New threads, vanishing threads and non-existent threads

Posted on 26th October, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

Putting together a new workshop/kit often means looking into various materials, threads and other bits and bobs that would be suitable for it (I know, it’s a hard life ). In this case I was looking for a non-divisible variegated green thread a little thicker than a strand of stranded cotton. Three of the possibles I’m considering at the moment are (from left to right) Weeks Dye Works perle #12, Chameleon perle #16 and Sulky Blendables 12wt. I’ve never tried any of these before so I’m looking forward to stitching some samples with them.

The WDW shade is called Emerald, and I’ve got one called Bayberry on back order from Sew & So – it looks lovely but I think it may be just a little too thick for what I want. The Chameleon one, a shade called Fennel, I picked up at the Knitting & Stitching Show; about the right thickness, but not many shades available unfortunately. You may notice that the Sulky image (of a shade called Cactus) is a stock one, as I ordered this from America and it hasn’t arrived yet. There is another possible green in the Blendables range but that looks rather dark online. I had hoped to find them at the K&S Show so I could see them in the flesh, but either they weren’t there or I missed them – easily done with so many stands there!

The vanishing thread is Tamar Embroideries’ mercerized cotton (which used to be called brodery cotton). It is being discontinued, not because it wasn’t popular, but because they can’t get the thread anymore for dyeing! So goodbye to this lovely variegated green thread that was perfect for little lazy daisy leaves. I hope they’ll find a good substitute soon.

And the non-existent threads? I dreamed them. In one of those very realistic-seeming dreams a friend was explaining a printing machine to me, which turned into a weaving machine; beside it was a wooden rack with hanks of thread hanging from it, all labelled. I particularly noticed two of them, very attractive slightly fluffy threads not unlike chenille. The labels identified them as “fine priel” and “open priel”.

I woke up and the dream turned out to be as illogical in the cold light of day as dreams usually are, but I did remember the name of the thread! Alas, the only priels I managed to find were a mountain and a meandering stream; neither of them at all fluffy and both impossible to stitch with.

2016 Knitting and Stitching Show

Posted on 11th October, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

My annual Knitting & Stitching outing was once again very enjoyable. I always combine it with some serious walking around London, taking in a good number of parks (and the odd cemetery) on the way, and this year there were the added pleasures of the Opus Anglicanum exhibition at the V&A, and meeting up for lunch with an old friend, the Salvation Army Major who married my husband and me 11 years ago.

If you have the opportunity, do go and see the exhibition; it runs until 5th February 2017 and shows an incredible collection of medieval English embroideries – mostly ecclesiastical, but some secular as well. And although many of the exhibits are showing their age, being rather faded and moth-eaten, quite a few are remarkably colourful and sparkly still, and the ones you can get really close to give you an opportunity to see in detail what stunning work the embroiderers produced (and with what minuscule stitches). After so many centuries, some of the symbolism is lost on us, and I was particularly grateful for the explanatory notice beside a depiction of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus, which said, “The striped leggings of Christ’s attackers were a marker of their sinful pride and bad character.” I had some stripy tights years ago, and never knew they revealed my bad character!

At the Knitting & Stitching Show itself I really enjoyed the many exhibitions, both great and small, of various forms of needlework; I also took the opportunity of adding my bit, or my bunny, to the Embroiderers’ Guild’s World’s Longest Embroidery which is in the Guinness Book of Records. It is officially finished but wherever it is displayed they encourage people to put in a small bit of embroidery where they can find a space, whether a small motif or just a sample of stitches.

Of course I bought one or two things as well… although a large part of the stash I brought home was actually stuff I had ordered a month earlier from the Golden Hinde and was picking up at the Show to save on postage, so there may be some justification in not counting it as a Show purchase. On the other hand, why would that make a difference ? It is new stash, and I’m going to enjoy it! Some of this is for my Jacobean goldwork – I found I didn’t have a lot of pearl purl #2 left after using it for the stem, and I also wanted to try some of the wavy check thread as a substitute for the prescribed thread on the flower. The two coloured purls are an impulse buy; I thought they would make rather nice forget-me-not flowers with a gold bead in the centre.

At another stand I was chuffed to find Sadi threads, used in Indian embroidery. As they are rather less expensive than goldwork threads they are great for practice pieces or beginners’ workshops. They don’t come in quite so many sizes and types, but are very useful nonetheless (you can read more about them on Mary Corbet’s blog). I got Sadi fine smooth purls in silver and pale gold. My final stash purchase was a skein of Chameleon hand-dyed #16 perle; I love the Chameleon overdyed silks and have been wanting to try out their perles, and a #16 is new to me so will make an interesting experiment, probably as part of a Floral Gem project. Oh, I also managed to get good quality petite tapestry needles (for the Floral Gem and Christmas Wreath kits) at 2/3 the usual price but had already put them away when I took the photograph and anyway they really aren’t that exciting to look at .

It was nice not to have to worry too much about the expense of these pretties as the two workshops I taught easily covered them and my travelling costs. But quite apart from that benefit, I just enjoy teaching workshops! This year it was the freestyle Wildflower Garden and the Shisha tile, and I got some lovely feedback from the participants which was very encouraging. Below is a collage of some of their work.

Some of the Freestyle participants' work

At the Royal School of Needlework’s stand I picked up a leaflet with a special Show offer of 10% off their day classes – and there is a goldwork class in Rugby next year… To make use of it I will have to decide by 31st October; I’ll let you know!

A compact hobby

Posted on 16th September, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

As I’ve probably mentioned before, once a month I go to a craft group at our local library. It’s enjoyable to meet up with others who appreciate making things with needle and thread or wool or bits of fabric, depending on whether they are stitchers, knitters/crocheters (how do you pronounce that?) or quilters, and there is always tea or coffee and cake as well. Usually my preparation for a meeting amounts to deciding what project to bring, but this time I was in charge of the eatables, as our usual baker was on holiday. A batch of cheese muffins and one of coconut bites later that part was taken care of. Now for the stitching project, which couldn’t be too big as most of the space in my bag would be taken up by the muffins/bites.

And this is the sort of situation where needlework turns out to be a most convenient hobby (unlike playing the double bass, or turning clay pots) – you need very little for it! One of the small Floral Gem projects seemed like a nice, compact idea, and although I could easily have taken one of my small project boxes, I rather liked the challenge of keeping everything to a minimum. So here it is, everything that is needed to complete the project, with all the threads, beads and embellishments fitting in a 1½” tin, and the whole lot fitting into a 5″ x 7½” seal bag.

And did I complete the project? Well, no, not quite. Not in 90 minutes, and some of that time taken up with eating muffins and trying to keep the cream cheese off the fabric. But I made a start, and now there’s only the outer wheatear stitch border to do.

Surprising finds

Posted on 6th September, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

Life is full of surprises, to make an unoriginal observation, and they come when you least expect them . I had two this weekend, one at the Beaulieu Autojumble where Mr Figworthy and I have a stand and one when we returned home. Although both were stitching-related, they were surprising in different ways – both pleasant, fortunately!

While wandering around the Autojumble on the look-out for valve spring compressors, rubber bump stops and what not, we stopped at a stand that sold fuses, washers, and other small stuff. You could buy individual fuses, washers and other small stuff, or you could get selection boxes (which sound as though they ought to contain chocolates). Smallish boxes with compartments. Project-box-sized boxes with adjustable compartments, to be precise. And he sells the boxes separately as well (though not at the fair). And they are cheaper than your usual craft boxes. And they look as if they’re stackable. And he is based not too far from us. I can feel an order coming on some time in the future. If they look this good with fuses in them, just imagine how beautiful they will look filled with stash.

It was surprising to find anything that might be useful to a stitcher at an Autojumble; it generally isn’t surprising to find stitching things at the house of a stitcher. Even so some stash may be unexpected, not to say mysterious! When we arrived home I found a plastic folder full of stranded cottons and a chunky pair of scissors lying on the sofa, without a note or anything to identify the sender or the reason for sending. Oldest son had found it pushed through the letterbox and had put it in a conspicuous place for me to find, assuming (very probably correctly) that it was meant for me rather than for my husband. Colourful, isn’t it? Lots of useful threads for the charity workshops, which is what I will use them for unless I hear from the giver that they meant them for a different purpose.

I wonder what the next surprise will be?

Projects for stash

Posted on 31st August, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

When I wrote about stash with no immediate purpose, did I by any chance mention the very colourful autumn maple leaves which nestled themselves among the floral gems in my shopping basket last month? No? Or the icy snowflakes that came with my order as a free sample? I can’t think how they slipped my mind…

Anyway, I do now have a very specific purpose for the floral gems! Some time ago I bought aperture cards that were just the right size for the three freebie stars, in the hope that they would make quick Christmas cards. Which they will. Some day. But as I was thinking of cards to make for our church’s Craft Fair in November it struck me that they would also be just the right size for a small embroidery centred around some of those sparkly little flowers – and wouldn’t they make lovely cards for all sorts of occasions? (I did think of adding the little bunny face I stitch-doodled some time ago, but I’m not sure I can make him small enough, and I wouldn’t want a monster bunny in these tiny little embroideries!)

My first attempt was, as you can tell from the picture, a rather informal affair, and relatively naturalistic, but the flowers (and the butterfly) can also be used in a slightly more formal and abstract arrangement. The four curves are a bit wonky but actually I rather like the not-quite-symmetry.

And then I found I had some cards with slightly larger, circular apertures which also work with these embellishments! (Must not get carried away, however – the whole idea is that they should be quick and not use too many resources; if you’re stitching for charity you want to keep your costs down. On the other hand, I think I have the makings of another workshop here!) Note to self: keep butterflies lightish in shade, they look better that way.

An added bonus about these little projects is the fact that they can be worked completely freehand should I want to; as long as I have some hint of the visible area on my fabric (i.e. a lightly pencilled square just a little bigger than the aperture of the card) and make sure I stay well inside it, it’ll work. These might just become my go-to travel projects for the next few months!

Incidentally, several people have been giving me bags (small and large) of needlework materials over the past two months – some asking me to find a good home for the threads/canvases/books/frames, others offering them for use in the charity workshops or a similar purpose, and I have indeed used some of the threads already in these Floral Gem cards. In one of these bags there were three small boxes with six compartments each, used for some beads and odds and ends of threads. I found they make the perfect receptacle for the various beads, gems and sequins I’m hoping to use for these cards, as well as some of the threads. And the boxes look so inviting they can’t fail to inspire me to stitch a great many of them.

A novel use for split washers?

Posted on 27th August, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

As my husband (to whom I’ve been married 11 years today!) was packing up an order for a customer of the Figworthy household’s main business (spares for pre-war Austin Sevens, in case you’re wondering), he handed me a small part and said, “isn’t this rather like your spangles?” It was a split washer, and he was right in that it is gold-coloured, round, and has a hole and a split in it. “Could you use it?” he then asked. A challenge! Well, it definitely looks as though it might be part of a goldwork project, if not perhaps in a very traditional design.

Now I must admit that I am not very good at gauging sizes (remember that 4mm ribbon which turned out to be 6mm?) and although it did seem to me that it was probably rather larger than the 3mm spangles in my goldwork stash box I hadn’t quite realised how much bigger…

Steampunk goldwork, anyone?

A visit to the Viking Loom

Posted on 20th August, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

You may remember that a while ago I bought some satin display boxes from the Viking Loom. Last Monday I quite unexpectedly had the opportunity to visit their new premises just outside York, and of course I jumped at the chance! I had been to their old shop in High Petergate, which was lovely, but I’d read on their website the new place was much bigger, including workshop space. My sister-in-law kindly lent me a bike (which took a bit of getting used to, as my trusted Dutch bike has back-pedal brakes and no gears) so off I went up Wigginton Road and past the chocolate factory, which was rather like being bathed in cocoa – very invigorating!

To say that the new place is more spacious is definitely a bit of an understatement. It’s not many craft shops that you approach by means of a tree-lined avenue, or where the car park is overlooked by horses and a a dovecote, and where you can park your bike next to a miniature orchard with geese in it.

The house , too, is impressive, but unfortunately not part of the shop so an outside view only. A lovely yellow labrador of supreme laid-backness welcomes you (if that is not too active a word) to the Viking Loom itself, and the first room you get into is awash with colour, filled as it is with innumerable shades of Appleton’s crewel and tapestry wool.

Then it’s upstairs, to a room devoted to all things quilting (which I didn’t photograph), followed by the embroidery room which had kits and books and threads and tools and a surprising number of goldwork bits and bobs. As I wandered into this room a lady asked if I was looking for anything in particular or if I would prefer to browse. When I said I’d browse a bit first, please, she offered me coffee or tea – I can tell you it’s a rather nervous affair, walking around with a hot drink while looking at all these gorgeous things! The tea (proper, strong Yorkshire tea, with lots of milk) was made in a little kitchen attached to the workshop space, where two ladies were having a lovely time sewing and “escaping the housework and the children”, as they informed me.

Of course I couldn’t possibly leave without taking a little bit of stash with me. As luck would have it, I found two things which I had been reading about, and wanting to try out, but I didn’t like to order them online without having at least some idea what they were like. One of these was trigger cloth, a fairly closely woven fabric for freestyle embroidery; unfortunately they only had it in bright white, not the antique white I usually prefer, but it felt nice and sturdy with enough body not to need backing (unless you’re using very heavy embellishments or goldwork materials). And as I was looking at the fabrics, a piece of hand-painted (not dyed) silk jumped out and said “goldwork seahorse” to me, so that got added to the trigger cloth. The silk is actually painted on the premises by a lady who comes there every now and then to paint a batch.

The other thing I’d been reading about was heavy metal thread, as used by Hazel Everett in her goldwork book. Unfortunately she doesn’t mention a brand name, or where to buy it, and so some further research was called for. This lead me to Madeira’s #12 metallic thread, which is indeed known as Heavy Metal, a misnomer if ever there was one for this fine, 3-ply thread which can be used as it comes, or split into its three plies for detailed or miniature work. I could find it online, but not very easily, and the postage for these chunky reels made it rather too expensive to buy on the off-chance that it would be to my liking. But there it was, at the Viking Loom, ready to be inspected and touched, and available in four colours. I got them all.

Visiting family is fun anyway, but if they happen to live close to a place like the Viking Loom it’s even more fun!

Stash for projects, and vice versa

Posted on 12th August, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

Sometimes (most often, perhaps) we stitchers buy stash with a particular project in mind. But sometimes you have to think up a project for some stash which inexplicably found its way into your shopping basket because it was too pretty to ignore/on special offer/added to make the most of the postage. The gorgeous green silk (Threadworx overdyed Vineyard silk in the shade Princess pea) falls somewhere in between the two categories, as it was bought for a specific project, which however is as yet only a few sketches on two Church meeting agendas (at least I won’t have a problem dating that particular design). The shiny flowers come unashamedly in the second category – I was stocking up on sequins for the Shisha kits when I got lured by the “Clearance Sale” link, where I found some very good-value silver seed beads, and these irresistible little gems at a mere 50p a bag. So I bagged one. Just in case I would think of a design to use them in. Which I’m sure I will.

Simply Sequins always send a little complimentary bag of goodies with their orders, and this time it was mixed sequins and shapes. I picked out some particularly pretty ones with a broadly floral theme, together with a few beads and some things already in my stash, and a few of those lovely sparkly flower gems I’d ordered in the sale, and they are now all together in another bag, ready to be experimented with. Don’t they look inspiring?

I’m putting together a short course of embroidery tasters at the moment and was thinking of using ribbon embroidery for the fifth lesson, but I’m wondering now whether some extremely free freestyle embroidery with lots of sparkle might not make rather a pleasing contrast with the much more structured Hardanger project which is set to be the opening lesson. Hardanger embroidery – Shisha embroidery – Freestyle embroidery – Tactile embroidery – Go Mad with Bling embroidery. Does that sound nicely balanced?

PS. I admit it. I’m a pushover for sparkly pretties. I liked the floral gems so much I ordered another bag of them, in mixed colours. Just to use in the embroidery taster classes, of course! (And if you believe that, you’ll believe anything…)

Unruly ribbons

Posted on 8th August, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

While we were away in The Netherlands I worked on a few small projects which had been languishing, half-finished, on a pile surrounded by More Urgent Things. They were two Shisha Tiles and a Christmas Wreath. Getting kits ready for the workshops in October and November I’ve been stitching a fair few of the latter, and I like them better every time. But the ribbon can be a bit of a challenge.

Once the wreath is completed and the bow attached, I arrange the ribbons nicely by curving them slightly (as in all the best Christmas illustrations) and pushing them against the wreath stitches to keep them in place. This usually works, but the problem is that it isn’t a very permanent way of arranging them. Make the wreath into a card or try and push the card into an envelope and suddenly the ends of the ribbon stick out very straight instead of in nice decorative curves. Sometimes this happens without even touching the embroidery, with the ribbon straightening itself out by a sheer effort of will the moment your back is turned.

Curved ribbon ends on the Christmas Wreath

Straight ribbon ends on the Christmas Wreath

Incidentally, the second photograph above also shows a different distribution of beads. When teaching non-counted embroidery I’ve found that the “free” in freestyle makes some people nervous. They’d much prefer to have dots showing exactly where the French knots are to go rather than be told to “work some random French knots inside the circle”. So it occurred to me that placing the beads on the Christmas wreath, for which there is no chart or guide, might put some people off. Could a simple circle of alternating red and gold beads down the centre of the wreath be a usable alternative? I think it could; personally I prefer the random distribution, but this looks quite effective as well and will definitely be offered as an option for those stitchers who don’t enjoy randomness.

Anyway, back to ribbons. Would it be possible to secure the ends of the ribbons where I wanted them without it looking as though they were secured? Well, I will let you be the judge – do you think the ribbons in this wreath look as though they are flowing naturally?

In a completely different project, I was doing some ribbon embroidery. I tried and tried to get a gathered ribbon right – but it just wouldn’t work. It kept coming out far bigger than I had expected and planned. I had originally charted it for either 3mm or 4mm ribbon, so I knew that the 4mm ribbon I was using would come out a little bigger than a 3mm ribbon, but even so it looked ridiculously big. Then it finally dawned on me that the ribbon I was using was actually 6mm instead of 4mm…

Helpful equipment

Posted on 25th May, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

One of the things I’ve always liked about embroidery as a hobby is that you need very little “stuff” to enjoy it. Fabric, threads, needle, scissors – that’s about it for the essentials, and if your teeth are good and you’re not doing Hardanger you could probably dispense with the scissors (no, I wasn’t serious there). You can go mad and spend a fortune on hand-dyed fabrics, speciality threads, heritage-quality frames and stands, daylight lamps, silks, goldwork materials and what not, but you don’t have to. Nor is it the case that you can only do simple things or beginner’s projects if you stick to the basic equipment. A talented needleworker can produce works of art using standard cotton threads and plain fabric. It’s a great hobby!

That isn’t to say, of course, that I reject all equipment that isn’t strictly necessary. I could learn to stitch in hand, but I prefer using flexi-hoops – to me they make my stitching easier and more comfortable. More extravagantly, I love my Millennium frame and Aristo stand for larger projects; again, they make stitching more comfortable, and on top of that they are beautifully made and very strokeable .

Another piece of equipment I am very pleased to have found is my Vario Light Pad. I’ve got the A4 version, which is plenty big enough for any designs I’m likely to want to transfer. Yes, I could use a well-lit window and tape the design to it and place the fabric over it and try to draw on a vertical surface. Or I could use the prick-and-pounce method of transferring, about the only one that will work on practically any fabric, but that is more complicated and anyway requires its own equipment. But for transferring lots of small designs onto relatively thin fabric the light pad is unbeatable, especially in combination with very thin Pigma Micron drawing pens.

And so a couple of nights ago, while we watched the Queen’s 90th birthday party (recorded from ITV so we could whizz through the adverts and some of the more annoying presenters) I set about tracing another 26 Little Wildflower Gardens onto light blue cotton, stopping occasionally to give my full attention to the riding skills of the Azerbaijani horsemen (and women) or the percussion antics of the Swiss Top Secret Drum Corps (where do they practice drumming if they want to stay top secret?). A very pleasant combination of activities, and I’ve now got enough designs transferred for the next two workshops plus a few extra!

Flights of Fancy

Mabel's musings on anything stitchy

Category Archives: Materials & Equipment