VS Renaissance Rose bellpull - finished up

Here we are at the finish line for this project.

As this design was for a framed piece whilst I wanted to make a bellpull out of it, I needed to adapt the bottom.  It wasn't terribly difficult - I just needed to add a row of buttonhole edging around the outside of the hardanger section and then, using the new edge this created to site a row of four-sided edging on each side.  When this had got to the needed height, I just turned the top over a pretty hanger I got at the Knitting and Stitching Show in November.

And that was it!

Here the purple card back makes a nice contrast and shows off the cutwork section nicely.  I actually used this type of card as a support when packing up the bellpull, which you can see next catch up project post when I also share the wedding card.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

VS Renaissance Rose Bellpull - bullions!

I mentioned in my last posting on this project that I'm often wary of bullion knots.  I think that, with a combination of Kathy's extremely helpful, 'alternative' method of working them (compare how the needle is held in this, more traditional approach, which I find overly awkward to work and leads to puckering)and the sheer quantity of knots that I had to work on my one and only piece of Brazilian embroidery and the 'Sunshine and Flowers' sampler, I've managed to get a fair grip on how to get them to work out OK.  I was really quite pleased with how the majority of these came out.

Having said that, I still wouldn't call myself confident with them, but I'm certainly getting there. ☺  I need to try the same do it over and over again method with cast on stitches and flowers next as I'd love to master those.

You may have noticed especially in the big heart, but also in the other two, smaller motifs with the bullion roses, that there were some pink lazy daisy stitches to insert too, which also add variety and balance to the piece.  Having said 'balance', I realised, looking at this photo, that the roses are much more numerous on one side than the other, but oddly, I didn't notice when looking straight at it.  Maybe this angle of photo has highlighted it.

This is the last section, (which I actually did first) and you can also see that I also worked the outer border as far as I could ready to make the piece up into a bellpull.  The original design was to be framed, so I had to think carefully about how to go about it.  More on that in the next in this series.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

VS Renaissance Rose Bellpull - part one

Thanks SO much for all the kind compliments on the last finish - and also all the way through the project.  And now, welcome to a new project series!

Before she approached me about her wedding dress panel, Lauren said she and her fiancé would like a bellpull with a favourite Bible text for their home as their wedding gift.  I chose the absolutely gorgeous Renaissance Rose design from Victoria Sampler to adapt for this piece.

Here's the initial floss toss and, with the exception of deciding against the gold shades in favour of the aubergine cord, this is pretty much what I used - for a wonder!  I normally chop and change several times during the process.  Do you?  Or do you stick fairly closely to the pattern and/or original palette?

As you can see, I opted for 8 shades of Coton à Broder #25 from DMC and Anchor.  The fabric is 28ct congress cloth (I think) in an ecru shade with which I used Anchor Pearl Cottons #8 and #12 in shade 926.

A quick comparison with the chart photo shows that I needed to start out with a little adaptation of the original design in order to meet the requirements.  I decided to replace several pattern rows in the middle, including the 'For You' bit with the scripture they wanted and also to move a cross stitch floral line down to make the text section framed by a similar motif.  It took a couple of goes with a piece of graph paper to get the lettering charted correctly, but it wasn't too big a challenge - especially not after the last project!

After the middle section was complete, I filled in the surface work on the lower half, including the beaded parts, (using good old Mill Hill petite seed beads, which I'm a big fan of), but not the bullion knots which I'm always a little wary of and decided to leave until last.  I hadn't ever thought of doing it before, but I love the section of ecru four-sided stitch in the section above the hardanger heart.  I think it adds a great textural element.

Next came the top few motifs, including the leaf and bead 'frame' for the lovely heart motif.

I then did the cutwork section on the lower heart, as you can see below and even remembered to take some photos at this point.  I didn't take as many WIP shots as I would have liked of thie piece and some were too poor to do anything with other than to delete them!

Here's the piece at the point that we'll leave it for this post and next time I'll show you the bullion knot sections.

I loved this project and I'd really like to do another one, perhaps on bright white fabric and with yellow flowers.  I would very probably want to keep that, but it would be a strong candidate for exhibiting in the summer shows.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Lilac Bellpull Project

Here we are at the second project of last autumn's stitch-a-thon!

Actually, I began this one in the summer shortly after getting all the projects for the Bingley Show sorted, but didn't get to work much on it until a few weeks later on.  I used it as a bit of an alternate project alongside the autumn leaves some of the time. Not often, as this one was over-due anyway and the leaves one was to a fairly tight time schedule, but I did a little bit here and there for variety.

The starting points were that the bride (a Chinese friend who'd actually got married back in July) loved purple shades and has very little room in her home - no living room, poor thing - and so something to hang was best.

In Patricia Ann Bage's 'Beginners Guide to Drawn Thread Embroidery', I found this design, the centre of which I'd worked a few years ago, also in purples, as a wedding card.  The bellpull ends I had in stock were quite narrow though, so I needed to adapt the pattern ever so slightly to take it in about 4 threads at each side.

I didn't seem to take many WIP shots, so we can do this all in one post.  Here we go:

At this point I realised that two things needed changing:

1) The purple squares just didn't work.  The shade of purple was too red to co-ordinate well with the lovely, rich, blue-purple in the centre motif (much more glaring that it appears here), and; 2) I'd miscounted on the chart and should have left done klosters blocks of 13 stitches, then 9, then 13 again.  So, I took it out back to the innermost green square sections and re-worked it with the correct spacing and the red-purple replaced by Kreinik #4 Very Fine Braid in 032.

As you can see, it wasn't very comfortable to work this piece.  The fabric I was using was really too narrow to fit into the nearest size of frame I could make up (Q snap 8"/11" rectangle).  Maybe it was partly this, but also an unhealthy mixture of not reading the instructions properly, rushing to get the project completed after the Autumn Leaves one so as to get on with the next (I wanted clear decks as far as possible) and/or over-confidence that led me to mess up with removing the threads as you can see here:

I removed all 12 rows instead of removing 4, leaving 4, then removing the final 4.  I just didn't read the instructions for the filling stitches or look closely enough at the pattern at the right time.  Lesson learned!  So, I had to choose alternative fillings that didn't require a central bar of threads still in place and that would look OK in this fairly long space.

Unfortunately, I didn't get any decent photos of the final stitched stage before the awkward sewing up part, but here it is finished up and you can see the fillings in the close ups.  A little narrow, but not too bad on the whole.

I'll leave you with a photo that I snapped on my phone (very badly, sorry!) of the happy couple and their witnesses signing the register.

Which project next?  The bridal dress panel is coming up soon. ♥

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2016/7

L*K 'Cherish All Living Things', another show piece

Those of you who follow me on Instagram will have no trouble recognising what my second entry into this year's Sheffield Horticulture Show was as I posted quite a few WIP shots there last month as it progressed.  I've saved the 'main camera' photos up until I was ready to post them all in one go on blog.

Fans of Lizzie*Kate designs will probably know this one, although it's a few years old now.

As you can see from the first photo, I had my tray of over-dyed threads to hand much of the time as I was constantly changing the colours for shades I thought looked better!!

 Here we have all the cross stitching complete.  Just needed to add the charms before finishing up.  With all the other L*Ks I've worked, I didn't use the trims provided as I wasn't that keen on them, but this time I like the ones in the chart pack, so decided to include them.  What I had in my stash just didn't work out with this design, most of them being too big.

Rather than spending £30-40 on framing, I decided to make this one up into a bellpull.  That way, I could use up one of the bellpull ends I had in stock and also present something a little different in the Show.

When I was stitching this piece, Sir asked me if I really thought it stood any chance of winning something and I said I did as it was very different from the entries I saw last year, which were mostly detailed, picture type pieces (very British taste) and I'd noticed that the judges seemed to lean towards the less classic, more whimsical pieces.

When we went to the Show after judging, he saw what I meant and agreed that this was a departure from 'same old same old'!!

I'd wanted to enter something in the 'Cross Stitch - Own Design' category, but thanks to computer use problems (the headache saga continues.....ad infinitum), I wasn't able to even complete my design.  However, I plan on doing one, or even two, for next year's competition.

There were four entries in this category (embroidery, on the whole, was poorly supported this year), but winning second place out of four was a lot better than first of one as with the butterflies!!!  Don't you agree?

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Still alive!

And even still stitching from time to time, but those times are a little rare at the moment.=( Here's the band sampler finally made up into a bell-pull, so I have been doing something I can show off.

The hardanger is still in progress and I hope I can get it done before we go! Only 2 more weeks and we move out of our home, then we fly out 2 days later. LOTS to do and I'll be amazed (and delighted) if I actually get all I need to do done in time, given that we're away the last weekend and have what seems like copious farewell dinners etc to go to. So much sewing etc to do as well as packing up.

Managed to sell rather a lot on E-bay and got shut of more or less everything I listed on there, except the stitching mags. I only listed a dozen or so to test the water, but it was stone cold, so I dropped that whole idea. The last 5 listings end tomorrow night (including the pattern for the band sampler, if you want to have a go at it!) and that will, hopefully, be it for my and E-bay sales for now. I've made about £300, which is great, considering that DH thought I might make £50 if I was lucky, and have cleared out all the threads I know I'll never use as well as several other stitching things and about half of my make-up. It's amazed me what people are willing to buy and how much, in some cases, they're willing to pay for it! I sold 2 Victoria Sampler designs with their relevant accessory packs and one went for about £15!

We've begun to pack some things up already and should be starting to move the boxes into the storage room at the weekend. Some local friends are borrowing certain things and I did a good bit of giving away this evening as well. Next up is sorting through the clothes into 3 piles: Take with me, save for later and give to charity. Ooof! Is it any wonder I've had no time to post or stitch? What does amaze me is that, during this last silent month, I've gained about half a dozen new followers!!

Other than the above, we've got our visas sorted now and have been offered one place to live with the option of another as well, so we won't be homeless when we get over there. Friends here are housing us for the last 2 days before we go, helping us with last minute linens and taking us to the airport as well. Banks are all sorted for international use and accounts being closed left, right and centre here. It's all happening, is very late at night and I should be in bed!

GOODNIGHT!=)

Waterlily still unfinished, but...

<-Here's the waterlily progress so far:

Horrid photo taken in totally unsuitable light, but it doesn't matter too much at this stage, I think.

Anyway, the reason I didn't get too much of this done is that I decided to get on with finishing up this other piece instead.->

This is a co-operation between my 11 year old chum, Ellie, and me as her gift to her brother on his wedding. (He's the groom of the 31 August wedding and who the waterlily and damselfly piece is to be for from me.) It's been about 50/50 really as it was my idea and I did 95% of the designing (well, taking various elements from other designs and adapting them, but isn't that really what all samplers are??), including making a large scale chart for her to work from. I supplied all the materials, oversaw about 85% of the stitching and started off each piece to show how it was done etc. I also did all the cutting out, put in the ribbon on row 3, the filling stitches on the big heart, the whole row of cross stitch near the bottom and did a lot of fixing up loose ends and stitches that were coming out etc as well as all the sewing up into the bell-pull you see here, which took hours on end yesterday afternoon. Anyway, I hope you all like it and that the happy couple will when they're presented with it next Friday!=)

Bellpull complete and ready for viewing!=)

Here it is, completed and finished into a bellpull. The bellpull ends that I had to order were far too big and I then found that I had this odd end in my stash. Actually, it was the other half of the one used on the wedding bellpull. On that one, I just used the top end and so had the bottom one, complete with tinkling little bell, left over. DH kindly took the bell off the hanger for me, leaving the bell intact so that I could attach it to the bottom. I'm very pleased with the effect. What do you think? Click on the photo for the full sized version and more detail.

Here's the current state of affairs with Cataflute. I don't think it'll be finished on time, (I'll see the couple these are gifts for for the last time on Weds evening), but I'm going to try. If it isn't done, then I can post it on to her - it's always nice to get something through the post. Having said that, it's even nicer to meet a deadline and to see for yourself if someone likes what you've made for them!=)

Almost there.....

The bellpull is almost finished now. This is the last WIP shot (click on it to see more detail), the next photo will be one when it's all done and bellpull ends are in place. As you can see (better from the full sized pic), most of the work is done now and I just have to do the filling stuff on the top section plus the second row of 3 big squares and the centre of the star-type thing near the bottom. All of it is the same kind of stitch - Greek Cross filling. Will do that this evening and hope to get the bellpull ends tomorrow sometime.

Nothing else of note to report really, just working and other normal life kinda dull stuff!!

Surface work progressing well.

Hope to have all the surface work completed today, which isn't much more than you can see here. I need to finish those motifs at the bottom, then do a line of stitches underneath them, then there's something similar at the top to go in, albeit a cutwork area that's bigger. Kloster blocks are quicker to do than fancier shapes though. Then there's only 3 'lines' of cable stitch to do and it's onto the scissors bit. Hoping to have it all done over the w/e, but as things usually take much longer than planned, don't hold your breath!!!=)

Tannia, the design is Mary Hickmott's Stitching Heritage Series' 'Hardanger Sampler'. The picture is clickable if anyone wants to see it in better detail at this stage.

Something to show - at last!!

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And here's my latest cross stitch ->

You can see what it is already, can't you???!!!LOL Seriously though, it's going to be Margaret Sherry's 'Cataflute'. I love her designs, they're gorgeous, just dead boring to stitch!!

I'm hoping to get the hardanger piece done by close of play on Sunday, then really crack on with the cross stitch.

Oh, I got the rest of my Coton à Broders from Tandem Cottage this morning. I must say that I think Anchor haven't got the best selection of colours in this range, which is a shame as it's a nice thread and would have more potential if there was a better colour range.

The Wedding!

Managed to get the 'wedding' bellpull done in time, (finished putting it on the hanger in the car on the way to the ceremony!!!), and ,<-here it is.

And this is me with the happy couple receiving their new gift. Just wish I'd got my glasses off fast enough - vanity!






Here's me having the long awaited 'Victory Dance' with my friend, Caleb. About 18 months ago in one of his e-mails he told me he'd been to an Irish barn dance the night before. I replied that, if I ever got better, (I had ME/CFS for 3-4 years), I would dance a set with him and here we jolly well are! One of my other friends told me she didn't expect to see me the next day as she thought I'd be wrecked for ages. Well, this time last year, I would have been virtually crippled for a week or more after just one dance, but after 4 barn dance sets, plus some other stuff, I was perfectly OK. No pay-back fatigue or malaise whatsoever. Yippee!=) So, if you have ME, CFS or FMS and are considering trying Mickel or Reverse Therapy, let me encourage you: Ignore the popular skepticism and misinformation and give it a try. It's hard going, but IT WORKS!

Almost Complete!

The VS design is almost done now - just the ribbon and beadwork to go now.=) Here's progress so far. I like this type of design a lot as there are lots of new things to try and they don't take vry long to do. Also, good instructions to follow, instead of DIY-ing it like the last wedding gift. Panic stations!!

Nothing more to report on the stitching front, except that there's another card coming up soon as some friends have their 20th wedding very soon and I think that deserves a nice card. Then there's a 10th in May...

Miraculous!

I can see the floor in my bedroom! Look at these before and after shots. This first one is from late last year before I started the clear-out, and the second I just took a few minutes ago.

It took a long time and a lot of work sorting out all this junk and putting it, not just in another temporary parking spot, but actually dealing with it once and for all. YIPPEE!

Now then, on the stitching front: I haven't backed the bookmarks yet, but I am going to as it protects the embroidery from picking fingers, accidents and other such horrors as well as giving a nice bit of colour through the cutwork and just finishing the whole thing off neatly. Also, I noticed that I actually snipped one of the edging stitches on the white one, (which is for DH, who collects bookmarks), and so need to repair that. Someone on a hardanger newsgroup assured me that it can be done and so I've fished out a piece of scrap fabric to practice on first.

Made a start on Hongda and Ke's 'wedding' gift and here it is so far:

It's adapted slightly from the chatelaine design on the Victoria Sampler 'Thoughts of You' pattern, which definitely came from you, Petra!! You're the only one whose ever bought me VS designs and I know I haven't bought any myself - yet! More on that one soon, no doubt.

"And here we are again for 'Show and Tell'"

Feel like Sally Brown doing this! That's Charlie Brown's lil' sister, btw!! Love 'Peanuts'.=)

So, a few more older finishes before I get stuck into finishing off all the WIPs and WTBSUs ('waiting to be sewn up's):

Here's the Victoria Sampler 'Heart to Heart' friendship sampler design I adapted a bit and made into an anniversary bellpull, (with a wonky bottom, rats!), and the largest hardanger card I ever stitched, which is about A4 sized!!

I just ordered some goldwork threads for my friend's wedding present, a 'Welcome' sign for their porch done in goldwork with a silk-shaded flower. Yup, real silk too.=)