Tolkien embroidery

[cecile]

Two Tolkien bibs I made for my nephew:

Comments

[dunderklumpen]

Best quote ever to put on a bib! I love it:)

I'm in the middle of embroider some bibs right now as well. So let me ask: How did you secure the threads on the back? I'm a bit concerned that my usual method won't hold because bibs get much more often washed than other things.

[cecile]

It's all split back stitch, so there's a lot of thread on the back to loop the loose thread under. I go back 3 times on the same line before I cut the loose end. I'm sure it holds, I did the same thing for tshirts of mine that I've washed a million times, nothing moves... It's not pretty though, here's what the back looks like :

[dunderklumpen]

Thanks. I wasn't sure if it would really hold this way. But that it works for your T-shirts is good news.

[dunderklumpen]

Oh, and I wanted to ask... you said it's split back stitch. I thought it looked like a satin stitch with only one thread. Did you use the split back stitch to fill the letters as well or only for the outlines? How many threads did you use?

[cecile]

Split back stitch with one thread. For each letter, I started by doing a simple line then I went back and did a few more back stitches along some parts of the line, to widen it and get that calligraphy effect. Even for the simple letters like "o", it worked better than a real satin stitch, because of the surface of the fabric: I needed a short, split stitch to really pin down and flatten the little loops of the terry cloth as much as possible.

[dunderklumpen]

Thanks for all the details. I was curious. Especially because it didn't look like a split stitch. Very well done:) Both of them.