Thursday, September 17, 2009

now for some non-political needlework....

i still have one more political embroidery piece left to post, and truly, it's my masterpiece - the one that started them all, AND the one that took the longest to do.

however, lets have a break from the ranting for a day, shall we?

i did this piece while i was in manitoba, and i haven't quite decided what to do with it yet. i originally thought i'd frame it, but then i discovered that it didn't fit in the frames i painted, so now i'm contemplating a pillow instead. we'll see.

i stitched it on this fabulous white cotton moire that i found at a thrift store. you can't see it very well in the photo, but it is pretty awesome. the problem with it was that it's so thin, even with stabilizer, my stitches really pulled and now it's all wrinkly, unfortunately. i need to learn to relax my stitching a bit.

the design came from Urban Threads. i fell in love with the machine embroidery design right off the bat, but the file is too big to fit in my 4"x4" hoop. so sad! during their big sale a few months ago i decided to buy the hand embroidery version at least.

craft1
the banner and words are backstitch, as are the outlines of the birds. i used chain stitch for the detail of the birds, and french knots for their eyes. the spool of thread is chain stitch, the thread itself is stem stitch, and the needles are satin stitch.

craft2
the upper bird is dmc 825 and j&p coats 7162 and the needles are dmc 318.

craft3
the thread is dmc 600 and the spool is an unknown purple. the banner is another unknown colour, and the text is dmc 946.

craft4
the lower bird is dmc 995 and dmc 312.


(excuse the stain on the left side - my iron did that! i forgot that it has started staining whenever you use the steam. anyone know how to fix it?)

5 comments:

Talia said...

You are so NEAT!!! One day I'll be able to embroider as neatly as you!!

kelly said...

A-MAZ-ING! Love it!

As for the iron, have you tried using distilled water, rather than tap water? I think that's supposed to help.

(Sorry -- I'm pretty much useless on the iron fixing front. Just wanted to share my drool over your work.)

amy dame said...

thanks you two!

talia, neatness isn't always better! i'd love to be able to do more scribbley style embroidery pieces, i love the look of them, but i'm way too much of a control freak! sometimes i try stitching bigger, and right away i'm back to tiny even stitches!

kelly, i think that's the problem too. i've started using bottled water, which i assume is pretty similar to distilled. i think the discolour comes from using tap water previously though, i need to flush it out or something like that. maybe?

Jennie said...

So awesome! Haven't heard of Urban Threads before, but I'm going to order a bunch of designs from them before my overseas holiday next month.

Jennie said...

P.S. Linked to you here: http://cravingsfrocks.blogspot.com/2009/09/holiday-project.html

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