Mabel’s sketchbook (III)

Although the Rosenstich/Greek cross pulled stitch turned out to be not quite what I was looking for, I was still fairly certain what I wanted to do with this Daffodil design. Well, when I say "certain" I don’t mean in the sense of knowing exactly what it would look like; more in the sense of having several ideas, one of which (or a combination of them) would definitely be part of the finished design. Hang on to that word "definitely" – it’ll crop up again later.

Mabel's sketchbook

As you can see, the sketch contains the following ideas:

  1. The daffodil would be stitched in four shades: "yellow + l. yellow bars", "d. yellow bars" and "v.d. yellow bars"
  2. The petals could be divided into 4 using cutwork and 4 using surface stitch
  3. Or the only cutwork/Hardanger could be the centre, with 4 petals in pulled work and 4 in surface stitch
  4. The surface stitch could be a closed herringbone, or possibly some sort of knotted or woven or plaited stitch

I decided that I liked the option with Hardanger in the centre, and then the petals half pulled and half surface; I also realised quite quickly that the stitch I’d been rummaging for in the recesses of my mind was not herringbone but fishbone stitch. It’s a lovely surface stitch that is great for leaf shapes, but as I started charting the first petal it soon became clear that there is an important difference between charting for yourself, and charting so that other people can actually make sense of it.

If I were charting just for me, I’d indicate the rough outline of the petal with a backstitch line (which would not actually be stitched but only appear on the chart to show the placement of the petal). Then I’d say to myself, "OK, now fill in that shape with fishbone stitch". Done.

But you can’t do that for a chart pack – as the whole design would be worked on a counted fabric, I’d have to indicate exactly where the stitches were to sit; I didn’t feel that the surface-embroidery-on-non-count-material method of asking people to transfer the leaf outline to their fabric using some sort of dressmaking pencil and then filling it in would be much appreciated.

So that was pretty much that for the fishbone stitch. Add to that the fact that my original idea for the pulled part of the design, Rosenstich (called Schwalm in the sketch because it is used in that type of embroidery), turned out to be rather too rough on the rest of the fabric to be much use, and things weren’t boding well for the daffodil. Nevertheless I set out to draw a few Kloster block and satin stitch outlines in various shades of yellow in the hope that they would miraculously turn into something usable. Soon I had quite a pleasing shape, and the day began to look better. Except that it did look rather familiar. And then I realised it was almost the exact shape of Flora, except that I was adding extra petals!

So that was it. End of story. I didn’t want to chart something so similar to an unconnected design, and besides, it wasn’t similar enough in overal shape to the three other UK designs to make a fourth in that set.

I’m sorry if this is beginning to sound as if hardly any ideas ever make it into a chart – it’s not quite that bad. But you do occasionally get dead ends, and things that were "definitely" going to be in there turn out to be impractical. Even so you usually find that some of those discarded ideas come in handy in some future design, or at least add a new skill to the repertoire (even if it isn’t a particularly useful one). And I’m not giving up on that daffodil yet!

Oh my goodness, I have been tweeted!

I am fairly computer savvy. I use it for my work, I design on it, I write my own websites. I even have a blog! I can do computers. But the associated ways of communicating have so far failed to become an integrated part of my existence. I don’t have a smartphone. I text very infrequently. I don’t Skype. I have a Facebook account, but any friends or relatives trying to contact me through it generally have a three-month wait before I finally pick up their messages and reply to them. As for Twitter, I am not even totally sure how it works, and have managed to lead my life without feeling its lack very keenly.

Imagine my surprise when I looked at my web stats recently (a useful little gadget which tells me how many people drop in for a visit to Mabel’s Fancies every day, and roughly where they are on the globe) and found a visitor who had been referred by something called t.co – which on investigation turned out to be Twitter’s link shortening service. I have been tweeted!

Perhaps there is something to be said for all those new-fangled communication methods after all! So for all tweeters and facebookers out there I’ve now added the appropriate buttons. One day I may even find out what they do …

Mabel’s sketchbook (II)

Last Monday I showed you the smallest of the three projects in my sketch, the little freebie peacock. There wasn’t an awful lot to say about it, as it was a fairly straightforward "conversion" from line drawing to cross stitch. But some ideas take a bit more thought and experimentation.

Most of the bottom half of the page concerns a daffodil. You may remember that I’ve been keeping an idea in the back of my mind for a daffodil-or-leek-themed piece to go with Scotland the Brave, Tudor Rose and Luck of the Irish, and when my husband and I were on our Welsh weekend, where the daffodils were outnumbered only by the woolly spring lambs and the vintage cars (it was that sort of weekend …), I suddenly saw how the piece might work, and that led to the sketchbook doodles.

One of the ideas was to use pulled work for some of the petals. In pulled work no threads are cut, but the stitches are pulled very tightly so that an open, lacy structure is created, and I thought that might make an interesting contrast with the cutwork of Hardanger. Then I remembered a stitch I’d found on the internet, for which I had rather tantalisingly not got very precise instructions but which looked interesting. It came from a technique called Schwalm, and was called Rosenstich. In fact it did have some cutting, but not nearly so much as Hardanger, and the stitch itself looked rather like a tightly pulled version of a dove’s eye, which would add a neat touch of similarity to the contrast. I drew the stitch very sketchily, with next to it an impression of what it might look like pulled, and a note to "check how to connect" the individual stitches, that it to say, how to get from one to the next!

Mabel's sketchbook

As I was looking for more information online, and trying to work out how I might connect the stitches (lots of pencil sketches and even more rubbing out!), I couldn’t help feeling that I’d seen that stitch somewhere else, under a different name. Now that in itself is not unusual – there are only so many different things you can do with a needle and thread, and it is not uncommon for people in different parts of the world to come up with the same thing (or something very similar) and to give it their own, local name. I seemed to remember it was pulled work without any cutting, so I looked through several of my books and eventually found it in a fascinating book I bought in a second-hand shop some time ago, Carolyn Ambuter’s The Open Canvas. It describes a great variety of pulled and cut work, all done (as the title suggests) on canvas rather than fabric. And in it I found what she calls (rather confusingly to a Hardanger enthusiast) "Greek cross filling".

It came with quite a clear diagram which was not unlike my final pencil-on-squared-paper version, except that I started each stitch in a slightly different way. Having compared the two, I decided to go with my own version as it would feel more natural to stitch it like that. Time to put it to the test!

I’ve always got off-cuts of 25ct fabric lying around, as well as some #5 and #8 perle (the latter a superfluous ball of DMC 319 which I had bought without referring to my stock list), so I used those. I found in time that using an off-cut was not a good idea, as it was too small to sit in a hoop properly, which made it difficult to pull my stitches evenly. Oh well. I had decided on some cutting (as in the Rosenstich version) but only very minimally – 1 thread every other 3. The cutting meant I needed some sort of satin stitch border, which I unfortunately miscounted so that on two sides there is a single group of 2 threads rather than 3. Never mind, it would still work. Incidentally, in any "proper" project I would have tucked the cut ends in!

Rosenstich Greek Cross

The next part was the actual pulled work, which was quite relaxing to do once I got into a rhythm. I was surprised to see that what was stitched pretty much like a dove’s eye turned into a little + when pulled tightly. Of course in traditional pulled work it would be white-on-white and nearly invisible, and if it ever made it into the daffodil project it would be yellow-on-white so visible but not very prominent; whereas here the dark green clamours for attention. But for practising and experimenting purposes that suited me very well.

Rosenstich Greek Cross

It did end up very puckered – at least partly because the fabric hadn’t been stretched tautly enough, no doubt – and even some very vigorous ironing didn’t restore it to the square it should have been; even so, I liked the effect of the bunched fabric threads and the holes.

Rosenstich Greek Cross

Nevertheless, I don’t think this one will be used in any of my projects; although it would make a really nice contrast with Hardanger, my idea of "echoing" the Rosenstich with dove’s eyes in the Hardanger part wouldn’t really work because the Rosenstich doesn’t look like a dove’s eye anymore. I’d also worry that the pulled stitches would distort the rest of the design. Unless, perhaps, it was done on a very loosely-woven linen, where the pulled stitches would be less likely to distort the fabric beyond their immediate area; but unfortunately I don’t like doing Hardanger on loosely-woven linen!

So still no daffodil design. On the other hand, I’ve learnt more about a stitch I hadn’t used before, found out what I can and can’t use it for, and I had an enjoyable time doing so. The daffodil will come. Some day.

Time flies…

First of all a belated Easter blessing to all those who celebrate it; may its good news remain with you throughout the year!

And now it’s Easter Monday, and Mabel’s Fancies’ official 1st Anniversary. Strictly speaking we’ve not quite reached one year yet, as Easter is a moveable feast and last year it was particularly late. But I like the idea of an Easter Monday anniversary, the first day after the new beginning of Easter. Don’t worry, I’m not trying to claim some sort of theological significance for Mabel’s Fancies smiley, but it was definitely a new venture for me, and I’d like to thank everyone who has shown their support over the past year.

Speaking of which, remember the sketch with the doodles for new designs? One of them was a peacock seen from the front. The idea was to have a "companion piece" to the little peacock in profile which I designed for use on silk gauze, but which can be stitched on other fabrics as well (one on black Hardanger can be seen in the Gallery).

Mabel's sketchbook

Well, I had a bit of a play with that sketch over the weekend, and here, as a little thank you, is the new peacock freebie. Enjoy!

download

Mabel’s sketchbook (I)

Saturday 7th April 2012

For some reason I can’t settle down to stitch at the moment. There are several reasons for that; the main one is the fact that most of my stitching is done in the evenings, sat in a comfy armchair. Fine for most of my designs, but not ideal for the woven picots in Frozen Flower – I really need to be sitting in my other stitching place for that, in the dining room with my hoop propped up against the table, being distracted by the garden which is beginning to get nice and colourful with all the grape hyacinths and tulips. But that really only happens at weekends when we have nothing else to do, which doesn’t seem to be quite as often as I’d like!

Stitchin place

Another reason is that several other designs are calling loudly to be stitched right now, and although usually I am quite happy to change my Planned order, unfortunately the threads for Fruit of the Spirit are on special order, and I’m beginning to be a little unhappy with the threads I chose for Odessa, so I can start neither of the two.

So what do I do in the evenings if I don’t stitch? Well, get through some of the programmes accumulated on our video recorder (or whatever the correct term is for its modern replacement), but also sketch new ideas.

Quite often I begin and complete designs on the computer. I’ve got an ancient cross stitch program which I bought second-hand on eBay several years ago, and by making extensive use of the backstitch tool and lots of self-defined stitches I manage to chart Hardanger with it. The advantage of this "doodling on the computer" approach is that I can use whatever turns out right and delete what doesn’t, and it is also a lot quicker to copy and rotate bits of a design when you don’t have to draw them all by hand. But sometimes I have only rather vague ideas, and then I prefer to sketch them out on paper; the paper method has the advantage that I don’t have to be at the computer to do it, and also that I can add notes, which I often do. Sometimes I even understand them when I read them back!

Mabel's sketchbook

So here’s the sketch I did a few evenings ago. It has the seeds in it of three designs, one of them probably a small freebie. Over the next week or so I’ll show you what these doodles are based on, which ideas made it, which were discarded and why, and what the eventual result is. That is always assuming that there will be a result, which at this stage is not at all certain …

An unexpected meeting and an impromptu class

You may remember (from the long Saga of Isobel’s Door Hanger) that we visited my husband’s parents a little over a month ago. My mother-in-law would be at her monthly embroidery class when we arrived, and I said wouldn’t it be interesting to see what they were all doing there, and promptly got invited to drop in. We’d be arriving about half an hour before they finished, so just enough time to have a look without disrupting the entire class!

There was some gorgeous stitching there – a beautiful photo album cover using various badges which all had a family significance, and a lovely doorway surrounded by flowers, which was all done in shades of cream and peach, and contained at least half a million French knots. I stood in awe of all this skill and creativity.

And then I saw a familiar sight; surely that was the latest Stitch magazine, and that lady was stitching my Tulips! I can’t tell you what an odd feeling it was to see someone stitching one of my designs – to see that familiar shape in someone else’s hoop, the stitches formed by someone else’s needle. It may just show me up for the rookie designer I am, but I found it quite exciting!

It also gave me an opportunity to be useful. You may remember seeing a notice on Mabel’s Fancies saying that unfortunately a stitch diagram had been left out of the Stitch article, and that people could contact me for the missing part should it cause them problems. Being on the spot meant I could show Karen the stitch, rather than emailing her the diagram. I got out my stitching folder and borrowed a few of her beads, and set about speed-stitching four Kloster blocks so that we could get to the problem, which was the beaded square filet.

Very few stitchers can resist having a look at a new stitch – who knows, you might be able to use it yourself some time! And so the afternoon ended with an impromptu mini group tutorial. You have no idea how tangly threads become when four people are watching your every stitch; and don’t even mention the cutting!

Impromptu Class

Karen has since finished Tulips, and has very kindly sent me a picture of her beautifully stitched and mounted piece, which you can see in the Gallery.

And the winner is …

*drumroll* Line! Congratulations, and I’ll send the skein of Watercolours to you as soon as I have your address. Perhaps you could send in a picture when you’ve used it in a project?

Everyone who entered the giveaway gave the correct answers, but if you didn’t enter and would like to know, Watercolours is a 3-ply thread, and shade 038 is called Morning Mist.

One of the people who wrote in asked me what the lovely shop in Ilfracombe was that I mentioned in my post about buying threads online. Well, it’s called Smugglers Needlecraft and it’s a veritable Alladin’s cave. We called in there once on out way to visit a cousin in Cornwall – a bit of a detour, but well worth it!

A Caron giveaway

Rejoice, rejoice – after some unpicking and a bit of a dilemma over the right shade for the lettering, the anniversary sampler is finished and waiting to be stretched over a lavender blue felt, if I can find any!

Lustrum anniversary sampler

In the process of trying to find the perfect shade for the Kloster blocks and satin stitch, I ended up with two skeins of Caron Watercolours 038. Both lovely, but of course I’ve only used the one that’s more lavendery; after all, that’s what the whole search was about! But what to do with the other skein, the mauve and cream one?

That’s an easy one – give it to another stitcher! Either to try something new, or to add to an existing thread collection. So if you’d like to give this poor unwanted skein a good home, by the end of Sunday 1st April with your address and the answer to these two questions:

  • In Hardanger you use one ply of Watercolours – but how many plies does the full thread consist of?
  • The colour number of this skein is 038 – what is its name?

A random winner will be picked from the correct entries on Monday 2nd. Good luck!

Buying threads online

Nowadays very few of us are lucky enough to have a needlework shop anywhere near us – let alone one that sells more than 14ct Aida and stranded cotton. For speciality threads or slightly more unusual fabrics you either have to travel a long way (there’s a lovely shop in Ilfracombe, for example …), bulk buy all your needlework supplies at a stitching show once a year, or buy online.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love the fact that I can get pretty much any thread or fabric I could possibly need (and many, many that I will never need but am tempted by nonetheless) by going online. I can get supplies from the UK, from my native Holland, and (if I’m willing to pay import duty and Royal Mail’s extortionate handling fee) from as far afield as America, Australia and South Africa. It’s great!

But sometimes, it’s just not good enough.

When I was trying to get three shades of beads (some of them variegated) that would match three variegated shades of Caron threads for Very Berry, I realised I hadn’t a hope of doing so unless I could compare the beads and threads in the flesh (or should that be "in the fibre"?) My husband very kindly took me shopping at Burford Needlecraft and I managed to find the exact shades I wanted – but trying to match them up on a computer screen would have been utterly impossible.

Very Berry

We don’t always have that option, though. Usually, the images on the monitor are all we have, and they’ll have to do. And so, what with the unreliability of online images and the differences in dyelots, buying hand-dyed threads online can lead to surprises when unwrapping your purchases.

Some shops do their very best to minimise these surprises, and are willing to go the extra mile for their customers. Stitching Bits & Bobs (US) has more than once helped me find the right shades by going through their stocks and finding a silk "a little more DMC 3042 than 3743", or some such description of mine. Sew & So have likewise been very helpful.

So I turned to them again when getting the threads for the anniversary version of Lustrum. I had decided on Caron 038, a very pretty shade I already had in Impressions (silk/wool), so I knew what it looked like in real life. On their site, however, the picture of the Watercolours thread in that shade looked much darker than the others in Caron’s range (Wildflowers cotton, Impressions and Waterlilies silk). When I contacted them I was advised to add a note to my order explaining that I needed the Watercolours and Wildflowers thread to be quite close in shade, and so not to send them if the Watercolours thread was really as dark as the picture suggested.

I don’t know how many dyelots they had in stock, but they managed to find me a Watercolours thread which was the same lightness as the Wildflowers thread, which was great. Unfortunately there was another snag – the Wildflowers they sent and the Impressions I already had were much alike in colour, with lavendery blues, pinks and creams, but the Watercolours thread had no blue shades at all and hardly any pinks, but was mostly cream and a warm lilac. (Click on the picture for a larger version.)

Caron 038

When I contacted them they very kindly had a look at the skeins of Watercolours 038 they had in stock, but they were all much the same, so we agreed I’d return the threads. I contacted a number of other shops carrying Caron threads, and several of them were extremely helpful. Burford Needlecraft sent a scan of the thread they had in stock, the London Bead Company looked at several dyelots for me and described them ("this one is more lavender blue, that one is more mauve, but the mauve one has more pink"). Both, unfortunately, were not blue enough. Finally I turned to Thread Bear, and after a few very helpful emails back and forth I picked one which I will now use with the thread I already have – Impressions is a little thicker than Wildflowers, but its matte appearance should make rather an interesting contrast.

Oh, and you’ll want to know what the new Watercolours looks like, of course! It is not easy to show the difference between two threads in photographs, but I think you’ll agree the new thread is definitely less mauve and more lavender than the original. So here it is, with the other threads and fabric that will make up the anniversary sampler.

Caron 038

One last variation

Good news on the Frozen Flower front – the smaller of the two is finished, and I have finally succeeded in recharting the larger one so that it looks more or less the way I envisaged it, and is stitchable without having to wield two needles at once, or take your thread through half a dozen woven bars. Once the moving house card and the anniversary sampler are out of the way, it may even get stitched!

I’m all right for birthday cards for the next month or so, having done all those Round Dozen variations recently! This is the last of the lot – well, almost …

I used the cutting pattern of North and the satin stitch motifs from Noon, but with a Queen’s stitch border instead of a four-sided stitch one. This disturbed the balance, so I moved the motifs away from the centre. For decorating the uncut Kloster block squares I chose double cross stitch, but in perle thread rather than stranded cotton or silk, which makes them very 3D and textural, almost like very fat and regular French knots. I’ll certainly use them again!

Round Dozen variation

So why did I say this one was "almost" the last of the variations? Well, as I was charting three of these recent variations, I suddenly thought a spider’s web sort of surface stitch would make a great border too, as long as it’s for a card and not for a coaster. Not quite spider’s web roses or whipped roses, that’s a bit too much texture. So I charted it with a border of large cross stitches woven round, and of course I will now have to stitch it!