Thinking of making a needle book and maschma

I feel like I tend to blog about things I'm thinking of doing rather than showing the results of what I have done. Partially it's because I procrastinate, partially it's a matter of not having the time to do it so I'm stuck just thinking about it and partially it's because I write to try and sort out things I hesitate about. Writing about it sorts out the thoughts -- at it gives you motivation to produce a result once you declare to the world what you are about to to do as well as it's an opportunity to ask others for input.

If you follow this blog you must have noticed that the idea of a needle book and thread storage have come up. Last time I mentioned making a maschma, for example. This post is about those thoughts once again.

I've been thinking of making a needle book for some time now, but never come up with a good design. Because I have both beading needles and hand embroidery needles it's also a matter of whether to make one book for all the needles or make two separate ones. Right now I'm thinking of doing one just for my beading needles as they make up 80 % of all my needles (and most of my embroidery needles are collected in one place anyway as I bought them in a silk ribbon embroidery collection -- the big yellow package).

Being a tool junkie extends to needles too: I have at least half a dozen of needle packages, not including a zip-lock bag of collapsible-eye needles, DIY wire needles and a big-eye needle. There's the regular long beading needles in size ranging from 10 to 15 (!), sharp bead embroidery needles, ballpoint bead emboidery needles and curved needles. Have I forgotten any now? Regardless, right now I just put all the needle packages in the organza bag, having tied them together with a string through the holes at the top (most packages have a hole, if not I punch one).

But what about the threads? The main reason I stick with this organza bag solution is that it all fits in it, all my needles and all my beading threads, and it's easy to carry from one spot to another. It's just that they're all jumbled, I'd like a bit more order. Just as with my seed bead storage dilemma, it's a question of finding a good, cheap -- and easy to carry -- solution that can accomodate different shapes and sizes as I use more than one type of beading thread. There's the K.O. spools, but also carded thicker K.O. thread and smaller bobbins (One-G etc). Plus a couple of big spools of YLI jean thread and medium-sized spools of a Gütermann thread I use for bead crochet.

It's still easyier to find the right thread so I'll make the needle book project a priority over this: removing the needles, the organza bag might be as good a solution as any with the amount of beading threads I have.

But my ideas doesn't end there...

Apparently, one thing that's become popular among embroiderers in Sweden recently is making a marsma or maschma; a small embellished roll or tote for emboidery paraphernalia (needles, scissors, threads), probably of sami origin, one might call it. And I think it might be very useful for me as a seedbeader too as I like to bead in couches, beds and everywhere else where I can't take my whole bead stash with me. So one of my newest ideas is to sketch a maschma with room for a couple of tubes or flip-top boxes of beads, one or two bead thread bobbins and a pair of scissors. (Did I forget something?) So far I haven't figured out the design or even what material I want to use. And partially I procrastinate because I love to embroider, but don't really enjoy sewing.

To illustrate what a maschma looks like, here's a screenshot of a picture googling I did in order to find some inspiration for my beader's maschma. Click on it for the full size.

Looking at the pics I'm thinking that with the right material it could double as a small bead mat too. I rarely use bead mats (hence why everything here has a few stray seed beads embedded in them), but they can be useful so why not? I like things with double -- or more -- purposes. A bit like the Helen Gibb kit for a needle case with bead pad [which not longer is available on her website so no pic to show].

These are some of the things I'm thinking about while working -- it might not be a fun or wellpaid job, but at least I'm free to think, sketch ideas in my head etc while I'm doing it. Not that I always think of beads and stitching, of cause, but it's a recurring theme most days. I might not be showing many finished items as I'm focusing on other things right now, but I have so many ideas buzzing in my head. If only I could cure my bad habit of procrastinating...

Challenge WIPs

So... I tried keep up with Heather Powers' Jewelry Making Mojo Challenge, but because of the schedule it ended up being in the middle of a busy period so this far, this last week of the twelve, I've only finished a few pieces and have a few WIPs that's somewhere between finished and barely started on.

One piece that's finished or not depending on how you look at it is this circular thing.

Inspired by Heather Kingsley-Heath's books on albion stitch (which I reviewed here), I wanted to make something with inspiration from etruscan jewellery for the week 9 assignment "ancient history". If you google etruscan jewellery, you'll soon find a lot of circular pendants and earrings and it's those designs I had in made when making this piece.

The design is very simple, partially because I didn't follow any pattern so this was just a first test. At first, the design ended with a row of picots, but while it looked very pretty it didn't feel etruscan. All etruscan designs I saw had a clean cut edge. So I added a final row of beads, which I really screwed up, getting the bead count wrong so it doesn't lay flat as well as having to back engineer the thread path, making the thread too visible.

I'm hoping the next version will look better.


The second assignment I'm working on is the week 8 colour palette inspiration challenge. For it, I picked out a random palette that caught my eye. It happened to be this one from Pattern Pod (from this pin).

Not my usual type of colour scheme, but still not too out there. After looking through the bead stash and deciding I would have to start focus on my favourite techniques even if they're slow (I often stick to stringing and simple wire wrapping in short challenges in order to be sure I can finish it in time, but many times it just ends up with me being unhappy as it isn't my forte). In this case it meant hand embroidery and I have just the perfect colours of cotton floss of the palette. Finding a silk sample, I even found some grey to use.

Now... That's as far as I've come... I have a design -- flower with light yellow details for a small round brooch or pendant -- but haven't started embroidering it yet.

The metal component you can see in the first pic was just something I took out as the colour combos in this old WIP is roughly the same as in the palette and the floss -- which made it a good fit for the extra challenge of the week, which was to make two pieces using the same palette, but with different proportions between the colours.

Apart from that I'm also working on a few jewelry redos as per the week 5 assignment, but they haven't come very far either. I'm just creating WIPs at the moment -- and dreaming of starting a new big project, but feeling it'd better be left until after the harvest season is over. There's also other ideas like making a maschma/marsma that'll have to wait a bit -- though that's mostly a matter of procrastinating because I'm not that fond of sewing. Embroidering -- yes! Sewing -- meh...

Look what I won! (An embroidery WIP)

I don't always flaunt stuff I win, but this time I just had to. Partially because it's also a WIP as it included both a big book and an wool embroidery kit.

In the last minute I managed to send my e-mail and participate in a contest at the website Textil hemslöjd where I could win a book by Ulla Oscarsson that offers glimpses into the textile history of Jämtland and Härjedalen (two provinces in northern Sweden) and an embroidery kit for a big bridal cushion modelled after one made in the late 18th century in Jämtland. The book is called Kvinnomöda och skaparglädje, which loosly translates to women's effort and creativity/joy of creating.

Just have to show you a few pages of the book. It really covers everything from what fibres were used, what textiles were bought rather than made at home, what clothes people used through the ages, what textiles was used in the house, how they did laundry, what the embroideries looked like and what a bride wore. And, yes, it does include the Överhogdal tapestries.

The book with the loose banner with the title on

(Notice how the wind tried to "help" me today. Don't know what photo assistants I prefer: weather or cats...)

A very interesting book to read, even for those that like me have no connection to the region. After all, some of the history we do share in the rest of Sweden or Scandinavia -- and other parts become interesting just because of the local and regional differences.

I finished the book last night (or morning if we're being picky) so now I'm turning my focus on the second part of the prize: the bridal cushion kit.

It'll be one of my bigger embroidery projects considering it's 50 cm wide -- and the first time I work with wool. This will be a meeting between a 18th century embroiderer from Jämtland and a 21st century beader from Skåne and I will be adding my own touch to it.

That's really where I am at the moment, planning on how and where to include beads. Because it will of cause need beads! I'm not one to follow a pattern -- and everything is better with beads. Beads don't seem to have been very common in the embroidery of that time and place: I spotted very little beads in the book. It seems to have be a bit more common in other areas (like Skåne), but in general swedish folk tradition didn't really include much beading. So this project really will be a fusion between places and ages once I bead it.

One big part of the planning process is determining what beads to include: they need to match the embroidery yarns I got in the kit as I won't be substituting with anything from my own thread stash. An excuse to buy more beads? Hrmm... Maybe. I will try to do my best and see if I can't use what I already have, but this is a bit different from my usual style so bead shopping might be necessary for the best result.

Might have to make a few swatches to test bead-yarn combos first. Or just test combinations of embroidery and beading stitches. I want to do some beaded herringbone stitch. That's all I really have decided at this point.

So stay tuned to see what happens, but I warn you: I'm a slow embroiderer. This won't be done in the next couple of weeks!

New embroidery floss

I seem to concentrate my blogging to weekends for some strange reason... Today I just wanted to show something I got already on Monday, but never got around to write about. There are two things I might get in the mail that warrants a blog post: new beads or new threads. This time it was threads. And the best of threads: free threads (won in a giveaway).

I won a package of the new embroidery floss from Sublime Stitching at the Feeling Stitchy blog. Many of the colourways inspired me -- think some of them ended up on my pinboard -- but one in particular stood out: Mingles, a set of pre-blended floss. Pre-blended means that while cotton floss normally consists of six individual threads (ply) in the same colour, each skein here comes with three threads of one colour blended with three threads of another colour. While it at first glance might seem similar to variegated (e.g. Sublime Floss Taffy Pull) it's not: it's two types of threads, not one space-dyed thread.

This floss is a bit special as Jenny, thw woman behind the company, has added a personal touch with inspirational names and little one-liners on each colour.

I have an idea or rather a little something I want to try, but there's a risk I have to get new beads to be able to do it. Will have to really rummage through the bead boxes first: one never knows what's hiding on the bottom sometimes...

Other than that I have to real plans for the floss yet. Think they'd be useful for leaves and flowers perhaps so there'll probably be a small floral embroidery with these. Have only on a few occasions before mixed threads so I'm not used to stitching with pre-blended floss at all. So the best ideas probably won't pop up until I've had time to play around with the thread a bit, seeing how it looks when stitched.

PS! While planning my embroideries, I'm also considering signing up for this. Wonder if I have the stamina to see it through, though. That's what's kept me from signing up previous years, the idea of tying myself up to a year-long obligation. I haven't even kept up to speed with TAST this year (but have an idea about combining the two, focusing more on monthly goals than on weekly, which I hope will be easier). Anyone else doing BJP?

Beaded smocking

When I first saw smocking and shirring it didn't feel like my cup of tea. Too cutesy, too time-consumer (yes, I know I work with time-consuming techniques like seedbeading and embroidery all the time), too traditional, too often done on boring white cotton to make sugar-sweet toddler clothes with pastel embroidery. I could go on, but I think you get the gist...

But since rekindling the love of hand embroidery -- via bead embroidery -- I've spent a lot of time contemplating what it is I want to create with my embroidery. I've especially thought about surfaces to embroider (there's a reason this book and this one are near the top on my wishlist) and how to create inspiring dimensional surfaces, e. g. using decoupage, paint, image transfers and "trapped object" techniques. Both to do something different from the traditional embroidery we all learned in school and to create a good starting point less daunting than that pristine, blank canvas many artists hesitate in front of.

When I recently saw Phiona Richards' pearl book sculpture and then, the other day, some american and canadian smocking -- which is different from the smocking/shirring I've usually seen -- and particularly when seeing this I started thinking: what if I use smocking techniques to either create a surface for my bead embroidery or use it to make the beadwork (partially or fully).


And all that put together that made me stitch these little samples on a dotted fabric.

First I really messed up and created this little sample: didn't stitch it right and then the beads downed in the pleats. Still, probably useful for a less strict and almost freeform style.

Then I made this one. A better sample (and a bigger one, using 8 mm beads instead of 4 mm), but I should've added extra pleats on the sides.

...which I did in this sample. Just missed one thing: it'd be better so start with just one bead in the first row and then increase the number, the same way I ended it on the right.

I then thought: what if I use bicone-shaped beads instead of round? They'd fill out the spaces in another way. So I got some square bicone beads (aka pyramid beads) and gave it a go, creating my last sample of the day. Probably should've taken more care to get the fabric and beads even, but I hope you can at least see the difference in style/pattern when changing bead shapes.

This is also the only sample I did stitching through instead of along the squares.

Here's an overview of all the samples. I bought the fabric after having see a lot of gingham embroidery, aka chicken scratch, and thought the squares and dots in the pattern could be interesting to work with. It wasn't until I got my sequins out that I also started thinking of actually using it. And now it ended up a good candidate for smocking as I could use the pattern instead of marking up a grid (to stitch after) by hand. Now the whole piece of fabric will be designated to some sort of experimental sampler.

This was a lot of fun -- though I have to learn the techniques a bit better, didn't exactly go by the book when doing these. My way works too, but it probably wears down the embroidery floss harder than it should. So I'm going to find some various tutes, read up on the smocking chapter in Jane Davis' bead embroidery books and then hopefully I'll have some more -- and better! -- smocked beadwork and/or jewellery to show you in the future.

Though as for bracelets, I'll probably keep pursuing this technique instead, which I wrote about in a previous post (uhm, no it isn't finished yet... Was focusing too much on beads and too little on thread when I last went shopping). No fabric edges etc to worry about there.  I have had ideas about stitching beads to pleated shibori ribbon, but that'll be different from smocking and more along the line of what e.g. Alyson G. does -- or perhaps even something inspired by this from Cold Feet Quilter.

~*~

This has also inspired me to prepare a post about smocking with beads for my other blog. In researching it, I rediscovered Tinctory -- and could kick myself for forgetting about that gorgeous, beautiful smocked jewellery. If you haven't seen her jewellery, be sure to check out her Flickr page and/or blog.

Finding her work again, I returned to my musings of surfaces: for some time I've thought of using more hand-dyed materials, particularly fabrics etc as embroidery bases. As there's a certain pleasure in doing as much of the work myself I even considered that I might have to learn how to dye. But first of all, if I were to delve in to the world of hand-dyeing I'd only use natural dyes -- and they can fade, especially if not used right or picking the wrong materials, so there are many skills to learn. Second, learning that would take time as it's a whole new area for me, time and energy I rather spend perfecting my skills in beading, embroidery and metalwork. It could be fun to attend a short course or hang out with some dyers for a day and dye a bit, but nothing more than that. No, it's probably better to begin by finding good sources for hand-dyed fabric and fiber, preferrably using natural dyes and sharing my ideas on colours/aesthetics, and buy already dyed materials. At least for now.

~*~

UPDATE: As I've been asked about, I thought I'd just show a quick pic of how the beads are stitched. Basically, you just add a bead to every other stitch when making the pleats.

 

Original pic stolen from the smocking how-to guide on Tipnut. Altered by me.
The above mentioned blog post on smocking/shirring with beads can be found here. Blog in swedish, but many/most links go to websites in english.

Sequin waste inspiration links

I thought that as I'm not doing anything worthwhile anyway today, I could take a few minutes hours to show some of the links I found when looking for sequin waste (a.k.a. punchinella) inspiration. This is pretty much just a random list of things stumbled over. Hope you can find something of interest in it!

Most of the examples -- well, more or less all of them -- use sequin waste with round hole as that's the most common type. You can however find sequin waste in all sorts of shapes. For examples of this, see e.g. Simply Sequins (there's also snowflake-shaped punchinella, but it's out of stock so it doesn't show up in that page -- see it here instead).

~*~

First, I just wanted to mention that if you haven't seen it already, you can find some seqiun waste pattern photos in my previous post on the subject. You can also read about what sequin waste or punchinella actually is there.

A good place to start is of cause Flickr, searching for either sequin waste or punchinella. Different names resulting in different search results. Tip: use quotation marks around "sequin waste" for more relevant hits.

Another almost just as good place to start is Pinterest, again search for either sequin waste or punchinella.

In fact, those two places alone will give you many ideas, ranging from printing and scrapbooking to hand embroidery and beadwork.

So far, my favourites are the ones using sequin waste in embroidery. Plenty of examples at Flickr, like this, this, this (bottom right corner) or this (beaded). Notice how some cut open the "centre" to create open flower motifs. More embroideries, using detached daisy stitch, can be found at Pintangle. There's also tiny fragments of sequin waste in the art squares at Taylor's textile trials.

A fabric postcard with sequin waste background and beads and button embellishments can be found at Judy Skeel's blog.

Edited to add: Forgot to mention the videos from Guache Alchemy. One video with 7 different ways of using sequin waste plus a bonus video using embossing and inking.

At Rare Bird, you can see sequin waste being used to create patterns in friendly plastic, e.g. for making necklace pendants. There it's sold as laser mesh. Another version, using two layers, can be seen in Liz Welch's blog here. And don't miss this one either. In this pic, you can see star-shaped sequin waste too. Both sequin waste and sequins in friendly plastic can be found in this post.

Even more pics of friendly plastic and punchinella can be found at Adrienne Wood's blog.

Sequin waste can also be used for weaving as seen e.g. in this preview of a book by Lillian Coppock. Another use for it in the book is for wirework fish, as you could see in that link. More weaving can be found at Julie's mixed media blog.

Mixing punchinella and modelling paste (used with acryclic paints) can result in lovely art pieces like these by Amy Dame.

There are plenty of examples of sequin waste being used as stencils on Flickr so I'm just going to mention JoZart's blog post, showing how she created a background for a concertina file. And some pastel-painted polymer clay at Deez News.

Apparently, it can also be used as a bird scare.

~*~

Your turn: have you used sequin waste before? How? Have you found something inspirational online or in books for using this stuff? What would you do with it?

Feel free to add links to pics and blog posts. Your own or other's.

TAST week 28: Up and down buttonhole stitch

English name: Up and down buttonhole stitch
Swedish name: Langettstygn med omtag

I took a break from the Take a Stitch Tuesday challenges while working. Last week I did was 20, bullion knots, which isn't even on this blog (but a pic can be found on Flickr). A bit of a shame really as it was about the same time there came many stitches I haven't done before. But anyway, now I'm back on track again. Not such when I'll catch up on the weeks I've missed, but right now my focus is on the new challenges.

This stitch is one I've been waiting for. Saw it in TAST 2011 and so thought I might as well wait for it to appear in TAST to learn it. Of cause, liking the look of it I could've learned it whenever I wanted, but I wanted to do it this way so why not?

As the stitch is new to me, I stuck to some simple variations and did most of the stitching on my bright red aida as the grid makes it easier to focus on the technique and stitches than on trying to get everything nice and even. I wanted to make it in all black, but ran out of black floss -- just in time for the doubled motifs!

At first the stitch felt a bit tricky, but once I began stitching rather than just looking at step-by-step illustrations and finished embroidery, it turned out to be a fun and relative easy stitch. And it looks great too so this will be another one of my favourites.

No aurica yarn this time. I actually did a few stitches with beads too, but forgot to take a pics so it'll have to be added later.

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What is TAST?

Take a Stitch Tuesday is a weekly embroidery challenge throughout the year by Sharon of Pin Tangle. You can read more about it here (or by clicking the TAST badge to the right).


To see what others have done in this stitch, check out the comments in this post on Pin Tangle. Be sure not to miss Sharon's lovely stitch variations in the actual post.

Upphlutur

I mentioned in the Helsingborg post that I had a find to share. Nothing big and not a thing. It's a magazine article find.

It all started because few stores in Helsingborg are open on a Sunday so we went to Pressbyrån to look for a copy of the new rose-themed issue of Hemslöjd. I told my sis to keep an eye out for it while looking through all the magazine shelves, commenting and looking for something of interest. My sis found it first, but what she picked up and showed me was the mag next to it, norwegian Bunad (issue 2-2012). I'm not sure why she picked it up to show. Maybe she wanted to say "look, a norwegian hemslöjd magazine" or "look at those girls on the cover" (in colourful and patterned folk costumes) or "look at that price". Either way, I took the copy, flipped through it -- and there it was! An upphlutur.

I've never seen icelandic folk costumes (Þjóðbúningurinn) before and this particular one is very different from the scanian and swedish folkdräkter and bygdedräkter I've seen. (Not just because the other scandinavian/nordic costumes are regional while the icelandic ones are national.) I really liked the simplicity of the black-and-white upphlutur. And above all I loved the embellishments. At first I thought it was like goldwork, metallic threads embroidered onto the cloth. It didn't look like plain embroidery floss so my guess was goldwork with silver threads. Then I looked closer and saw that it was in fact silver filigree (real, handmade silver filigree) stitched to the bodice. Two of my favourite things in one: metalwork and embroidery!

Look at that!

The mother inherited her dress, which has vermeil filigree instead of just silver, from her grandmother, who in turn was given it in the 1920's (so it's really old). At that time this type of upphlutur was relatively new. It was designed by Gudmundura Thoroddsen in the early 20th century. The upphlutur itself was originally part -- or more precisely the "undergarment" -- of another folk costume, the faldbúningur (see this photo). When it was warm the faldbúningur could be worn without the jacket and from that the upphlutur was developed as a folk costume in its own right. The colours can vary. The bodice is often black but can also be e.g. blue or red. As you can see, different types of aprons are also used and the embellishments varies. The cap that goes with the dress is called skotthúfa or, in english, icelandic tail cap.

Of cause I can't show you the whole article (already this much is probably a stretch). There's more pics and information in the magazine and while it doesn't go in to any depth, if you want to see better pics -- and, if you understand norwegian, want to read the whole article -- you might want to try and get a copy. It costs 89 SEK or NOK, though.

You can read more about the icelandic folk costumes at e.g. The Icelandic National Costume Board  and Wikipedia. More pics of upphluturs can be found on the Icelandic National Costume Board website, Flickr and by image googling.

Myself, I'm starting to think about embroidering filigree and wirework on cloth now.

TAST week 19: Half chevron

English name: Half chevron
Swedish name: ? (variation av flätsöm med sidostygn)

This was a new stitch for me, though I have of cause tried my hand at both chevron and cretan stitches earlier during the TAST challenge,  so I kept it simple, tried to get familiar with the stitch. I like the effect you get when stitching multiple rows together and how much it changes depending on how you rotate the stitches/rows.

Along the right side you can also find two threaded variations of the stitch.

Having found that the Aurica yarn worked very well for both chevron and cretan before, it was likely the yarn would work for half chevron too. But it was a little tricky to get it at least a little even as the stitch has two different sides to it. If I hadn't been so tired when stitching it might've been easier to get the stitches nice and even, though.

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What is TAST?

Take a Stitch Tuesday is a weekly embroidery challenge throughout the year by Sharon of Pin Tangle. You can read more about it here (or by clicking the TAST badge to the right).


To see what others have done in this stitch, check out the comments in this post on Pin Tangle. Be sure not to miss Sharon's lovely stitch variations in the actual post.

TAST week 18: Crossed buttonhole

English name: Crossed buttonhole
Swedish name: Korslagda langettstygn

Hope you aren't expecting any exciting stitches. These two last weeks I've mostly stitched as a kind of meditation. Sure, I wanted to test different variations too, but one thing I like about some stitches are how they work up so fast and almost stitch themselves. So I just let myself go with the flow. Which is nice for the embroiderer, but doesn't result in any exciting or revolutionary stitching for the onlookers.

Here, I mostly tried different sizes/shapes and positioning rows of stitches in different ways, but I did try to make double crossed buttonhole stitches -- one of those ideas I thought was my own, but then realised many had done before me -- and there's also a few tacked down stitches and a little whipping.

I only did one stitch with the Aurica yarn. I liked the effect you get when measuring the stitches so the "filled" sections of yarn creates a border and the "open" sections are left for the crosses. Was just a little too tired to measure when doing this so I gave up after messing up the subsequent stitches and had to rip them up, leaving just one stitch.

Crossed buttonhole is a very decorative but still simple stitch. If I ever need to do some blanket stitches, this will be a variation to consider for that extra touch.

---
What is TAST?

Take a Stitch Tuesday is a weekly embroidery challenge throughout the year by Sharon of Pin Tangle. You can read more about it here (or by clicking the TAST badge to the right).


To see what others have done in this stitch, check out the comments in this post on Pin Tangle. Be sure not to miss Sharon's lovely stitch variations in the actual post.

Old gifts

I haven't been a very active blogger recently and it's not just because the weather called for outdoor work (according to the SMHI season map last weekend, we've had meteorological summer for a week now) but also other things that've gotten in the way. You should check out that map, it's kind of fun to see how the seasons in Sweden right now range from summer in the south to winter in the mountains in the north. But, anyway, I've got flower pics from these sunny summer days, but they aren't edited. Today I'm instead treating you to some different flowers, printed on fabric.

These are two fabric-clad boxes I got from an friend of my parents'. She was old by then and didn't do much embroidery so she gave me and my sis a few boxes of various sizes containing embroidery threads and a few tools. I have no idea how old they are, all I know is that I got them in the 90's and she was born in the 1910's so she'd had a long life to accumulate things in.

This little box above has a pretty fun floral design. The inside is lined with yellow satin and it has a stamp. Forgot to take a picture of that. I don't know if it was intended for embroidery floss to begin with or if it was repurposed for the sewing basket later. Haven't measured it, but it's about a 1 dm long.

The second box was big and flat like a (large) book. The old and stained wooden box is hinged and opens up to reveal compartments filled with embroidery threads on small bobbins. There was also a (silver?) thimble and the needlebook you can see below. The woman's name is written with a lead pencil on the inside of the needlebook.

I haven't used any of the threads. I don't even know exactly what most of them are (the blue skein on top of the bobbins are real silk, I know that much). It was a kind of treasure, getting all these colours and pretty boxes, so it's one of those things I save for something special. Or just save.

Too pretty -- and too special -- to use.

TAST week 17: wheatear stitch

English name: Wheatear stitch
Swedish name: veteaxsöm?

Last week the challenge stitch was wheatear, a stitch I hadn't tried before. To be honest I wasn't that impressed with it -- ok, but nothing more -- not until I begun adding beads to it! I also tried whipping the stitches (with and without beads), which I thought looked good. So in the end it turned out to be a stitch I'd love to use in the future. With beads.

I first did a few detached stitches with two or three straight stitches (above, left) and then continued by making a few horisontal rows of stitches. For the dark green horisontal row I whipped the straight stitches. For the blue roes, I added a second row of stitches above the first one.

Then I began doing the vertical chains. First just trying out different lenghts of the loops and then, below it, I tried whipping the loops. The remaining green rows are beaded, though it can be hard to see as I did most of them with frosted dark green beads. So let's look closer a bit closer at those.

The beaded variations are the ones I'm most pleased with. I tried several different onces and here's a summary of them:

1. With one bead on each straight stitch
2. As above, but afterwards beads were back stitched into the loops, one bead per loop
3. Detached stitch with one bead on each of the three straight stitches
4. Whipped with one bead per whipping stitch
5. Whipped with beads on the straight stitches
6. Whipped with beads on both whipping and straight stitches
7. One bead on each side of the loop
8. Longer stitches with multiple beads in each loop
9. Loop enters from and exit in one bead
10. As no. 1, but with longer loops
11. As no. 9 but with beads on the straight stitches too
12. As no. 7, but with longer loops

The last two rows with sand coloured beads are made to show the difference between using tone-in-tone beads and beads in a contrasting colour. Variations used are no. 9, 12, 11 and -- in the last row -- 10.

Of cause I also tried the Aurica yarn, but this stitch is a bit too complex to use with only the aurica if you want even results. Detached stitches work better than rows. I tried making rows of stitches, but it was so bad I ripped it up.

So it wasn't a good stitch for my novelty yarn, but again I must say it was a very good stitch for beads. I makes for lovely beaded borders so I'm glad I tried this stitch!

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What is TAST?

Take a Stitch Tuesday is a weekly embroidery challenge throughout the year by Sharon of Pin Tangle. You can read more about it here (or by clicking the TAST badge to the right).


To see what others have done in this stitch, check out the comments in this post on Pin Tangle. Be sure not to miss Sharon's lovely stitch variations in the actual post.

TAST week 16: French knot

English name: french knot (pl. french knots)
Swedish name: fransk knut  (pl. franska knutar)

Ok, so now I've catched up. Or I will have when showing the aurica sampler, which is the second half of my catch-up post (to be published here soon). This week I focused on ribbon embroidery as I've never really tried to make french knot ribbon roses before. Do know how to make french knots with thread/floss so why not focus on a type of embroidery I want to learn but haven't got very far with yet (oh, I don't want to use my pretty silk ribbons for my first clumpsy attempts -- what a waste of beautiful, and not always that cheap, silk!).

So these are officially my first ribbonwork flowers. First rose I made was the pink one, using 25-30 mm wide ribbon. Actually it's my second because I messed up, trying to just tweak it a bit and then pulled it too hard so it had to be redone (hence why the ribbon is a bit frayed). Not perfect, but I'm pleased with it considering what a newbie I am.

Then I went on to do the blue knots in 7 mm ribbon -- one turned out better than the other -- and the purple flower, which I made from a cheap synthetic ribbon yarn. I think I'm going to try and do some more embroidery with that yarn in the future...

Of cause I've also made knots with the aurica yarn. I tried a few variations, altering the number of twists and changing between starting with a section "open" or filled yarn closest to the fabric. My faves are the two knots in the middle (which you can see close-ups of below). I liked the black centre and puffy orange "petals" around it. In the top right corner you can see some stem stitches -- better pic of them will be found in the coming aurica sampler post. Hopefully you'll also find a less blurry photo of the french knots there...

 Making these stitches made me think of a UFO I found when looking for my old cotton floss stash. It's a cat embroidery I designed and began, but never finished, to stitch as a kid or young teen. The cat is modelled after a fridge magnet I had.

Stem stitches, french knots and bullion knots -- must be the first and last I've ever made so far! -- it was pretty ambitios considering how bored I was with stem stitch as a kid and knots aren't always that easy when impatient. Of cause I also have the first colour sketch and finished pattern (which was traced onto the black fabric).

Wonder if I'll ever get around to finish it? If nothing else my taste in embroidery and colours have changed a bit since then, making it less interesting to pick up again. I'm into other designs and materials today. On the other hand it's a pity not to finish a design I actually took some time to compose and pick out colours for...

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What is TAST?

Take a Stitch Tuesday is a weekly embroidery challenge throughout the year by Sharon of Pin Tangle. You can read more about it here (or by clicking the TAST badge to the right).


To see what others have done in this stitch, check out the comments in this post on Pin Tangle. Be sure not to miss Sharon's lovely stitch variations in the actual post.