Weekend Progress Report: Sept. 23, 2012

I haven't been working on my serious stitching lately due to the upheaval in my private life.  My two BAPs have been neglected but

 I did finish Primitive Needle's Here Lies Thy Needle.  It was simple and straightforward stitching just perfect for my current state of mind.  A bit boring but I am pleased with the final product.  I plan to sew it up as a knitting project bag.  Now that it's done, I'll have to come up with something different for waiting rooms.  And I'll be back in waiting rooms pretty soon since I'll be driving my Mom to the hematologist this Friday and Bill to both the surgeon and gastroenteriologist the following Friday. And I thought my days of driving Mom's taxi were done when the kids left home!

I have worked on my Encrusted Crazy Quilt Square, finishing up one more section and starting another. The section I completed is embroidered with stylized rose bushes done in fern and chain stitch with cobweb rose blossoms.  And the section in progress is going to be, I think, a satin-stitched sunflower with a raised center filled with beads ... I tend to make things up as I go along.  One of the reasons I picked up the Crazy Quilt Square was because I wanted to practice my cobweb roses before putting the finishing touches on the Mystic Smalls' Stitcher's Pocket which will have three of

them in the center panel.  And, although I used some scraps of metallic ribbon for the roses on the square and I will be using silk ribbon on the pocket, the technique remained the same and I am comfortable that I know what I am doing now.  It's always nice to have a "sampler" piece on which to practice various stitches and techniques and the crazy quilt square serves that function beautifully.  Then there's the added bonus that I will be able to make something practical out of the square eventually ... I am leaning toward a handbag or project bag of some sort, something with a zippered closure anyway.  I have got an idea for embellishing the thin strip of black moire above the cobweb roses: I have two tiny five pointed star charms and I thought I'd use them to stitch a shooting star motif with the stars heading toward one another and with their tails curving in opposite directions.  I plan on leaving the tartan silk unembellished since it is the patch that established my color scheme for the entire block.  I may put just a few more buttons at the smaller edge but that would be all.  So that leaves only the yellow and gold print and the rose patches to embellish.  One more item from the WIPs sidebar close to a finish!

Today I am going to thread up the sewing machine and bind the edges of some linen for the two Town Square SAL ornaments for which I have pulled the threads.  I believe those will be my next projects for the next little while.  I don't feel like I have recovered my equilibrium just yet.  I am still so tired all the time and my seasonal allergies have kicked in with the usual sinus headaches.  All the rain we have had this last spring and summer have contributed to a really bad allergy season this year.  So simple and straightforward stitching will be the order of the day for a little while longer.  The BAPs will still be there next month.  Right now I want something relaxing rather than challenging.

Encrusted Crazy Quilt Block Week 2

This has become an obsession. I can't seem to put it down and am making noticeable progress each day, at least, to my own eyes. Today, I attached the second velvet cord with half cross stitch in a metallic ribbon and added some more green silk to another seam embellishment. I have been brainstorming how to make a diamond trellis embellishment on the long red narrow edge, perhaps using the carved white mother of pearl buttons that look like carnival masks as motifs within the openings or threading a stem stitched vine with French knot berries or beaded flowers on the trellis. Tomorrow I get to download another class and I am very much looking forward to the next lesson.

The more I work on this block the more I brainstorm about other applications for this technique. I am already envisioning a tea cozy made up of four panels of encrusted crazy quilting using as it's main fabric the lovely rather Jacobean looking print salvaged from the slipcovers for a long-gone couch [those slipcovers were darned expensive and there is enough fabric there to make curtains for the sewing-room-to-be as well as literally dozens of tea cozies]. I am already mentally combing through my stash of quilting cottons for fabrics that pick up the colors in the upholstery weight cotton though I think I would have better luck with my wools, partly because of color considerations but also because of weight considerations. When this block is done I plan to use it to make a tote-like purse with button and loop closure and I plan on converting the band sampler I am using to play with the embroidery techniques as the strap or straps [either one long over the shoulder strap or two small hand straps]. I doubt I'd ever have the patience to make a full sized quilt in this technique but I can definitely see it used for handbags, tea cozies, vests, headbands and other wearable art. Maybe, if I am very ambitious, a small lap-robe type quilt. I definitely want to work up a few of those broad headbands that are so fashionable now as Christmas gifts for my daughter and nieces.

Weekend Progress Report #22

Well, the list is pretty much back to goal projects. My brief bout of startitis seems to have run its course.

Linda Stouch's RR: Tina's piece with a heart theme is probably lost forever as the stitcher who will remain nameless has been dropped from the RR ... one piece "lost in the mail" - possible, two pieces "lost in the mail" - improbable, failure to respond to e-mails and phone calls by organizer - damning. I am now waiting to receive Jane's piece [May 15th rotation - and held back while the nameless stitcher situation was resolved] and Dolores' piece [June 15 rotation] all within a week. This will call for some turbo stitching ... but luckily Dolores' piece is a PS and well within my comfort zone. I'll have to check the list to see what Jane's theme is ... and then go stash diving for an appropriate chart.

Sharon B's Embellished Crazy Quilt On-line Class.

This has been my primary focus this weekend. I have read and re-read Week 2's class and begun work on the seam embellishing: using the herringbone stitch, plaited algerian cross stitch, plain cross stitch, fern stitch, ermine fill stitch, chain stitch and french knots. I even made up a band sampler on which to practice some of the embroidery embellishments I wish to try over the next few days: the boullion stitch with it's many variations, some of the herringbone variations, trellis stitches that produce a diamond pane pattern and knotted stitches that produce figure 8 effects, as well as a few spider web roses. The first photo shows the block with the band sampler laid out behind it. The velvet cord that is laid across the top will be stitched down with the red 1/4" metallic ribbon in a spiralling half cross stitch. I have used silks, overdyed cottons, pearl cottons, metallic ribbons and braids as well as metallic floss. You can see close-ups of a few of these seams in the second photo. And I have pulled out all of my various stitch dictionaries in order to expand my repertoire and add variety and interest to the stitched embellishments. As I do all this, I envision where all the beads and buttons will go, experimenting with stacked button or button/bead combinations ... rather like playing with building blocks ... and have come up with a few combinations that I know will find their way into the final design. The third photo shows my favorite button combinations and the planned placement. Of course, I haven't stitched them down yet since they'd get in the way as I continue working with the embroidery embellishments. This project is very liberating since I can try out some rather over-the-top techniques and just play with different fibers and textures ... though I never attended kindergarten, I think I now know how a kindergartener must feel upon encountering a blank sheet of paper and pots and pots of fingerpaint. I haven't yet joined in the forum discussion with other participants nor have I posted any WIP photos, though I shall have to do that soon ... I have resisted looking at the work of the others till after my own project has taken a definitive shape of its own, for better or worse. One of the things I have enjoyed doing was working snakes of chain stitch over two adjacent pieces in layers: starting with a 1/4" wide metallic ribbon, moving onto a a #5 metallic braid and finishing up with a fine perle silk ... with the links of the chain getting progressively smaller as I use finer fibers. In a later stage, I'll add beads of various sizes so that that particular part of the block will look like a jewelry tray upon which a jumble of necklaces has been carelessly tossed.

Stash Enhancement:

I received an e-mail about the shipping date of the back-ordered Silk Mori for the May Thanksgiving ornament and have had offers of help with finding the right dye-lot of GAST Maple Syrup [for April's Thanksgiving ornament] floss from 123stitchers. I still need to find a source for the silk serica, though.

I pulled out and kitted up Shepherd's Bush's Be A Witch, ordering threads as needed as well as the two Homespun Elegance bee buttons I needed for HIH's Wee Bee.

SAL & Crazy Quilt Week One Class Progress

Town Square SAL: Monsterbubble's Jail. I put in a few hours on this each of the past three days ... even made it my "travel" piece by switching to a larger stitching bag capable of accomodating the doodler lap frame. As you can see, I still need to fill in the central arch and the taller tower with WDW Dolphin and then I have to back-stitch the outlines of the granite blocks in WDW Charcoal. I'd like to work on this till it's finished since I have received all the luscious Crescent Colors for the next piece in this series that I intend to stitch: the Town Square Saloon [designed by Crescent Colors, of course] ... and am itching to work on something a touch more colorful than all this grey. By the way, the piece is not really crooked, I must have loaded the scrolls slightly off kilter to give it that sadly askew look.

As for my Online Class, Encrusted Crazy Quilt Block: I have completed the Week 1 assignment which was piecing the block. I used a red tartan Duponi silk, a black watered silk moire, a black cotton, an ivory cotton with a very faint tone-on-tone floral pattern, a red cotton with a bleeding color effect and two different yellow-gold cotton prints. The yellow gold and red cottons pick up colors in the tartan though that may be difficult to see given the quality of my photography. In the first photo, it looks more like Modern Art because of the bold colors and the sharp edged shapes. In the second photo, I have laid out and cut [but not yet sewn] the lace and cording embellishments. I have used a variety of laces, including a heavy weight, white, wide grape and leaf lace, two much lighter, narrower, white cotton machine-crocheted laces and one tan lace that has a hand crocheted look as well as some black velvet cording. The next step is to tack down all the laces prepatory to the surface embroidery embellishment of the seams. As the block is embellished and "encrusted" it will take on more of a Victorian crazy quilt look. The Week 2 lesson has been down-loaded and I have begun studying it ... now the fun begins. There are so many surface embroidery stitches to be explored as a means of embellishing the block. I am going to work up a band sampler using the sew and flip crazy quilt technique so I can experiment with some of the stitches on real seams before working on my block. I'll be photographing the whole process for future posts.