I’ve just started a new little embroidery project, I know, I hear you, haven’t I got enough projects on at the moment! Well, I realised on Sunday when I was packing up for Embroiderers Guild that I haven’t got a little portable project at the moment, especially now my Lizzie Stitching Wallet is on a frame. When I’m going somewhere where I know I’m likely to be sitting around, I like to have some stitching in my bag. Embroiderers Guild doesn’t start until 10am, but because of bus times I’m usually in Skipton by 8.30am, so I go to my favourite coffee shop, order a pot of tea and maybe cinnamon toast, and I sit and sew, very relaxing…

…but I need a small and portable project, I can hardly sit there with my table top frame!. I decided to start a new project which has been lulling about in my brain for a few weeks now. A couple of months ago I found (on Pinterest) a stitch sampler made into a textile book (Right hand photo). It’s made by Maya Matthew and she has kindly written a detailed post on how she makes her books.

Shortly after, I discovered Pin Tangle, an amazing blog where Sharon has tutorials on hundreds of different stitches.She has also made a stitch sampler but this time on a 30′ (yes, you did read that right!!) by 8″ length of linen. What I loved with this one is how she made it into a journal with occasional snippets of what’s going on in the world at the time of stitching. This is the sampler on  the left.

Sharon organises TAST, or Take A Stitch Tuesday, she has been releasing a new stitch every week for people to learn and try, of course you can post it on various social media sites too. I’m a bit late joining this as they are up to week 92 out of a hundred, but the list gives a comprehensive variety of stitches for me to learn.

I’ve decided to stitch mine journal style with a page for each type of stitch. This doesn’t mean I’ll have 100 pages luckily as for example there are about a dozen different chain stitches, so they’ll all go together.

I’m adding occasional journal bits, such as where I’m stitching it, this could be fun when I go on holiday! Major events or news might pop up too, though I want it to be positive news and there doesn’t seem to be much of that around at the moment!

I’m using a different DMC variegated thread for each page, so I’ll also have a record of what the different colours stitch like. The number at the bottom is the DMC number.

So here is my first page on Fly stitch. I did plain fly stitch first, then did the strip down the side, though half way down I regretted stitching it so close together! The second row is Italian Border stitch, which is a fly stitch with french knots. The third row is Tete de Boeuf, which is fly stitch with chain stitch at the ends to look like a bulls head. The fourth row is plaited fly stitch, it’s amazing what you find when you google fly-stitch!!

I embroidered a dandelion seed head in fly stitch, I’ve fancied doing one of these for ages, so it was a good excuse! I saw the flower and the leaves on Pinterest. The final border is like a border of fly-stitch, I made that one up but I do like the effect.

I embroidered ‘Skipton’ as that is where I started stitching it, together with the date. I’m edging it with a back-stitch ruler as taught by Faby Reilly so I can join the sides together with whip-stitch when the time comes.

So hopefully over the next few months I’ll have a regular little post on TAST and learn lots of stitches too!