Sharing the love of stitch

Posted on 12th October, 2022 by Flights of Fancy

George Bernard Shaw famously said that those who can, do, and those who can’t, teach. And although I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I can’t stitch, the plain fact is that at the moment I don’t, so last week it was rather a treat to at least be able to teach!

Yes, it was the Knitting & Stitching Show, and although unfortunately I was unable to teach James the Snail, the Little Wildflower Garden workshop went ahead as planned. Well, almost as planned – the tail end of the railway strike combined with the workshops being moved to the far end of Alexandra Palace meant that several morning classes were a few attendees short. But those who were there enjoyed themselves and made great progress with their freestyle gardens.

Apart from teaching, did I acquire any stash at the show? Well, a few things: some pearl purl and coloured rough purl for kits, turquoise silk dupion and silver kid for the metalwork course I’m teaching in November, and some bottle green silk just because I liked the look of it – every show needs one impulse buy, don’t you think?

But even more fun than the stash were the people! Such as the American lady who got her times mixed up and arrived at the workshop 15 minutes before it ended, which led to her treating me to a cup of tea during which we had a quick one-on-one workshop and a lovely chat about (among other things) wine tasting, being an ex-pat, and Flanders & Swann; and Marlous, my fellow Dutchwoman and RSN student also known as the Stitching Sheep, with whom I caught up while she was helping out at the Golden Hinde stand.

And then there was the RSN stand. They are celebrating their 150th anniversary this year, and one of the things they used to entice people into the weird and wonderful world of embroidery was a big anniversary design set up on a slate frame. Future Tutors took it in turns to work on it, and members of the public could sit down and add a few stitches themselves. As I was chatting to the Future Tutor on duty, a lady looked at the embroidery and said “oh, I could never do that!” A short conversation elicited the fact that she did cross stitch and had also mastered French knots and blanket stitch, so we encouraged her to sit down with me and we stitched together. 10 minutes later she knew how to do detached buttonhole stitch to make a frilly edge. Result !

Another way of sharing the love of stitch is through my kits. It is my firm belief that anyone can stitch if they can just be persuaded to Have A Go. I try to make the instructions as detailed and complete as possible so that it does’t matter whether you’ve done Hardanger or freestyle or Shisha or goldwork before, if you methodically work your way through the instructions you will create something to be proud of. And although the contents of the kits are, to some extent, more important than the looks, I want my kits to be something to be proud of too! So one by one I am turning the loose-leaf instructions into neat booklets, and more and more of the kits will come in a useful (and recycleable) box rather than a plastic grip seal bag, as the Goldwork, Appliqué and Quatrefoil kits already do.

But whatever form the instructions take, one thing remains the same: a lot of measuring, cutting and ironing of fabric. I didn’t count them all, but including the backing fabrics I must have ironed well over 170 squares last night while watching an André Rieu concert (makes for very rhythmic ironing…)

The only other news at the moment is that I have decided to temporarily pause my RSN Certificate. What with a course to teach, and other stitching obligations in the next few months as well as our main business, I simply haven’t got the energy to give it my full attention – and it definitely needs that. So I have cancelled the classes I had booked, and I must say that has considerably reduced my feelings of stress. Who knows, I may even pick up some stitching just for enjoyment!

A stitch (back) in time

Posted on 18th August, 2018 by Flights of Fancy

Remember I wrote about having lots of projects on the go last time? Even as I posted it it seemed to me that surely five projects couldn’t be the whole lot – and I was right. I’d forgotten a tiny flower started as a travel project (of which I have no picture as there is not much to see yet) and a Kelly Fletcher butterfly.

And now there is one more as a medieval king joins the throng! This is the project Angela Bishop and Sarah Homfray used at the Coombe Abbey retreat to introduce a group of nine stitchers to the joys of Opus Anglicanum, or English medieval embroidery. It includes lots of split stitch in silk, gold couched using both the usual and the underside method, and some Serious Bling.

But before I say more about the stitching, a little about the venue. Coombe Abbey is an impressive building with lovely gardens, and makes a rather appropriate setting for embroidery of the type we were doing. Atmosphere in spades! Its only downside is unfortunately rather inherent in a medieval building, and that is gloom. Even though the room we were in had relatively large windows, we definitely needed the collection of daylight lamps that had been brought along. As for the hotel reception, anyone with less than perfect night vision would be advised to bring a torch. But it would be churlish to complain about such characterful surroundings – and I won’t. I thoroughly enjoyed my two days’ stitching there.

Can something be both intense and relaxing? This retreat certainly did a good job at being both. There is nothing quite like a long period of stitching time when you don’t have to worry about the ironing or the groceries because they are Somewhere Else and you can’t do anything about them anyway. Very relaxing. But trying to learn a technique that originally involved a seven-year apprenticeship in two days? Very intense.

Of course the seven-year apprenticeship involved rather more than just learning the stitches, and Sarah and Angela warned us not to expect perfection quite yet, so we had to settle for getting a taste of this lovely embroidery. We did so by means of brief talks about the background of Opus Anglicanum and other types of medieval embroidery, live demonstrations (using a nifty camera-and-big-screen combination), and of course trying the techniques for ourselves using the kit provided.

Day one had a lot of split stitch; it was interesting to look at pictures of medieval embroideries using this simple stitch so effectively, using changes in direction to create shading even when using only a single shade of silk. In our royal head this is especially noticeable in the way the spiralled cheeks, chin and forehead stand out against the rest of the face (or will do, when I get the rest of the face stitched…)

Day two had us tackling underside couching, a technique apparently almost unique to Opus Anglicanum; taking the couching thread down through the fabric creates lots of little “hinges” which keep the fabric flexible even when covered in large swathes of gold, as on ecclesiastical vestments. We were told to work a little of it in both silk and gold twist, and then to decide whether we wanted to fill in the entire collar and/or crown in this technique, or to go back to ordinary couching instead. This option was not unwelcome, as it is quite a time-consuming technique (the needle has to go up and down through the two fabric layers in exactly the same place, and must be pulled through just enough but not too much) which requires a lot of concentration, not to mention strong fingers. As I was still nursing an injured hand, I decided to stick to the mimimum – but I’m glad I gave it a go, as it’s an interesting technique.

Finally we got to add all manner of bling; beads, glass gems and tiny freshwater pearls fit for a king! In all it was an occasion which I’d be very happy to repeat – stitching with a group of like-minded people, in beautiful surroundings, with leisurely chats over lunch, and learning more about this wonderful hobby of ours. So here are the two things that made the retreat so special: the tutors and fellow-stitchers, and the project. The second picture shows what I managed in the two days, plus a little work on the crown at my library craft group yesterday. I hope to show you a finished king in the not too distant future!

By the way, Sarah and Angela were kind enough to give me some feedback on Forever Frosty, and one suggestion which I may well follow up…

Shopping and workshopping

Posted on 4th November, 2017 by Flights of Fancy

Some three weeks ago (where does the time go!) I was at the Knitting & Stitching Show in Alexandra Palace, having a jolly good time both as a tutor and as a stitcher going round the stands. I’m really enjoying the combination – my stash of fabrics, threads and other bits and bobs is so well-stocked after years of stitching that I’m not sure two days of solid shopping would on its own be a reason for going, but mixed with teaching workshops it’s great.

And I didn’t just shop, either: in between looking for silks and buttons I wandered onto a stand where you could learn to knit or crochet. I’m OK with crochet, but knitting, in spite of several attempts and in spite of having a knitting grandmother, mother, aunts and mother-in-law, has so far eluded me. I only had about 20 minutes before the next workshop, but the kind volunteer teaching me to cast on, knit and purl was so clear and helpful that I managed to produce something which, though not in any way aspiring to being useful (it will never become a jersey or even a dishcloth), did at least look like acceptable knitting. A very proud moment!

I did do some shopping as well, of course, and bought a few supplies (spending all of £7). Having learnt the basics of soft string padding at my RSN goldwork class the day before, I got a card of soft string to practice with at home (well, I couldn’t possibly go to Golden Hinde’s stand and not buy at least one thing), and from John James’ stand I got some good value petite tapestry needles for the Christmas Wreath kits and the Butterfly Wreath workshop.

There is a third item in the picture above: ten little wooden floral buttons. They are the culmination of a two-year search, which sounds much more serious than it is . You may remember I stitched an elephant for our niece’s wedding, and that after things going rather badly wrong during the finishing process it did eventually turn into quite a nice card, embellished with four small wooden floral buttons. As I’d originally bought five, at a previous Knitting & Stitching Show, I had one left. And I really liked them. So I tried to find some more, both at the K & S and in shops – unsuccessfully, until this October. Yes, this time I finally found the exact match to my remaining button – yay!

What I forgot to do, however, is make a note of who sold them, so if I want any more the whole search will have to be repeated … My task for next year: find the stand that sells the buttons and write down the name!

One thing I did notice – and it may not be as bad or as widespread as it looks to me; I hope it isn’t – is that fewer small independent shops have stands. Kate at Sparklies pulled out several years ago, and this year The Calico Cat, from whom I had hoped to purchase some 3-yard skeins of Gloriana silk, was absent. Both mentioned spiralling costs as one of the reasons that they didn’t come to the Knitting & Stitching Show any more. It seems to me that the K & S are shooting themselves in the foot here, as it is surely these small shops, often one-woman or husband-and-wife outfits, that make the show so interesting. Yes, being able to buy needles at a discount from John James, to name but one of the “big” names, is useful, but it’s the relatively unknown designers, the makers of unique hand-dyed threads and fabrics, the purveyors of kits you could only get from them, who make us come back year after year. Or am I projecting my own ideas onto everyone else? When you go to a Show like this (or if you had the opportunity to go), why do you/would you go? What makes it interesting to you? I’d love to hear.

And then there were the workshops. I do enjoy those! Especially when the people coming to them tell me that they have enjoyed them too . Here is a small impression of what was produced at the Shisha, freestyle and embellished embroidery workshops, including my own very artistic doodle cloth. (Incidentally, K & S, slightly more inspiring surroundings to teach the workshops in would be really nice…)

Kits. Lots of kits.

Posted on 7th October, 2017 by Flights of Fancy

When I started Mabel’s Fancies, it was because I found that other people liked the things I’d been designing for my own use, and as I had some experience in writing websites it seemed a good idea to set one up for myself and offer the designs for sale, thus to at least partly finance my hobby. My husband, ever ambitious, has long urged me to expand and go for world domination, but I’m perfectly happy for it to stay small-scale and bring in some stash money so I don’t have to worry about buying goldwork threads or hand-dyed fabrics.

To this end, I decided that digital chart packs were the way to go. There was a bit of a scare a while back when it looked like I would have to charge VAT for every digital sale abroad and make sure that it was the correct VAT for whatever country the buyer was from, which would have put a complete stop to that side of Mabel’s Fancies, but fortunately the law turned out not to apply to things sent out by email. Phew.

Quite early on in Mabel’s existence I did add one kit (or rather a set of three kits) to the range: the Mini Needlebook kits for people who wanted to try out Hardanger. Between them they cover the three most common bars and filling stitches, and you end up with one or more usable needlebooks. And that was it. A few tools were added, like squissors, but on the whole most of Mabel’s fancies were digital ones.

Then I started teaching classes and workshops. And for those classes and workshops I needed to provide material packs. And as I was putting those together I thought I might as well put together a few more and bung them on the website, and so the needlebook kits were joined by bookmarks and notebooks and coasters (all in Hardanger), as well as a number of cards in Shisha, freestyle, tactile and embellished embroidery. It was definitely expansion, though fortunately still a long way away from the world domination advocated by my husband.

On the whole, I can get away with making up a few kits at a time, or even just making them up as and when they are needed. I’ve got two boxes with kit materials, some of them pre-cut, and so putting a single kit together when it’s ordered is fairly quick, and it means I’m not taking up storage space which is rather at a premium in our house. Even when it’s a single workshop, which is usually for a maximum of twelve people, it’s all quite manageable. It’s when there are three or (as now) four workshops looming that the production line begins to get a bit overwhelming.

And so this is what our house has been looking like for the past week or so:

You may have noticed, by the way, the complete and slightly surprising absence of Cat in these pictures. Lexi took pity on me and decided not to spread her fur onto the fabric, tangle the threads in a play-fight or photobomb the FoF pics. She confined herself to attacking and killing a few off-cuts – I am much obliged to her.

A successful workshop and a swarm of bees

Posted on 16th May, 2016 by Flights of Fancy

Last Saturday was the first of the three Freestyle Embroidery workshops in aid of the Dunchurch Baptist Church building fund; I found myself doing some last-minute preparations around lunchtime (transferring the design to twelve pieces of blue cotton and putting them in hoops with some backing fabric) but fortunately got everything done in time *phew*.

When we got to the church, 45 minutes before the workshop was about to start, two ladies were already waiting – they were from relatively far away and hadn’t been sure how long the journey would take, although I hope their early arrival was at least partly due to enthusiasm and eagerness as well!

The twelve participants came from a wide range of ages, from 14 to 90, which was lovely; but they were all women. Not that I mind women, you understand – I am one myself, after all – but I know for a fact that there are some very talented male stitchers out there. What keeps them from attending these stitching workshops? Is it seen as unmanly? Are they afraid people might spot them as they stealthily creep out of the church, clutching a piece of stitching? I hereby call on all men, stitchers or not, to come and have a try; it’s not difficult, or scary, or dangerous, and if you can wield a precision screwdriver a needle and thread should hold no terrors for you.

By the way, do you remember Katie my helpful guinea pig, who tried out workshop kits for me to see if they were suitable for young stitchers? She was there, and was by far the fastest stitcher. That’s what dedicated concentration does for you .

Everyone enjoyed the afternoon, and in spite of a good amount of chatting, and some time spent on tea or coffee with biscuits and buttered scones (the latter kindly donated by one of the participants), by the end of the afternoon twelve wildflower gardens were flourishing in various degrees of completeness.

I have been told of at least three that have been finished since then – and indeed more than finished. Jenny was not satisfied with her first bee, and so with laudable determination she kept on trying until she was. If any of the flowers in her garden fail to get pollinated, it won’t be for lack of effort on her part!

One workshop down, two more to go, and in an attempt to be more organised I am getting the kits ready now. Ironing the fabric, cutting it to size and transferring the design to it; printing the instructions and attaching the cover photographs to them; sticking 2 needles per kit into a bit of felt; folding the cards, inserting them into their envelopes and adding a piece of wadding each; and my favourite bit, getting the threads together. Don’t you just love playing with colourful stranded cottons?

The Wildflower Garden kits, without threads

A workshop and too many projects

Posted on 27th May, 2015 by Flights of Fancy

The weekend before last I taught the first of my three shisha workshops in aid of our church’s building fund. As one of the ladies attending brought cake for everyone, we can safely say it was a great success .

But even ignoring the cake (not easy – there was chocolate cake, carrot cake, coffee & walnut…) it went very well, with ten ladies practising their needle skills and producing their very first piece of shisha embroidery. Would you like to see how they did?

That last, rather abstract version is my doodle cloth (yes, that sequin is very purple), which I use to demonstrate stitches. The next workshop will be on 13th June, and the last one, which still has places available, on 11th July.

My preparatory stitching for these workshops has long been done, but there is plenty more on my Would Like To Stitch list; and being a bit of a serial starter I now have five projects on the go with several waiting in the wings. Actually being stitched at the moment (on a sort of rota basis): the goldwork balloon, my Pearsall’s wool experiment, the second Wedding Elephant, a set of birthday coasters for my mother, and Join the Band, a Hardanger and surface stitch band sampler. Nagging to be started: the Tree of Life, several Kelly Fletcher designs, and the little goldwork project whose design I’m using for my wool experiments. Waiting to be charted: a goldwork toadstool, flower & seahorse (not all in one design, I hasten to say), several “outline” designs to be worked in stem stitch, and the Round in Circles SAL.

Could someone please leave me a fortune so I can retire?

Shisha sampler finished!

Posted on 2nd February, 2015 by Flights of Fancy

After the two experiments on my pre-sampler sampler I decided that the condemned blue & white daisy would be replaced by the more open version of the Cretan shisha variation. A closer look at the sampler confirmed something I had vaguely suspected before, namely that the 24mm sequin was too big for where it was. A rummage through my modest stash of shisha materials produced a bag of 18mm mirrors, which I bought for a class I taught some time ago. Just the size Mary Corbet was working with in her instruction pictures, so that would work very well – I could now be fairly sure that the 16-dots-only version of the Cretan stitch would come out all right. I picked a rather chipped mirror as I wouldn’t be able to use that in a class and it would do perfectly well for a sampler. (Do you find yourself doing that, when teaching someone to stitch, or passing on some threads or materials? Saying “well, it would be all right for me but I couldn’t possible give it to someone else”?)

As I had feared, the holes from unpicking the daisy were quite visible, and using a smaller mirror meant I wouldn’t be covering them with the shisha, so I mulled over various options in the back of my mind while working the Cretan stitch; I could go over the holes in French knots, or beads, or small sequins, or perhaps chain stitch. Oh well, let’s cross that bridge when we get to it.

In the end, I decided not to do any of these things. I did add sequins and beads, but only to balance the overall look of the sampler, giving it a vaguely circular outline and filling in a few obvious gaps. The unpicking holes will be part of the sampler, a reminder that you don’t always get things right first time round. As for the Cretan stitch, I definitely like the way it turned out and will be using it again; probably only with the smaller mirrors, though, which I think look a bit daintier than the big sequins (unless you’re doing a really chunky piece that will be seen from some distance away, like a wall hanging).

In fact, as I was considering using this stitch again, I thought it would make rather a pretty floral design with some stems and leaves added. So back into the hoop went my shisha experiment, and out came some DMC floche, variegated stranded cotton and blending filament. Some stem stitch and fishbone stitch later the two shishas had become part of a flowery whole.

Stems and leaves added to the Shisha experiment

Fishbone stitch leaf in stranded cotton and blending filament

After that, it was a small step to cards. Using the less dense Cretan variation with a smaller sequin or mirror, with a scroll and a leaf to complete it, makes a quick and very attractive card for birthdays or other celebrations – and of course the colour of the flower can be adapted to the receiver’s preference. Tucked away in a drawer somewhere were some pretty aperture cards that were just the right size for this project, and, well, I’ll be making a few more of these in the near future! Not only that, but the design struck me as just the right project for the 2-hour workshop I’m planning in aid of our church’s building fund. Slightly different stitches, probably, like chain stitch and fly stitch; a blue background; cheerful yellow shell discs instead of sequins; some spangles…

But first it’s back to the golden bee and watering can, and, at some point, Orpheus!

Workshops both ways

Posted on 12th July, 2014 by Flights of Fancy

I’ve got workshops on the brain at the moment. For one thing, tickets for the Knitting & Stitching Show workshop at Alexandra Palace are now available, so if you’re coming to the show on Friday 10th October and you’d like to try your hand at Hardanger (or brush up your skills, or simply spend some time stitching with like-minded people) do join me there.

Then there were the two workshops at Dunchurch Baptist Church, held in aid of the building fund on the last Saturday in June and the first Saturday in July. They were great fun to do because none of the ladies there (no gentlemen, unfortunately – are they shy about their needle skills? Or were they all occupied in polishing their car or playing cricket?) had ever tried Hardanger before, and several hadn’t really done much needlework at all. Did that matter? No! In fact, as one lady said, “It’s remarkable! We didn’t know anything about it and now, only two hours later, we’ve made something really pretty.” There are few things more gratifying than to watch someone cut and remove the threads for the first time and then give a delighted gasp because there, as if by magic, is that airy pattern of five holes. They all did really well and I am proud to show some of their work here:

But it’s not just teaching – I’ve booked myself a workshop as well, or to be precise a Royal School of Needlework Day Class. They do some in Rugby now, which is too good an opportunity to miss! So I’ve signed up for goldwork, and the fact that it’s on 6th December, the day after St Nicholas Eve, makes a great excuse for a present to myself. No previous experience is required, so having done one of the RSN’s short workshops (the lovely dragonfly below) at the Knitting & Stitching Show two years ago is a bonus and should help me not make a complete fool of myself .

Putting things together and building things up

Posted on 27th February, 2014 by Flights of Fancy

Not too much stitching this week, but a lot of preparation – I’ve been putting the kits together for the Knitting & Stitching Show workshop next month (there are still some tickets available), and getting some more card and felt for the Dunchurch workshop in June. For the pink floral card I can’t quite decide whether it looks better with the baby pink or the bright fuchsia felt! By the way, did you notice the small coloured rings that hold the threads for the K&S kits? They were an unsuccessful attempt at finding a replacement for my light wooden storage rings; unfortunately they were far too small to store full skeins of perle on, but they turned out to be just the right size to hold the threads for one Hardanger patch – and they look bright and cheerful into the bargain.

Card and felt for the Dunchurch workshop kits

Another thing that needed some preparation and putting together was Treasure Trove. I’ve done a fair bit of the surface stitching (just half the border to go) so it was time to start on the goldwork. For this I needed 4 tiny yellow felt circles, 4 slightly larger yellow felt circles, and four gold kid octagons. After some deliberation I decided on 8mm and 14mm for the felt circles; the gold octagons would be cut from 2cm squares. I measured everything carefully, cut it all, and then panicked – surely these minute bits of felt and kid couldn’t possibly be the right size? But fitting them to the running stitch outlines I had previously worked as a guide, they were just right. I could see I was in for some very fiddly stitching, securing first the smallest circle, and then the larger one covering it, both accurately centred inside the running stitch outline.

As it looked like the sort of stitching that would need fierce concentration, I decided to do it at my very chatty and distracting stitching group. Apart from one knot-and-loop at the back of my work which I noticed too late (and subsequently secured behind previous stitching rather than unpick the whole thing) it all went remarkably smoothly, and I ended the session with what one of my fellow stitchers called “four felt blobs”. She obviously wasn’t altogether sure whether anything else was going to happen to them, but I reassured her that the rather garish yellow blobs would in fact be covered in tasteful antique gold. I would have started on it there if it hadn’t been for the fact that I forgot to bring a sharp needle, and my size 28 tapestry needle simply refused to go through the kid!

So just a little bit more to do on Treasure Trove – and then I need to stitch the blue-and-silver version…

Serendipitous hoops

Posted on 7th February, 2014 by Flights of Fancy

If you’ve recently looked at the Workshops page you will know that we’ve got several planned for this year. The two London Knitting & Stitching Shows will probably not surprise you, but why on earth one at Dunchurch Baptist Church? For a very simple reason – I am a member there, and we are raising funds for a new building.

The rather sad reason why we need a new building is that the old one, built by the members themselves in the 70s, is falling to bits. The much more joyous reason is that it’s getting too small! But whatever the reason, a new building needs a new budget. As anyone who has ever tried to raise money for a good cause will know, it takes a lot of ingenuity and creativity to come up with enough events and projects that will interest people. Our Elders decided to start from the Parable of the Talents – anyone who wanted to was encouraged to collect £10 from them, and to use that money to raise more in whatever way their particular talents suggested. So far this has yielded a Murder Mystery Evening with 3-course meal (tomorrow, and we’ve got tickets!), a Christmas Cookbook (recipes to be handed in in March and cooked/baked in April – book to appear just before the Village Fête), an Arts & Craft Exhibition with cake stall, a sponsored walk/run/cycle ride/pram push, several Quiz Nights, a Beetle Drive (I had to look that one up ) and a concert. Oh, and a Hardanger workshop.

It wasn’t until I’d offered it and picked a date that I realised I’d need twelve 4″ hoops. When I teach at the Knitting & Stitching Show, hoops are lent us for the duration of the workshop, but here I’d have to provide them myself. And oddly enough I didn’t have twelve 4″ hoops just lying around…

As you do nowadays, I Googled hoops, and found that even with my husband’s and my £10 pooled I wouldn’t be able to afford twelve. Until I came across a Gumtree ad. Eight red 4″ flexi-hoops. The hoops were somewhere in Wales (I think), and only local pick-up was specified, but I thought I might as well contact the seller and see if they’d be willing to post them. The lady was very helpful and said yes, she’d be happy to send them. I asked if by any chance she had any more hoops. “Not red ones,” she said. “But I do have twelve green ones.”

Just the right number, and for a great price that was well within our Talent budget – they were obviously meant to be! In the end I bought the eight red ones as well, on the grounds that some workshoppers might like to buy one to take home. And here they are: my serendipitous collection of hoops. Now all I need is twelve people to use them on Saturday 28th June.

Flights of Fancy

Mabel's musings on anything stitchy

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