Experimenting on robins and ladybirds

Posted on 20th December, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

No no, there’s no need to call the RSPB and the RSPCA – only fabric was hurt in these experiments, by being repeatedly stabbed with a needle. In the case of the robin, I was trying out a herringbone variation which I found when researching stitches for the Canvaswork module. I put in a few rather faint guidelines and worked the first row; as the rows intertwine, my idea was to change the colour gradually from 2 strands of dark through one dark with one medium to two medium and so on. But just as had been the case when sampling this on canvas, it was terribly awkward trying to get the needle up underneath the previous row of stitches as per the instructions in my Anchor Book of Canvaswork Stitches.

Could you perhaps do it differently by going down underneath the previous stitches, which would be easier as you could push those stitches out of the way with the needle when taking it down through the fabric? I tried it on my canvas doodle cloth and yes, it works! The front looks pretty much identical (the blue line shows the stitch done according to the book, the pink line with the alternative way of working it) – any difference in the picture is, I think, the result of having done only two lines the alternative way, which makes it look less dense. It does use more thread on the back (the blue arrow in the second picture points to the tiny stitches on the back when doing it “properly”, the pink arrow to the longer stitches of the not-so-awkward variation) but on the whole I’d say it’s worth it for being much less frustrating and a lot quicker.

So I gave that a try, and got to the first change in shading (dark/medium blend); then realised that I need to do the tail before continuing with the wing/body as it is further back in the design. I wanted to do it in satin stitch over a split stitch edge, so I have to come up at the body end, which would mess up the body stitching if I left it till later. In order to get the impression of texture in there in spite of the flat stitches, I chose to blend my dark and light brown, skipping the medium.

A tail needs seeing to first, with a split stitch outline

Blended satin stitch to make a perky tail

As for the ladybird, that comes from the needlepainting book I recently got. I’ve been wanting to try needlepainting, if only as a preparation for my Silk Shading module, and I also had some new (and older but not much used) fabrics and some new (and older but not much used) silks to experiment with. Fortunately the book comes with some beginner’s exercises and as there are three I’m going to try them with different combinations of fabric and thread. First up: a ladybird shell in Pipers floss silk on Empress Mills’ 440ct Egyptian cotton.

By the way, as I refused to believe that any cotton could have 440 threads to the inch (which is what the count would mean for a counted embroidery fabric like Lugana or Edinburgh linen), I did a bit of digging and found that in cotton for sheets etc. the count includes both the warp and the weft, so 440ct cotton will have 220 threads per inch horizontally and vertically. Still very fine, but not as eye-watering as it sounds at first!

The first, darkest silk for this is appropriately red, but the shading is not going to be subtle – I only have the Pipers silk in about seven jewel-like rainbow colours, so the shell will be worked in red, bright orange and bright yellow. The white will have to be borrowed from another brand of silk. Pipers floss silk is very fine, and being a filament silk it snags easily, which is why you can see the individual filaments in a few bits of the thread. Splitting the stitches took a lot of concentration, and very good lighting! The second picture shows the project with a standard match for scale (and in more accurate colours, having been photographed in daylight). It also shows that my initial row of long and short stitch does not have a very neat bottom edge, so I may unpick that part and start again.

And that’s where I am with these two experiments! I hope to be able to finish them over the Christmas period, while also getting some Canvaswork homework in. But for that, I’m waiting for a Christmas present…

Baa, Baa, Rainbow Sheep

Posted on 14th December, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

…have you any rainbow wool? Well, Catkin Crown Textile Studio do, and until Christmas Eve they offer 15% off their beautiful Heathway Milano crewel wools (25% if you’re a subscriber to their newsletter). I have pretty much all the shades I want plus spares of many of them, but fortunately I found a good excuse to make use of their generous sale even so: a sheep, and a sheep-mad friend.

You may remember Trina, who was the inspiration for both Whoo Me (by means of her painted pebble owls) and Trina’s Sheep (by means of being sheep-mad ).

Well, recently I came across another embroidered sheep, or rather a pair of sheep (well, rams) – Tanya Bentham’s Bayeux-stitched Bertie & Bartram. They are both fun but I just fell for Bartram (or should that be Baa-rt-ram?) with his rainbow fleece. And what better to stitch him with (in the absence of the more correct-for-the-period naturally dyed wools Tanya uses) than my very favourite Heathway Milano wools? And what better belated birthday present for above-mentioned friend than a companion sheep?

So I had the fun of making up two project packs – one in more muted shades on Tanya’s invitingly soft wool fabric for me, one in brighter shades on vintage Irish linen (inherited from my mother-in-law) for her. By the way, the reason why her hoop/fabric combo is smaller than mine is that for some reason best known to herself my mother-in-law cut up the linen into very long narrow strips, and this is the biggest hoop I could fit it into; fortunately there’s just about enough room to manoeuvre. As for the threads, as you can see I haven’t got entire skeins of some of the shades, but, erm, did I mention something about a sale?

Oh, and I got a few more spares at the same time…

Finishing up, and a festive robin

Posted on 10th December, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

In previous FoFs I have showcased some of my students’ work as they progressed through the course, but before showing you their last project here’s what I’ve been stitching all those weeks – not nearly so nice as theirs, but I like keeping these demonstration/doodle cloths as a record of classes and workshops. They are actually quite decorative in their own messy way!

But how did the students do? Well, I got to see some impressive Quatrefoils – here are two of them:

Quatrefoil stitched by one of the students

And quite a few projects already made up into cards!

Finished student project - Shisha flower

Finished student projects - Quatrefoil and Shisha flower

The 6th session had no project of its own planned; it was meant for the students to work on anything they hadn’t finished and ask questions about whatever they’d like to know about embroidery (I didn’t promise I’d be able to answer everything…). But as some of the students had got on so well, to the point of having already mounted some of their finished work, I thought it would be nice to have a bonus project. For each of them I put together a square of cotton sateen with the rather seasonable Robin freebie transferred onto it, and a bundle of stranded cottons consisting of black, two shades of red, and three shades each of green and brown, which I gave to them at the end of the fifth session. And then I encouraged them to just have a go using their newly acquired skills, stitch it any which way they like and have fun!

As I had a spare transfer (I drew one of the legs too long, so I kept that one back) I decided to follow my own advice, going for the naturalistic look by giving him a battlement couching chest – not such an inappropriate choice perhaps, seeing that they are fiercely territorial little birds .

That encouraged a few of the students to have a go at that stitch as well, and although they found it tricky to get the spacing right, a little more practice should easily sort that (the student whose robin is shown below has also taken to blending with enthusiasm). Other students asked for some help with kits they had bought, and after getting into the rhythm of the raised stem stitch one practically finished her Christmas Wreath.

Another worked on her Christmas Wreath kit

I’ve really enjoyed teaching this course. Encouraged by the positive feedback from my students, and having been asked about a follow-up course, I’m busily thinking up class ideas for next year. Keep an eye on the Workshop page to find out when this materialises!

Can we canvas? Yes we can!

Posted on 2nd December, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

Until recently I didn’t really “feel” Canvaswork, so I approached my first proper class (which initially had been planned for last July, but got postponed several times for various reasons) with some trepidation. I came armed with two outlines which I knew to be far too detailed, a framed-up canvas which I knew wasn’t tight enough (but which by this time did at least have the required rectangular running stitch outline in sewing thread), a few samplings in the wrong sort of thread, and about one idea. I did not feel confident.

Framed up, but not quite tightly enough (and as yet minus outline)

The tutor assigned to this class was Angela, and I’d been looking forward to seeing her and perhaps having a little Bruce chat with her, but unfortunately she had gone down with Covid (apparently feeling rather rough with it, poor her) and so the class was taken by Helen Jones. With only four students we each had plenty of time to discuss things with her, and for me the first thing was indeed to get that canvas tightened. I unlaced part of it, turned the bottom roller once and re-laced. It is now most definitely taut as a drum, but as that is difficult to photograph you’ll have to take my word for it!

The next thing was to simplify the outline. I was surprised at how far you take this process in canvaswork, and I fear mine probably still has too much detail (especially in the windmill) but this was as simple as I felt comfortable with, and Helen OK-ed it. To make it easier to transfer she suggested tracing the pencil lines in marker pen; this was also a good opportunity to get the horizon level. In the photograph the furthest edge of the paved area which forms the strongest horizontal line in the piece is actually slightly curved, but making it perfectly level would help to “anchor” the design when transferring it – if the horizon didn’t follow a straight line of holes on the canvas, I’d know I had to reposition it.

Tracing the outline and levelling the horizon

Having got used to prick & pounce and paint for transferring the design at RSN classes, canvaswork is a bit of a wayward module. There is no way the canvas would take the pounce in any meaningful way, and as you have to transfer the design when the canvas is on the frame you can’t just bung it onto a light box either. Instead, you build a squat tower of books with the design on top of it, place the frame over it so that the canvas rests on the design, and then trace what you can see of it through the holes with a permanent marker. It then becomes abundantly clear why the outline has to be simplified so much: the canvas simply will not take any great level of detail. It is also surprisingly difficult to manipulate the traced design if its position is slightly off, sandwiched as it is between the books and the frame. But eventually I got that nice straight horizon to line up with a row of holes, and drew it on.

I can’t guarantee that what eventually ended up on the canvas is exactly like the design outline – some of the squigglier lines were difficult to trace precisely – but again it got the OK so perhaps I was being a bit too fussy. What definitely did need addressing was the fact that I managed to leave off an entire hedge, which I didn’t notice until I got home and showed the canvas to Mr Figworthy! It has since been added in.

Because it felt silly to do absolutely no stitching at all in class, I did do a tiny bit of sampling: it’s a herringbone variation which takes shading rather well, and which I hope to use to bring texture to the green bits that aren’t worked individually. It is rather fiddly, as you have to bring the needle up underneath previous stitches half the time, but I think it will be worth the effort.

My next class is in January; until then I’ll be colouring in a print of the outline (officially “making a colour and shading plan”), choosing stitches and doing a lot of sampling. I’ve got some ideas for the two large tulips in the foreground and various other bits and have sketched and scribbled a few ideas (yes, my handwriting is atrocious) to be translated into sampling at some point.

Due to canvaswork being the Mary Mary Quite Contrary of embroidery, those two big tulips will be worked first. In all other techniques you work the background first, and then the things that are a bit nearer to the viewer, and so on, until you reach the things in the foreground. If parts of the design overlap you stitch the overlapping bit last, which looks more natural and convincing. But in canvaswork you stitch the foreground first, and end with what is furthest away in the picture. As far as I understand, this is because the further back in the design you go, the smaller the stitches get – and it is much easier to work small stitches around large ones than fit large ones into a background made up of small stitches!

Having to end with lots of green and a big expanse of sky after doing all the interesting foreground bits may sound like starting with the fireworks and going downhill from there, but I rather like it – I think those tulips will entice me into a technique which is entirely new to me and feels unfamiliar and challenging. Let’s hear it for the Tempting Tulips!

A matter of perspective

Posted on 29th November, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

Remember the hourglass I started some time ago? I drew it in various ways, some with more perspective than others, and I chose to stitch the “flattest” version first. But even a relatively flat hourglass needs some perspective. As this is just a project for my own enjoyment I could simply wing it and see what happens, but that is not how I like working. So out come the paper and pencil to try different alternatives before committing one of them to the fabric.

Two things in particular needed sorting out: the sand in the top half of the glass, and the round top of the frame. I drew the sand in two ways, going round in circles or with straight lines going down the sides of the upside-down empty cone that is created by the sand running out through the central hole. The circle version would be easier, but I felt the lines-down-to-the-centre approach would give more of a sense of the sand running down.

For the round top of the frame I drew a rough circle with concentric circles inside it, then held the paper up to my eyes horizontally, that is to say level with the floor. It turned out that when the circle looked like the oval in the design, the centre of the circle seemed to be about two-fifths from the back, three-fifths from the front.

Then it was a case of strategically placing dots on the fabric to create a number of ovals inside the shape. At first I thought just indicating how far they were from the front and the back would do (the white dots), but just so I wouldn’t have to think too hard and calculate while stitching, I indicated how far they were from the sides as well (black dots).

My very first idea had been to fill in the shape entirely with chain stitch, but in the end I decided to work as many ovals as could be fitted into the back half of the shape, and let them space out to the sides and the front. And I’m pleased with how it worked out!

On to the sand in the top half of the glass. I’ve started by working these long stitches over an edge of split stitch; when the far side of the sand has been stitched, the near side will be stitched in lines of longish split stitch following the curve of the glass. The sand in the bottom will be long & short over split stitch with a ragged lower edge, and then comes the fun part of adding tiny shiny beads over the top as cascading grains of sand.

And once that is finished, I will allow myself to start work on a new project. Well, it’s started already in that I’ve got the fabric hooped up with the design transferred and all the threads picked – but no stitch will be put in until the hourglass is complete! Probably…

More stash, more students, a cross and a petal

Posted on 24th November, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

As I was putting kits together for the course at Rugby’s Percival Guildhouse, I noticed I was getting a little low on some of the shades of Madeira Lana needed for the No Place Like Home project. There was plenty left for the class kits, but I have plans for this little house (watch this space…) so off I went to my two suppliers, only to find that one of them, from whom I got the larger reels of variegated Lana, no longer carries this thread! Fortunately most of the shades required were solids, and I didn’t need that much of them, so Sarah Homfray and her 25m skeins came to the rescue!

One of the things I try to do in the course is to introduce different types of thread, and this wool/acrylic blend is one of them. It made its appearance in week 2. Which brings me to the students using the thread (who, in spite of the title of this FoF, are in fact the same students as the ones I mentioned last time, but “more students’ work” was a bit cumbersome). Here is how they got on with No Place Like Home (class plus some homework) and Butterfly Wreath (in-class progress). I’m really proud of how well they are doing!

When I manage to do some “free stitching” (that is to say not for future publication, or at least with no deadline for publication) I grab one of the many projects lying around that are awaiting completion. Some are fairly recent, like the hourglass stitched with Paintbox Threads materials (update soon), others were started as far back as early 2019, like Hengest and Llandrindod. Hengest is still languishing, but I’m getting on with the pretty jewelled cross. At the moment I’m working on the dark gold that surrounds the gems, and when that is done there is just the subtle bling to be added to the stones, plus possibly some decoration along the light gold circle. But for now I have to decide what to do when the split stitch of the gold frame doesn’t quite match up with the split stitch of the gems. Sometimes it’s a matter of simply filling in the gaps with more gold (orange arrow) – but should I perhaps make the gem corners a bit sharper by adding a few stitches in red (blue arrows)?

Perhaps I’ll work on something else while mulling that over… One thing which I hope to get to grips with in the not too distant future is silk shading or needle painting. You may remember that lovely book I got a while ago which has some exercises in it to try before starting on the full-blown projects – more about that in a future FoF, but another inspiration presented itself from quite a different corner recently. While we were having some pruning done in the garden a late rose got cut, and we put it in the kitchen in one of those tall narrow vases. It’s a lovely dark orange when in bud, but it goes progressively paler when it opens, and when it started to drop its petals I had a close look at one. Not only would the colours make for a lovely silk shading project, it looks like the stitch direction lines have already been pencilled in by the Creator .

A petal with ready-painted lines for silk shading

Spangles, stash and students

Posted on 19th November, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

It’s been a while since I last Foffed, but now I can burst in with a Hurray! Finally, the second of the two secret stitched models is finished (sneak peek of a tiny bit of it below) – but is it finished? Well, everything that is on my design plan is now on the fabric, but I keep thinking it may need a few more spangles before mounting…

Which brings us nicely to the second part of this FoF. It’s always pleasant to get new stash, and although this doesn’t look particularly interesting it feels very nice: fluffy cotton wadding for mounting the models mentioned above (and probably the metalwork racehorse). It’s very much like the stuff the RSN gave me for mounting Bruce and is meant to compensate for all those lumps and bumps on the back of goldwork caused by the plunged and oversewn ends. By the way, having used lightweight, open-textured polyester wadding for years in cards and to put behind embroidery when mounting, and having seen pictures online of “batting” which looked more like this soft but more solid cotton (or wool), I thought they were two different things. Turns out they are all wadding if you’re in the UK, and all batting if you’re in the US. Ah, language, I love you .

As for students, I’ve been seeing nine of them for a few weeks now at the Percival Guildhouse in Rugby, and so far they seem to be enjoying themselves which is a good sign! They came to the course with varying levels of previous experience, from a lady who wants to brush up her embroidery skills after a lull of some years to one who has done mostly cross stitch until now and wants to “have a go” to some who have never done any stitching whatsoever. I was impressed with how dedicated they all are, working hard on the new stitches in class and then showing me what they’ve finished at home the next week. Here are some of the Little Wildflower Gardens (the Week 1 project) which they brought to class the week after, several of them complete with bullion knot bee – Well Done Students, is what I say!

…and more silk.

Posted on 27th October, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

Did you know that so far none of Mabel’s kits use silk? I know, it’s shocking! Time to do something about it, using that pretty little flower, the Quatrefoil. Putting together a new kit means sourcing supplies, which in this case means more silk. Ah, the sacrifices I make for my customers…

To begin with the fabric, I decided on a dark red silk dupion. The obvious place to go for that was The Silk Route, who were so helpful in finding just the right silk for Bruce. Unfortunately (it is a recurring theme, I know) it is very difficult to accurately judge colours on screen, so I rang them and they very kindly sent me two dark red samples to choose from. I then wondered whether dark blue wouldn’t work as well, rang again, and even though they had already sent off the first two samples, they popped another one in the post to me!

The blue turned out to be rather too dark, and of the two reds the lighter one was definitely the one to go for. They agreed to cut my half metre lengthwise, which means less waste and a few more kit-sized squares than if it was cut widthwise. It’s a power-woven silk dupion, which is smoother and more even in texture than the hand-woven type (this difference will come up in my Goldwork assessment FoF too). I like my kits to be accessible for stitchers who have no experience with a particular technique, so not putting too many slubs in their way seemed like a good plan.

To do the silk fabric justice, the design is stitched using silk threads. I chose Rainbow Gallery Splendor silk because, well, really just because it is one of my favourite silks with its subtle sheen and lovely soft feel, but also because it is, in my experience, one of the easier silks to work with. To complement the silk, and because a bit of bling always adds a certain je ne sais quoi (not to mention joie de vivre), the petals are outlined in gold Jap with a choice of couching thread: easier but more visible sewing thread, or bouncier and more slippery but practically invisible translucent couching thread. Add needles, an aperture card and some wadding and you’ve got the components of a new kit.

And after a fair bit of measuring, cutting, tying, winding, folding and packaging… *fanfare and drumroll* you’ve got our new Silk & Gold Quatrefoil kit!

PS – Just to reassure anyone interested in the Quatrefoil kit in the light of my previous PS about filament silks, Splendor is a spun silk so hopefully no moths were harmed in the making of it.

Silk, silk…

Posted on 24th October, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

I have got a new embroidery book. Yes, another one. Shush. Anyway, it is all Mary Corbet’s fault for writing yet another irresistible review. It will no doubt be very useful for the Silk Shading module of the RSN Certificate, but really that’s just an excuse. In fact it seemed to be the sort of informative and beautifully illustrated book that would be worth having and reading even if you never stitched anything from it – and so it turned out to be. Background information about pollinators, instructions for needlepainting, and lots and lots of lovely photographs of the exquisitely stitched projects. I love it.

Victoria Matthewson's needlepainting book

Information about the plants and pollinators stitched in the book

Very detailed photographs illustrate the needlepainting process

It joins Tanya Bentham’ Opus Anglicanum book on my current browsing pile, and they make a dangerous pair – because they mention various silks and materials that I now want to try out!

Do you remember Ethelnute the Opus Anglicanum king? He was stitched using Silk Mill silk, which like the ones mentioned in Tanya Bentham’s book is a filament silks, made from unbroken silk reeled off the cocoon of the silk worm (which is why some suppliers call it “reeled silk”). It is beautifully shiny, but not as flat as the ones Tanya uses, so the sheen on those should be even more spectacular.

I’d never heard of tram silk, but it sounded rather interesting, so I ordered a taster pack through Tanya’s site. You can get full reels from the suppliers she mentions in her book, the Handweavers Studio, but getting a reasonable range of colours plus postage would be quite expensive, which led me to go for Tanya’s mixed pack of smaller cops. Exasperatingly, I received the book with its link to Handweavers the Monday after returning from London, where on one of my walks I passed through the street where their shop is without knowing it! Oh well, I will now have a few more shades to play with plus two fabrics I hadn’t used before which I popped into my shopping basket to make the most of the postage: ramie, a fine linen-like fabric, and a lovely soft wool fabric used for Bayeux-style embroidery.

A lovely range of tram silk colours and two fabrics

Talking of fabrics, the Pollinator book mentions a fabric that I looked at on one of the stands at the Knitting & Stitching Show, a silk/cotton blend. I nearly bought a fat quarter and then decided against it because I didn’t know what I’d use it for. Sigh.

Back to silk. The other one that caught my attention was the silk produced in various weights by DeVere Yarns, especially when I found that it was mentioned in both my recently acquired books – quite a recommendation!

I’d heard of DeVere Yarns before, and I’m fairly certain I’ve seen them at previous Knitting & Stitching Shows, but somehow I hadn’t tried their threads before. They are a family business and extremely helpful: when I decided to buy one of their Colour Packs but felt that it needed an extra shade between the dark and the medium blue they had a look at the colours while we were on the phone, then called me back later after they’d had a look in better light and found the right shade to go with the pack. Not only that, when I ordered that extra silk in a different weight from the pack they emailed me to ask whether that order was correct, and when the parcel arrived it included a sample card of their various silks and other threads as a bonus – very good service indeed.

You may think that all this is quite enough silk for anyone, but there has been more silken activity in the Figworthy household. No, I’ve not been growing my own silkworms – we haven’t got a mulberry tree. All will be revealed in the next FoF…

PS – I will admit to feeling slightly uncomfortable about filament silk because the moth is not allowed to hatch; at some point I will have to decide where I stand on that. Spun silk (which is not quite so strong and has a less exuberant sheen but looks beautiful in its own way and is very nice to work with) is made from the shorter remnants of the cocoon that are left after the moth has chewed its way out, and is therefore blissfully unproblematic; it’s not even taking something from the moth that it could conceivably still want (like honey from bees). Definitely the more worry-free silk.

Quick ways to store your needles

Posted on 21st October, 2021 by Flights of Fancy

Once or twice I have mentioned a quick-to-make needle matchbook; it’s the finishing method used in the Hardanger mini kits, I made a set of ten recently for my course students and I have them dotted around the house for my own use. I’m fairly certain I also wrote about an easy felt needle roll at least once. However, when I looked for my FoFs about these needle storage solutions to send to a student, I found that I never actually wrote them!

A narrow needle matchbook for my own use

The reason I haven’t written about the matchbook needle books became clear when I sought out the original site from which I got the idea: that had such a good description of the process that it would be silly to reinvent the wheel! You can find the post on the Make It Do blog. The only change I made to it for the Hardanger kits was to have the patterned side of the card on the inside, so that the Hardanger patch could be stuck to the plain coloured outside. I cut the card to 6cm x 17cm, and pre-score it 2cm from the bottom and 8cm from the top; for my little project books like the one shown above, which usually hold only a few needles and aren’t decorated with needlework, I use narrower strips of card and I don’t bother scoring them, but fold them by eye.

Much the same goes for the needle roll – that idea came from a Mary Corbet blog post which (of course) contains excellent instructions. I did happen to take several pictures when I put mine together, so I’ll post those here as additional illustrations to her description. First cut the parts that make up the roll: a larger rectangle of felt with two slits and a cord or ribbon fed through them, plus a smaller rectangle to hold the needles; I embroidered mine with a B (for “beading”) and numbers (for the various sizes) in backstitch. Place the needle felt on top of the larger felt and roll the layers up together, towards the cord or ribbon. The top layer will probably shift a bit while you roll them, so don’t start with it right up against the edge. Use the cord to tie up the roll. Done!

So here we are, two very clever ideas, neither of them mine unfortunately, but brought together here for any stitchers looking for quick ways to store their needles. Both methods take only scraps of felt and card, so why not rummage through your stash and have a go?

Flights of Fancy

Mabel's musings on anything stitchy

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