
It’s two years since Bella came to live with us and she has come on leaps and bounds so I thought it was time to do an update. Here’s my first post about when we first brought Bella home. I remember reading a post about a rescue breeders dog that sounded just like Bella and the owner said it took about two years for his dog to finally come out of her shell and I think that’s about right.
When she came to us she wouldn’t come in the main house (we had to take her round the house on a lead wherever we went for a couple of weeks ) she only ate when we were in bed and didn’t ‘do’ treats at all. She didn’t like doorways or gateways or walking close to us if our legs were crossed. She had never been lead walked or come across traffic. She shrank back with any sudden movement and certainly wouldn’t approach for a fuss. So yes officially she was a rehome, but in reality she was a rescue!
This was Bella in November 2023…
She is still timid and can startle herself very easily, but she has so much more confidence than when she arrived. She will eat when we’re around now but still backs off if we approach her. She is much happier and more confident outside such as on walks, she loves what we call her freedom runs and zoomies. Yesterday she was very happy as her favourite puddle finally returned to the old cricket pitch. She spent five minutes having zoomies into the water!
Inside our home she has her safe spots, the sofa in the conservatory is hers, but she also has a corner in my sewing room, another in my OH’s office. She still needs encouragement to join us on an evening in the lounge.
When she first arrived I said we would have cracked it with her when she lay on her back and wriggled. This summer she finally did just that on the lawn in the garden, even allowing us to do belly rubs. She still wouldn’t do it in the home but that’s huge progress.
In the last couple of months she has finally started taking treats from our hands, she’s better at this outside on walks, needing a lot of encouragement at home and even then she sometimes just won’t take it.
She is greatwalking both on and off the lead when I hold the lead up she sits and waits for me to walk up and put it on. She seems to understand when I put the lead on due to a potentially unfriendly dog as she sits for it to be removed as soon as we pass them! She doesn’t pull on the lead any more, or at least she doesn’t with me, she seems to understand that with me (due to balance issues) she mustn’t pull.
She is a gorgeous dog with a very gentle personality, we are hoping to get a puppy in the summer as we think that having a friend will bring her out of her shell even more.
I keep playing catch up with this stitch-a-long and then forget to post about it! This is the weekly word prompt for a piece of textile art, Anne Brooke is running it, I saw her finished hoop at the knit and stitch show last month and it looked amazing, full of texture and interest. The project is designed to be stitched on an 18″ hoop, I’ve no where to hang an 18″ hoop so I’m making mine into a book, so I have had to adapt things occasionally.
Last week the word was ‘attached’, so Anne added buttons, stitching them on in a variety of ways. I stitched some buttons on as they did help fill a few emptier spaces. I also stitched on a brooch my mum made years ago when she went to jewellery class.
Other words on these two pages are ‘limpet’ which are Suffolk puffs, ‘wriggly’ which is twisted thread couched down, ‘wall; which was meant to be a wall of crochet, but I couldn’t get it thin enough to work so I used detached blanket stitch instead. The two holes are ‘edge’, Anne had then overlaid with a piece of backing fabric behind, I thought it would be quite nice to have a window through to the next page. The tassel is meant to be ‘teasel’ but I think it looks more like a thistlehead, I still haven’t worked out what word to put next to this one, shaggy, flowing…I’ll wait to see what the last few words of the year are.
The other side of this strip with the other hole has a few more buttons and a spare Suffolk puff. Mend was an early word, you can just see behind the three circles is a raw edge. two pieces of linen weren’t quite big enough so I stitched the circles over the raw edges to join them together. Thr three circles on the right were for ‘ripple’, that’s wool that’s couched over. Twisted is a stitch which I can’t remember the name of but you basically do a line of stitches slipped on a needle before pulling it through to make a sticking up stitch!
The page on the left still needs a bit of filling to one side I think, even if it’s just some running stitch circles.
Another recent word was twist, this is a macrame knot used to make a twisted length, I struggled to think where to place it in my book of circles, in the end I added it to the page opposite the dangle bits.
The pretty pieces for ‘woven are made on a cogged wheel, they’re called Yorkshire buttons, if you want to make a button you carry on weaving thread round the circle and then gather it round some stuffing. I’ve added a few on other pages too as they fill up space nicely without dominating a page.
The ‘wrapped’ is done with buttonhole stitch over a washer, some of it is perle thread, other times it’s 4 ply wool.
The other end of this linen strip has a few more Yorkshire buttons but this time they come under the word ‘love’, or to give it’s full title, do what you love.. ‘Yummy’ was just a piece of something you really liked, for me it was this piece of batik. Fly stitch is used for ‘buzzy’.
On the left there is ‘gills’, using pistil stitch to represent the gills of a mushroom. Coils are just a heap of bullion knots.
With just three weeks to go I’ll be glad when this SAL has finished, I’ve enjoyed doing it and Anne always makes me think out of the box a bit, trying new things, but once a week for a year takes some keeping up with!
Once I’ve done the three remaining weeks I’ll have a look at my pages and see which areas need a little more stitching, it might just be a circle of running stitch, or herringbone. or I might repeat one of the techniques from earlier in the year.
I’ll post the other two sets of pages in a couple of days time 🙂
I’ve just finished another postcard, these are designs by Rebecca of Featherstitch House, they’re lovely designs with a video suggesting stitches and threads. Three weeks ago I had just arranged the base fabrics of the foxglove postcard, using bondaweb to keep everything in place whilst I stitched it…
The following day I had my Skipton Stitchers meeting so I took it along to work on.
The background has rows of running stitch to add some texture, I’m always a bit hesitant about doing this kind of stitching as it’s random, I don’t find random easy! I used a fine variegated green perle which I bought in Singapore last month, mixed with a DMC variegated which has the pink and green tones. I’m amazed how well it’s come out, I really like it.
The petals are stitched with straight stitches which are woven together to give a bit of shading. For the leaves I used fly stitches to make the veins. By the time I came home my foxgloves looked like this…
The foxgloves then sat in my workbox for two weeks, partly because the design called for some lettering, Rebecca had used some of those mini printing sets, I looked for some at the knit and stitch show without success, my local Hobbycraft only sold the large alphabet set so I started to think of alternatives.
I wondered about embroidering straight onto the green background but decided it would probably be lost amongst the running stitches, I could do hand written labels on cotton, embroider them…but I decided eventually to use evenweave linen with simple back-stitch lettering using the variegated DMC thread. I stitched them on with back-stitch, they are straighter than they look in the photo!
I can’t take credit for choosing the apt quote, that was Rebecca. Digitalis is the Latin name for foxgloves and digoxin is a heart drug made from foxgloves. It is used to slow the heart rate down.
The foxglove flowers were finished with chain stitch along the front of the ‘frill’ and blanket stitch along the inside edge. I started doing the lines and spots inside the trumpet with pistil stitch, but in the end I found separate French knots and straight stitches worked better.
I’m really pleased with this postcard and thoroughly enjoying stitching them all. This afternoon I think I’ll prepare another one as I’ve got another Skipton Stitchers meeting tomorrow.
Please visit the other blogs that are also taking part in this SAL. There are so many different projects to enjoy. The participants live all over the world so you may need to allow for time differences. We’re posting today at local time. Click the links to their blogs below and see what they’re up to.
It’s happy dance time, I’ve just, this morning, finished my book of cross-stitch words. I’m pleased with it but I can’t say I’ll be rushing to make another slot and tab book!!
In my last post I shared the finished pages of cross-stitch, a mixture of Little Sheep Virtues, some with apt quotes along side, and some of the Sew Together series…
The instructions for the slot and tab book is on Anne Woods website, she uses it for her ‘100 days of stitch’ books, they’re very good instructions, very clear, but you do have to concentrate during the construction…a lot!
The instructions are for a book of twenty pages, four of which are taken up by the front and back cover. I would have thought you could alter the number of pages but it’s certainly beyond my brain. Having seen a comment on instagram about the books I made the front and back covers half an inch wider than the pages as they wrap around the spine a bit, it worked out well as the covers are just nicely wider than the pages when closed. I did a crossword for the front title, it’s also got the grid in ecru which is hard to see on the photos.
Having read the instructions and handled the pages quite a lot when doing the running stitch, I realised that my cheats method of bondaweb to attach the backing fabrics for the quotes was not going to survive turning the page inside out, some were already starting to lift. This may be because its quite old bondaweb, but I needed to rectify it. I used the button hole stitch on my sewing machine and a variegated green machine embroidery thread to go round each one and I think it’s worked pretty well.
To make the book you basically need three sets of pages with a slot in the centre and two sets with ‘tabs’, the tabbed one will slot into the other…
…so the top one on the photo has the slot and the bottom one will ‘slot’ into it. Easy enough! The problem is that the pages are not opposite the one where they will be when it’s put together! You will notice the tape stuck on each page, that has the page number on, so page 8 is attached to page 13…I knew I would have to concentrate!
I stitched the first set of four pages together, turned them the right side out, pressed them, happened to fold them in half…and realised one set was upside down! I had to unpick it all and start again, not great with quarter inch seams when you’ve already trimmed the corners!
After that they all seemed to go together smoothly, I hand-stitched all the openings closed and started to put it together. You have to put them together in order and when I went to slot on the fourth page I realised I had attached the two sides the wrong way round as in left to right. It was the last set of pages I stitched later in the evening so I was probably tired. This wouldn’t have been vital in some books but two quotes were opposite the wrong sheep. Out came the unpicker again!
Luckily the correct pages were backing the right page, so I just unpicked the centre seam, stitched them both closed so I had two separate pages, I could then attach them again by hand having swopped them left to right. I fixed it this morning and after a good press I put them all together…
…and everything was in the right order!
This method of making a book makes a nice soft, squidgy book, not quite so neat and tidy as books I’ve made before. I think it would be lovely for a children’s fabric book, they could even have fun taking it apart and putting it in the right order!
As I said before, I’m pleased with it, I like it…but I don’t think I’ll be making another using this method…too much brainpower for a start! I think I like my fabric books to have a bit more structure too, I like softer books for some things, but I still like the construction to be neat and for the pages to lay nicely. It was a useful exercise, I’m trying out different book constructions at the moment for my talk next autumn – I’ll certainly have plenty to talk about with this book!
I’ve been concentrating on my cross-stitch words book over the last couple of weeks, I felt ready to get it finished! I’m making it using the tab and slot method which is a way of putting together a book by slotting the pages together. The only instructions I’ve found are for twenty pages, it’s quite a complex (but simple!!) way of constructing a book so for my first attempt I wouldn’t like to deviate from the instructions, so twenty pages it is!
The pages include the front and back cover, so that takes up four pages. With the four Sew Together pieces and the Little Sheep Virtues I had eleven all together. I have patterns for another two sheep but I really didn’t fancy doing another one. Instead I’ve chosen five of the sheep virtues and found a quote that goes with it.
I’ve used two French ones which I’ve kept for years, though I had to check the spelling, I’ve hopefully got them right. I would roughly translate them as ‘Everything is possible with hope’ and ‘True friendship is like the sea, it comes in and it goes out, but it’s always there’.
I’ve just used my usual back-stitch font in a fine green variegated perle thread which I think works very well. I decided to live dangerously and not plan them out first on graph paper, I just started to stitched them as I would write them, luckily they all worked out! All the quotes are mounted on a rectangle in the same fabric as the matching sheep.
I used fabrics from my stash to make the surrounds for all the pages. I’ve trimmed them to 8″ as I want my finished page to be 7.5″. Initially I was planning to just leave them plain but I decided they were a bit too plain so I’ve done a double running stitch line along two sides of each piece and added three buttons to the opposite corner.
I’ve just two pages to add running stitch and buttons to, otherwise all sixteen pages are complete…
I’ve just got the front and back to make now and then I can start putting it together…and that’s when I need to start concentrating!
Over the last week I’ve been making a stitch-book. It’s not one that will have different types of stitches in, it’s an empty book for pieces of embroidery I’m not sure what to do with. I’ve a few pieces that I’ve done at work-shops, I’m pleased with them, I like them too much to throw them, but not enough to have them framed to hang on the wall! At the moment they’re heaped in a box.
You may have seen Stitch-books on Etsy or on the Stitchbook Studio, they consist of folded pages on rings. The idea is that you can open out the page, stitch on it, and then no one can see the back once it’s folded. They sell the pages ready made or you can buy the pattern. OK if I’d seen one in the flesh I could have worked the pattern out but when someone has gone to the effort of designing a product and writing a pattern, I think they deserve the business.
The actual sleeve is easy enough to make, I made it slightly more fiddly by adding pelmet interfacing to the edges so the pages would stand up better. The hardest bit in my opinion was inserting the eyelets! I had bought a tool to insert them, a bit like a pair of pliers, as I thought that would be easier than a hammer, which it was. I just never twigged that you also need a hole punch! I used to have one that belonged to my mother but it was totally blunt so I binned it.
At the knitting and stitching show I thought I’d see a hole punch, none to be found! I did see a Prym plastic set that included a hole punch, it was only £3 so I thought it was worth a punt. The instructions were very poor, a video didn’t help, so in the end I ordered a beast of a pair from Screwfix, what sold it for me was a review from a lady who’d used it on denim for bag-making.
They worked! I still didn’t find it easy squeezing the eyelets in place, they either went first time or they were a nightmare! Anyway, they’re all on, six on each page, four pages complete.
Having made the pages, I decided I wanted a cover of some kind. I could have just made a square to go on the front and back, maybe with a tie to hold it shut but I felt that would still be quite flimsy. I decided to make a folder, using the rings like a file.
The cover is definitely an example of measure twice, cut once! Ideally it would have been better a little wider and a little longer. I used samples from one of those sample books you see in curtain shops. It seemed quite apt for a book of samples! Of course the samples weren’t quite big enough, I had two squares so I needed a seam down the middle. As the patterns didn’t match it was quite obvious so I decided to stitch a spine over the seam. I had a co-ordinating fabric which worked very well but with hind-sight this being a bit wider than I had planned meant the front and back were a smidge short.
To fasten the rings to the folder I stitched a tube of the lining cotton fabric, ironed it flat so it as about 5/8″ wide. I stitched it down the centre but left gaps where the rings would be, stitching across at each ring too. The rings slot in quite nicely.
All I need to do now is start stitching pieces in. I’ll probably make a couple more pages then see how it goes.
I seem to have ended up with four different hand embroidery projects on the go at once, all actually destined for different fabric books so I’m afraid I haven’t done much from my postcards project, it is less easily portable, so it didn’t get taken on holiday. It’s only small but it takes some planning. I have however managed to start another one this week.
I decided to do one of a foxglove, they’re a lovely flower, I love seeing them both in the garden where they happily self seed, or in the wild. Rebecca from Featherstitch House has done a gorgeous design using raw edge applique and bondaweb.
I chose a mottled green cotton as my background, the grid marks on it are guidance for some background stitching. I drew them before I remembered I needed to iron on fleece on the back and as it’s done with a Frixion pen, all my marks disappeared! Rather than draw them all again I popped it in the freezer overnight so they all returned.
The foxglove parts are stuck on with bondaweb, though Rebecca uses Fuseaweb which apparently doesn’t separate from the paper like bondaweb tends to do, I’m going to keep an eye out for it at the Knit and Stitch show next weekend.
The instructions call for four different pink fabrics for the flowers, I haven’t got that much pink, but in my scrap box I found some watercolour print cotton I made a dress with years ago with pink roses. I fussycut the different shades from different parts of the roses. I’m pretty pleased with how they’ve worked out.
All I’ve got to do now is the embroidery!
Please visit the other blogs that are also taking part in this SAL. There are so many different projects to enjoy. The participants live all over the world so you may need to allow for time differences. We’re posting today at local time. Click the links to their blogs below and see what they’re up to.
thecraftycreek 