Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Embroidery

I have done hand embroidery since I was little. My mom was "in to" cross stitch. She did it a lot. I got on board and did it a lot too. I know that I still have some of my old projects that I made. One of them is a purple Popsicle. I'll see if I can find it and post a picture. Both mom & I cross stitched sweatshirts. I still have the ones I made and the one she made for me. If someone has made me something or written me a card I can't get rid of it. Anyway, my last cross stitch project was a "quilt" for my niece Elle. I started it when I found out my sister was pregnant and gave it to Elle when she was 18 months old. It was the letters of the alphabet with kiddo's around the letters. I quickly gave up cross stitching when I started quilting.

In the summer of 2010 I was looking for a hand work project that I could do on the plane ride to Hawaii. I knew that I was going to want to do something for 5 hours. I found twilling. I saw the most beautiful wall hanging in Quilting Bits and Pieces in Eudora KS. It was twilling and I thought that I was hooked. It turns out that I was not. It took to long for me to finish. I am not very patient and I like to see results quickly. Problem with that is I had purchased a lot of pearlized cotton thread. (that is the type of floss for twilling). What to do? It sat for almost 2 years. I was cleaning in my sewing room & found it and I was determined to use it, but how? I found an embroidery book that I had also got at Quilting Bits & Pieces and found a butterfly pattern that looked very easy. Then I went to YouTube and looked up embroidery and learned how to do stem stitch embroidery. I am using the pearlized cotton. The cool thing is that it really looks like twilling. I made 24 butterflies and made them into a 30's quilt. Here's the quilt
All of the 30's fabrics are scraps! I purchased the yellow at Quilting On The Square in  Holton KS. It really turned out great & I am happy with it.
 
Now I have started another embroidery pattern. I am making this one using white fabric (I had all of this on hand) and red thread. Here are pics of the 3 blocks that I have finished.
 
 
This one reminds me of candy canes
I think I'll make this sunflower again using different colors. That will be for another project.
 
There are a lot of sources to learn new techniques. Some are free and some you need to pay for. Look for them and you might learn something that you'll love to do.
I'd better get off of my toukis and get some things done. I have a current craving for coffee cake. It's time to go digging in the cookbooks or the Internet for a good recipe. I hope that y'all are having a great day, Talk to you more later,
 
 
Vicky

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