About
Sew in Love was started back in June 2005 as a personal record of getting on with and completing a number of half finished things I had hanging around at the time. It increased in both scope and readership during the following 12 years, but then, like many, I took an extended break. Posting is planned to recommence in late 2020, technology permitting.
You will find here as regular features:
*WIP photos and reports on the projects I have on hand, sometimes including design notes (where relevant) and where things went right or wrong.
*Finished projects
*Ideas and plans for future projects
From time to time I post:
*Tutorials on aspects of embroidery that people are most curious about, especially raised work/stumpwork.
*Articles on subjects I know at least something about.
*Links to others' work that I've found especially interesting and/or to retail sites where you can get supplies that are not so easy to track down, (such as wire for stumpwork etc.)
*Something amusing that isn't stitchcraft related, but that is harmless and that may spread a smile.
What you won't find is:
*Reams of info about my personal and daily life, except where strictly necessary - most readers just don't come for that and it can lead to problems when the author gets just a little too honest about how s/he feels about things....
*Photos of the above
*Tacky gimmicks, gadgets and clutter! ;)
Posting schedule:
Generally speaking, I post when I have something to share and that, at present, can mean anything! It all depends on how much I've been doing and having the time and desire to blog.
Myself
I was born in autumn 1971 in Leeds, northern England. I'm married to Martin, a 1966 model, made in Germany, and we have no kids or pets. By profession I'm a linguist and teacher, although I don't work much in either of those specialisms just now, beyond a little volunteer Mandarin teaching work here and there.
I loved art at school, but wasn't as good at it as I could have been had I taken the trouble to practice out of lessons. I didn't realise in those days that I had to work at anything as most stuff came so easily and I just dismissed anything else as 'I'm no good at that'. I did want to be good at art and for the teacher to 'spot' me, but the only highlight of my school art career was being called out from an end of year whole school assembly to collect a certificate for a piece I'd painted making it to the second level of a Cadbury's kids' art competition. I didn't know whether I was more embarrassed at the unexpected honour of going up in front of the whole school or stunned by the fact that the piece that had been entered for the competition was hung in the school corridor upside down! So much for modern art!
With needlework I found something I could make a decent job of straight away without wasting paint and spoiling paper. After doing some printed canvas needlepoint kits as a child and the freestyle embroidery of a T-shirt for part of my GCSE Art course when I was 16 back in 1988, I started stitching as an adult in 2002 when I was stuck at home with ME/CFS. I needed something to do to stop me being bored senseless or worse - spending all my passably well time doing ME/CFS reading and research! An old Taiwanese friend had arranged for me to forward her cross stitch magazine subscription to her, so I was seeing these interesting looking magazines coming through my door. One day, I took a couple of them and sat up in bed flicking through the designs. 'I could do that!' I thought and next time I ventured into town, I got myself a few scrap ends of Aida fabric from a small craft shop and my mum gave me her old threads and I had a go at stitching my very first piece - the little house card for an old friend when he moved into his first independent place.
Brazilian embroidery
Blackwork
© Elizabeth Braun 2010-2020
