I caught up with Anne Brookes weekly SAL over the weekend, luckily this weeks was a quick one!
This SAL is to stitch on a large hoop, I’m making mine into a book as I haven’t enough wall space left so I’ll have to adapt bits and it will probably be quite a bulky book! Each week the stitching is based on a word, obviously we can either follow Anne’s suggestion on go off-piste.
Week 3 word was rolls. For this Anne made narrow rolls of fabric and then couched them down with a variety of threads. She did quite long lines which help to break up the big circle of linen. As well as putting mine in a book, I’m also having a loose theme of circles. I tried cutting my first roll on the bias, thinking it would take the curve better…it might have done but it was awfully fiddly! I used a leafy quilting cotton for that one. I’m trying to use a variety of fabrics and threads, so I then made a roll from a crisp cotton gauze and another from some even-weave linen.
Having made the rolls I drew arcs on one of the linen pages and then stitched the rolls along the arcs, hopefully creating nice areas to stitch in in future weeks. I couched it down using perle and then some textured threads.
I’ve quite a collection of textured threads but I rarely use them, so I’m trying! I used a large eyed chenile needle to make sure the hole was big enough for the thread.
This week the word was hummock. This was made with a Suffolk puff (sometimes called a yo-yo) which was then lightly stuffed and couched down. Mine was very lightly stuffed so it didn’t dome too much and I might even end up taking a little bit out of it at a later date if I think it’s too big.
You’ll also note I’ve written the words on the fabric, following the curves. I’ve used a fine-point grey pen, I thought I’d start writing them before I forgot them!!
This was a little kit I found during my declutter, I decided I either stitch it or rehome it. I decided to stitch it, it was one of those free kits from the front of a magasine ages ago. I’ve always like the book ‘Diary of an Edwardian Lady’ which the picture is based on, in fact I’ve still got my copy from probably about 30 years ago!
The kit said it should take about four hours to stitch. Now I’m a quick stitcher and it took me a lot longer than four hours. However after several evenings work, it was done.
I had changed the aida in the kit from white to ecru, which I felt blended in better with the bookmark outer. I don’t like stitching on aida but I didn’t quite trust my thread counting to make sure an even-weave linen was the right size.
Here;’s the finished stitching,..
…and the made up bookmark.
It did cross my mind when stitching this, it just shows how many hours go into a fairly small piece of cross-stitch…minimum wage is around £10, would anyone pay £40 for a bookmark! How often do you see cross-stitched greeting cards at craft fairs, often for under £5!
I think it’s very pretty, I think I’ll use it with my bed-time reading.
When bees find a good source of nectar, they do a dance to show the other bees where it is, so having finally finished my bee book, I’m doing my happy bee dance!
Three weeks ago I’d stitched the pages together, I just had the cover to make. During the Sewing Room Declutter Challenge tidy up I then found a bumble bee kit from Raggedy Ruff Designs, my initial thought was that it would fit on the cover of the book…
…I then started making the cover and had to rethink!
I had chosen a lovely blue bee themed fabric from Lewis and Irene. I measured round the book aiming for the cover to be 1/4″ bigger than the pages. I used some Pellon to stiffen the cover, Pellon is like a very thick vilene, like it’s probably 2mm thick. It’s also iron-on on one side. I ironed it on and put the folds in for the spine so I could work out the cover design. I always add a strip of fabric underneath the spine too, just in case it’s visible.
I made a bee hive and a queen bee last month to go on the spine. It only just fits and it was quite hard work stitching through the pellon. There’s a little gap at the top so the queen bee can be pulled in and out and the ribbon is the book mark. I added a bee charm to the end of the ribbon.
My tulip bee didn’t look right next to the hive on the spine, so I kept the cover simple with the title and a ribbon to tie.
I mulled over the name of the bee book for quite a while, I did quite like ‘A Bee Compendium’, with its ABC, but with compendium being such a long word, I couldn’t get it to work. In The end I kept it simple with ‘Bee’. I found a cross-stitch font I liked on Etsy and stitched it on a blue linen. The tiny bee button which I’ve had in my stash for ages worked perfectly.
I started to stitch the title on using the back-stitch but I realised very quickly that trying to do neat back-stitch through the pellon and stitch the label straight at the same time was going to be very hard. Instead I back-stitched the linen first and then machine stitched right next to the back-stitch so it blends in nicely.
So, my next dilemma was what to do with the tulip bee! Obviously I wanted to use it, it was too bright and happy to go at the back opposite the Last Bee poem. Colourwise it actually went perfectly next to the title page, so although it’s not ideal having the title page second, I wasn’t going to start unpicking pages. I cut a piece of iron-on buckram the same size as the pages to back the tulip with. I could then slip-stitch it to the title page, ready to stitch it to the cover.
For the back inside cover I decided to keep it simple with just the blue of the cover, so I made another ‘page’ of the blue fabric and slip stitched that to the Last Bee page.
Then came the fiddly bit, stitching the inside covers to the outer cover…lots of clover clips and a few curses later and it was complete. I had added the ribbon as I went which holds the book closed, I do like a ribbon closure on my fabric books.
Well I thought it was complete…
I was sorting another box for the Sewing Room Declutter Challenge and I found another bee embroidery, a square of crazy patchwork. It was so lovely I had to use it! I just checked back and I made this in January 2022!
Luckily it did look right next to the Last Bee poem, colour wise it worked and it wasn’t too bright and cheerful. I trimmed it to a neat 5″ square. I looked at ways to attach it as the book was already complete. In the end I used bondaweb!
There is definitely no more room in my book! I’ve counted up and there are over fifty embroidered bees of various sizes and styles. If you include the ones on the fabrics too there are over a hundred bees in the book.
I decided the best way to share my book was a video, so I’ve add a reel to YouTube. Apologies for the silence, I tried adding some peaceful bee themed music, but it seemed to cut the video short!!! Here’s the link…
This SAL is organised by Avis, please follow the links to see what everyone else has been stitching;
This year I’ve decided to join in with two of Anne Brooke’s SAL’s, Bobbin Along which is a weekly one and What’s Sewing which is a monthly one. Anne Brooke is a lovely lady who lives not too far away near Brighouse, she started doing SAL’s in 2020 and has continued ever since. They are very much what I would call free embroidery, I did one in 2021 and it does push me out of my comfort zone so they’re good to do every so often!
Last time the SAL was to make a book, this time Anne is stitching into linen on an 18″ hoop. I know I haven’t the wall space for a big hoop, so despite the fact that Anne said her plans won’t work easily with a book, I’m going to adapt them and make a book!!
Every Friday she releases a video and a new word prompt. She then demonstrates how she is interpreting that work in her stitching. After much prevaricating over how I’m going to do this stitch-a-long, I finally started this week and stitched the first two weeks. I’ve chosen some duck-egg blue linen which was left over from a jacket as the base for the book, I’ve then picked a heavier cotton print of eucalyptus leaves as the inspiration for my colours.
The first word was ‘layers’. Anne appliqued three shapes onto her hoop which also helped everyone move on from the ‘white page syndrome’ where the starting fabric seems so big and plain you’re scared to start.
I have an plan to have a circles theme through the book, that might change, but I chose three different weights of fabric and cut out three different sized circles which then overlapped like the different layers of our lives. I stitched them on with a variety of simple stitches.
Week 2 word was ‘Loops’, Anne stitched an arc of loops which could then the trimmed to add texture and depth. I thought mine would get too squashed in a book, so after attempting a loopy butterfly which was not a success I changed to a thistle head which although the loops have been trimmed, they are designed to lie flat. I stitched a curved stem which follows the arc of the circle in chain-stitch, which of course is all loops! I then added an arc of loopy French knots, these are just French knots which are left loose, rather than pulled up neatly into a knot.
I’m trying to use a wide variety of threads this time. I’ve pulled perle, linen and textured threads into the mix and on this page I’ve only resorted to DMC for the stem and the French knots as I needed the fineness.
I think I’m just going to keep going on one page until it feels full, then move on to the next one, as obviously I don’t want a 52 page book, or even a 26 page one! I’m planning to write or embroider the words on the pages too.
I keep saying this is the last bee and then I make another one!
I found this kit whilst I was sorting through my patterns for the Declutter Challenge. I’d completely forgotten I had it, which is a bit frustrating as I now have to decide how to use it!
It’s another kit by Andrea from Raggedy Ruff Designs, She helpfully provided two sizes and the smaller one fits within the page size if the top flower is a little shorter.
This one was fairly quick to do as it’s on a plain background. The shapes are traced onto freezer paper which allows for easy cutting out of fiddly shapes. I was particularly pleased with the left hand tulip, the batik Andrea provided was gorgeous mix of yellow and purples, I managed to do some fussy cutting and I love the vein effect of that central petal.
I tend to use tiny dabs of fabric glue to hold the pieces in place whilst I then stitch all the way round with some mid brown thread. Then I stitch all the way round a second time, I used to miss this part of the instructions out but actually I think you do get a better effect. Any bit you wobbled on or missed, you can catch it second time round.
Then comes the fun part, adding the machine embroidery! I’ve done quite a few of these now so I am getting more confident – I don’t have to remember to breathe anymore! I also know it doesn’t have to be neat or perfect – the eye is very good at picking out the correct line!
So here is my finished bee. The only bit I’m not sure about is the orange edge to the top tulip, I’m tempted to go over it with a purple pen, maybe I’ll try a bit with a purple frixion pen first!
I haven’t decide yet where this is going to go. My first idea was to put it on the front cover, it would look good there, but I’m not sure if it will look right with the bee hive on the spine. I think I’ll make the book cover, add the hive, then I can see what it looks like. The alternative is to put it on the inside cover opposite the title page. Colour-wise I actually think they look OK together so it is an option.
I’m doing quite well with the sewing room declutter this year, I’m almost up to date! Karen Brown from Just Get it Done Quilts breaks it down into daily bite-sized chunks, some bigger chunks than others!
After a day sorting through books and magasines, I’ve two piles to either sell or charity shop. I love books so it was quite hard, but I had a realistic look through them. There are some I’ve had for years but they’ve still projects in them I’d like to do, others are good for ideas or techniques. However my tastes and crafts that I enjoy have changed over the years and some books have never been used and are not likely to now. I’ve got three GB Sewing Bee books which I’ve hardly used, luckily my daughters friend has just taken up sewing so she is going to give her them.
Patterns was big area as I have sewing patterns, quilt patterns, as well as embroidery patterns. I’ve a little pile of unused sewing patterns to sell, I’ve binned a few which I’ve made but either no longer fit or I don’t want to make again. I sorted out my embroidery and cross-stitch patterns and any unwanted ones can probably go to my stitch group sales table.
We had a day sorting scissors etc. As I’ve mentioned before, I have a bit of a thing for pretty embroidery scissors, but they’re all sharp and used fairly regularly. I decided I didn’t need quite so many paper scissors, a large pair and a smaller pair were enough, so the rest have gone downstairs for general use.
Threads was a big day for me. Sewing machine threads aren’t too bad but my overlocker threads are getting old and thread doesn’t last for ever. I’ve kept four of each colour and disposed of the rest.
My DMC threads are pretty sorted, I’ve a set of mini drawers with Pip and Chip bobbins, they’re all in number order as that’s mainly how I use them. I had a few old ones which I think probably came from my mums, so probably over 20 years old. I decided if they weren’t used by now they could go.
I had quite a few other hand embroidery threads which needed sorting, I put what I could on bobbins, they’re kept in another set of drawers in colour order. I need to try and use these more, be a bit more adventurous rather than always reaching for tried and trusted DMC.
Machine embroidery threads are in a box and last years I made trays for the box so they’re nicely sorted.
I enjoyed the day for irons and pressing stuff as I’ve recently bought an ironing station! Well actually it’s a kitchen trolley, but the top was just the right size for my wool ironing mat. I’ve a drawer for things like pressing cloths and hams, a cupboard where I can keep the Best Press spray and my clapper. I hang tape measures on the end and there’s shelves for some of my storage boxes. It’s on wheels too so I can easily move it round, though it’s working quite well sitting at the end of my sewing table.
Today I’ve to sort out notions, that may take a while…buttons, ribbons, linings interfacing…it’s a big section!
So far my sewing room doesn’t look much tidier, probably because I’ve still several projects on the go, but at least I know it’s more sorted!
Last week I finished a bee for the cover of my book. It’s meant to be a bee-hive scissor fob and needle keep. I spotted it at the Knitting and Stitching Show in Harrogate in the autumn. It was actually the promotion postcards that first drew my attention as they had embroidered bees on!
They are designed by Blue Coppice and her designs were so pretty. Having asked if I could possibly have two of her postcards I did want to support her by buying one of her patterns. My thought is that the bee-hive will go on the spine of the book with the Queen Bee needle keep slipping inside it as a bookmark.
The bee and the hive were pretty straight forward to make though the hive took quite a while. It’s padded satin stitch so there are a total of three layers of thread and the top layer is then couched down with three different shades to give the curved effect. Obviously if I wanted to make a scissor fob then I would have to make another hive for the back. It’s backed with a co-ordinating batik and I slipped some felt inside as padding. I just back-stitched round the hive front and backing and then turned which was a little fiddly. I could then just slip-stitch the bottom.
The queen bee is embroidered on black felt. She has a little crown of gold thread and a red bead. I put a little felt inside again before over-stitching the front and back together. You can just see a needle sticking out of her bottom, her sting!
I love my little Queen Bee and her hive, my stitching might be a bit higgledy-piggledy with the couching but I think that somehow makes it look a little more rustic like a traditional woven bee skep.
If you fancy embroidering a bee or two, there’s several lovely designs over on the Blue Coppice website.
Well I’m afraid I’ve managed very little on my Owl and Hare Hollow quilt over the last three weeks, other projects have been taking up my evening slot when I would usually be quilting.
Three weeks ago I had almost quilted twenty-three blocks, hoping I would cross the half way point for the New Year…
…and I have now quilted the grand total of twenty-four blocks! So I have managed to quilt just over one block and I’ve still not quite reached the over halfway point of twenty-five blocks! In my defence we have had Christmas and New Year in between.
So this is my quilt so far…
As you can see from the hoop creases I’m working on the fifth row from right to left. Somehow I seem to have missed the bottom row completely and some of the next row too so I think before I start on the last two rows I’ll try and quilt those first.
Fingers crossed next time I will have crossed the half way point!
This Hand Quilt Along is an opportunity for hand quilters and piecers to share and motivate one another. We post every three weeks, to show our progress and encourage one another. If you have a hand quilting project and would like to join our group contact Kathy at the link below.
I’ve been a busy bee with my book over the last three weeks, I now have the makings of a book! It’s mini happy dance time!
Three weeks ago I was still making the final pages, cutting them to size and embellishing as necessary…
Since then I’ve finished all the pages, added a few more embellishments, organised them into some semblance of order and made them into pages. I’ve stitched the pages together and all I need to do now is make a cover.
I stiffened each page with either pelmet vilene or buckram, The vilene was left over from the garden book, I think I possibly prefer that one but the shop where I bought it from has moved to a little village not accessible by bus. B&M fabrics in Leeds sold the iron-on buckram so I thought I’d give that a try. The buckram is very adhesive on both sides so I just ironed down the edges over to the back initially. The Vilene is just adhesive on one side only so I could Iron it to the page and then iron the edges over. I slip-stitched all round before pressing the buckram side carefully so as not to get any creases forming. Most pages have one side with vilene and one side with buckram so the pages feel a similar weight.
The last couple of books I’ve made have been bound with my adaptation of Coptic stitch. This time I decided to try slip-stitching the pages together, each side was slip-stitched to it’s neighbour. I did pairs first, then put the pairs together and so on. The last one was very fiddly as by that time it was pretty thick and inflexible, making slip-stitch tricky. I tried a curved needle but mine are quite thick, too thick for the dense cotton.
I like the appearance of the slip-stitch from the inside, like you can’t see it, the disadvantage is that the book bows to the middle very slightly as the corners are more bulky. Hopefully this won’t be noticeable once the cover is on.
The hive page on the left is one where I added a little more, with the length of light purple lace and three buttons.
Having organised pages into pairs and then a rough order according to colour, I realised the one page I was having difficulty pairing up was the collage bee, just because it’s so big and bright, somewhat in your face! I made a four patch in yellow bee fabrics, initially intending to do a Raggedy Ruff quilt page. I then had the idea to make a pocket page, I’d been thinking how to do this for a while as I’ve been given or collected a few pictures of bees whilst doing this project, I was going to tuck them into the back cover. I decided however to make a page from some fine fabric which a friend gave me. I wanted to use it as she had gone to the effort of sorting it out and bringing it to the Skipton monthly meeting, the bees were quite ‘cartoonish’ though which made them quite difficult to place in the book. They worked perfectly though opposite the big bee. I just made a diagonal pocket and stitched it over the four patch. The top bee is a spare one which I carefully cut out and I confess I glued it on as whatever colour I tried showed up too much.
Another addition I made was to the goldwork bee, I cut it into a hexagon and mounted it on honeycomb fabric. I then found a gold thread which was thick enough to couch round the hexagon, I’ve had it in my stash for years so it was nice to use it. It looked great opposite the blackwork bee but I didn’t want the goldwork to damage the blackwork or the vintage lace. I used a tulle with gold bees on to make a protective page in between the two.
I’ve already chosen my fabric for the cover, a lovely blue Lewis and Irene fabric with bees on, I’ve just got to work out how I’m going to attach it. I also need some inspiration for the title of my book, otherwise it might just be called ‘Bee’, ideas so far include A Bee Compendium…which is nicely ABC, a Bee in my Bonnet, or something to do with the fact that if you count the ones on fabric too there are over 100 bees in the book!
Hopefully next SAL I’ll have my dancing shoes on 🙂
This SAL is organised by Avis, please follow the links to see what everyone else has been stitching;
Over the last few weeks I’ve managed to stitch the first and last page for my bee book…
At the Harrogate Knitting and Stitching show I made a bee-line (please excuse the pun!!) for a certain stall, in my garden book I stitched a little fabric panel with a lovely painting of a blue tit…
The same artist was there and as I thought, she had one of a bumble bee. I wanted to do the same idea of words on the background, I decided to do all the different jobs a worker bee does over her lifetime, from nurse to undertaker to forager. The background was blue, green and yellow, so I chose a similar DMC thread, so it wouldn’t compete with the bee.
I used a spare bit of green linen for the title and my details…
For the last page I used a poem I found a while back, fitting called ‘The Last Bee’ by Brian Bilston. I think it’s very poignant and also cleverly written with all the letter ‘b’s missing. I kept the page very simple so I didn’t detract from the serious message.
All I have to do now is make all my bees into a book!
thecraftycreek 