Spring? and Plans

Mother Nature was doing spring cleaning, and she found...some leftover winter.


To answer Elmsley Rose's question - yes, there is another project planned. This is what it looks like now:


(You're right, it doesn't look like anything - at this stage it is just bits of ironed cloth. It has been at this stage a couple of weeks and I'm starting to get ready to do the next bit...I seem to not like the orderly preparation stage, and I expect I will progress much more rapidly once I get to the fun part.)

Of course, there are lots of other things I could work on, instead - here is a peek into one of my new drawer units (a lot of organizing happened in January) - one collection of unfinished embroidery things:


Unfinished projects are truly a lot more inspiring when they are in a drawer, easily accessible, rather than stacked in small boxes and baskets, which always end up under things or in another box.

And lastly, soon I hope to write the long-planned post, which has to do with this item (now finished, but that picture is for the "real" post):


Oh, and P.S. Monday I was looking at Sharon B's blog Pin Tangle and this time I feel compelled to do Take a Stitch Tuesday, even though I'll be over three months late starting. It will get me to test out all those stitches I've read about but never tried, and make samples like I've been kinda wanting to.

And that REALLY is it. I need to go to bed. Good night!

"Historic" Embroidery

A couple of weekends ago I finally finished the teeny tiny last little bit of the interminable lion embroidery. I *think* it might actually be my first embroidery - the first one started, at least!


The main point was to try couched/laid threads, as in the Bayeux Embroidery. At around this time I read Heraldry for Embroiderers by Vicky Lugg, and was smitten by the heraldic lions. I made a lion...and it came out rather unsatisfactory (bad edges).

It is on (14 count?) cotton,and I decided the cloth didn't look very appealing at all, and I should embroider all over it. Problem one: using leftover weaving linen. Bad idea because 1) you have lots and lots of short lengths (and since this was before I knew about starting/ending threads with no knots...lots and lots of knots) and 2) it quickly wears to the point of fuzzy catastrophic failure. Problem two: huge difference in density between lion and background. (And I didn't remember that when I made the "white pods" embroidery!)

Anyway, I plugged away at it for intervals, but it has been dormant now several years, practically done. I gave up on a few things I wanted to do - it has enough issues that there was no way to "fix" it, and so many knots that it would have been impossible (I really wanted claws).

Oh - and to fix the bad outline around the lion, I twisted two colors of embroidery thread into cords, and couched them down.

Also done, shades of white/stitch variation sampler. Some of the effects only show if you are at an extreme angle (picture two). My hands-down favorite is the diagonal satin stitch. My hands-down unfavorites are left as examples of what not to do.



I suppose eventually I will lose track, but today is eight weeks without kitty.