Interesting things, as promised...
I don't know if any of you know that my crafting tends to go in a sort of wave pattern. The crafting itself is always there (unless I'm more than usually depressed), but the current obsession shifts from one thing to another. One of these "phases" can last anything from a few days to a few years. During this time I almost exclusively do one thing. I might do something that's not the current "in" thing, if I need new clothes or a gift for someone, but those things I have to work for. Ideas for the "in" thing just pops up, every form of inspiration turns into that kind of thing.
The knitting has lasted a very long time, several years, probably because there are so many different forms of knitting. Lace, cables, shaped knitting... there is always something new to try. But now, it seems, it's time for a change: Embroidery.
I don't know where it came from, I never do. But suddenly I start to hang out on the Embroidery board at Craftster, I look around the web for patterns and ideas, I rummage through my boxes-of-things for fabrics and threads... And my knitting projects lay abandoned by the wayside.
It's not the first time I've been bitten by the embroidery bug; the very first crafting project I remember was an embroidery. But it's been a couple of years now. It's way easier than I remember to get a decent result, and this time around I think I got the hang of working with a hoop.
One thing that's better with embroidery is the pics. Embroidery is mostly flat and can be scanned with reasonably good results. So here is the load of FOs from the first week of the obsession:
The Firstborn! 4x12 cm approx. Pattern is from a tattoo mag I have, it's a tribal. The fabric is not quite that yellow in reality, it's unbleached cotton. DMC mouliné thread in an unidentified turquoise (I lost the label). Stem stitch, it's my favourite.
The second:
About 7x7 cm. Also stem stitch. White cotton, from an old sheet. Pattern is a Tudor rose (I think) that I found in a newsletter from a SCA embroidery guild. Thread is something I bought ages ago (last time I was obsessed with embroidery?) to make traditional Halland embroideries from.
The third:
18x16 cm, approx. Same materials as the one above. Pattern is an Elizabethan Blackwork pattern. Mostly stem stitch, and some satin stitch for the dots. One of the dots is made in another stitch I don't know the name of: It looks like satin from the front, but the back is different. I learned to do it when I studied traditional Swedish embroidery at Gamleby. It uses less thread, and almost all of the precious thread is on the front; I think you can see why it was more popular than satin stitch in peasant's embroidery. The fascinating thing with this is that I haven't tried to do it in years, and last time it looked like crap. But now my first try looked great. Weird.
As you can see it's just bits of embroidery right now. I think I might make a bookmark from the first, and maybe some small bags from the others. But I still have various loose bits left from my previous embroidery binge, so don't hold your breath...
Speaking of previous sins; in a post back in November I wrote about a petit-point embroidery I just finished. I had started it years before, but got sidetracked with another obsession and had to struggle to finish it. I think I took on a train trip in order to get it done. But here it is:
I know it's seriously skewed; I haven't found anything sturdy enough to block it on yet. It's petit point. The middle square has the stitches going in different directions, to make nice clean edges and catch the light. I choose the colours as wild as I could, to break my habit of "playing it safe" when matching things. It was mainly meant as an experiment, so I have no idea what to do with it. As usual... :-)
I have big plans for the future; I have got more of those Elizabethan blackwork patterns, I have several magazines with tattoos that will make really nice embroideries, and I have learned to use Photoshop to make almost any image into a pattern, in the correct size to boot. And I have enough fabrics and threads in my boxes-of-things to keep me going for a while... So watch this space!
The knitting has lasted a very long time, several years, probably because there are so many different forms of knitting. Lace, cables, shaped knitting... there is always something new to try. But now, it seems, it's time for a change: Embroidery.
I don't know where it came from, I never do. But suddenly I start to hang out on the Embroidery board at Craftster, I look around the web for patterns and ideas, I rummage through my boxes-of-things for fabrics and threads... And my knitting projects lay abandoned by the wayside.
It's not the first time I've been bitten by the embroidery bug; the very first crafting project I remember was an embroidery. But it's been a couple of years now. It's way easier than I remember to get a decent result, and this time around I think I got the hang of working with a hoop.
One thing that's better with embroidery is the pics. Embroidery is mostly flat and can be scanned with reasonably good results. So here is the load of FOs from the first week of the obsession:
The Firstborn! 4x12 cm approx. Pattern is from a tattoo mag I have, it's a tribal. The fabric is not quite that yellow in reality, it's unbleached cotton. DMC mouliné thread in an unidentified turquoise (I lost the label). Stem stitch, it's my favourite.
The second:
About 7x7 cm. Also stem stitch. White cotton, from an old sheet. Pattern is a Tudor rose (I think) that I found in a newsletter from a SCA embroidery guild. Thread is something I bought ages ago (last time I was obsessed with embroidery?) to make traditional Halland embroideries from.
The third:
18x16 cm, approx. Same materials as the one above. Pattern is an Elizabethan Blackwork pattern. Mostly stem stitch, and some satin stitch for the dots. One of the dots is made in another stitch I don't know the name of: It looks like satin from the front, but the back is different. I learned to do it when I studied traditional Swedish embroidery at Gamleby. It uses less thread, and almost all of the precious thread is on the front; I think you can see why it was more popular than satin stitch in peasant's embroidery. The fascinating thing with this is that I haven't tried to do it in years, and last time it looked like crap. But now my first try looked great. Weird.
As you can see it's just bits of embroidery right now. I think I might make a bookmark from the first, and maybe some small bags from the others. But I still have various loose bits left from my previous embroidery binge, so don't hold your breath...
Speaking of previous sins; in a post back in November I wrote about a petit-point embroidery I just finished. I had started it years before, but got sidetracked with another obsession and had to struggle to finish it. I think I took on a train trip in order to get it done. But here it is:
I know it's seriously skewed; I haven't found anything sturdy enough to block it on yet. It's petit point. The middle square has the stitches going in different directions, to make nice clean edges and catch the light. I choose the colours as wild as I could, to break my habit of "playing it safe" when matching things. It was mainly meant as an experiment, so I have no idea what to do with it. As usual... :-)
I have big plans for the future; I have got more of those Elizabethan blackwork patterns, I have several magazines with tattoos that will make really nice embroideries, and I have learned to use Photoshop to make almost any image into a pattern, in the correct size to boot. And I have enough fabrics and threads in my boxes-of-things to keep me going for a while... So watch this space!