Painted Ladies complete!

I took a few shots whilst the piece was still in the working hoop (above), then some more after having stretched it around piece of thick cardboard (below) (the back of an old art pad!)

And here it is in situ after judging at the Sheffield Fayre last weekend.

Don't be too impressed at the 'First Prize' docket - it was the only entry in the category!!!!

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Working the Butterflies

Here we go with a photo-heavy post showing the working of the butterflies.  Lots of small stitches make for long-winded work and I would say there was at least 10 hours work here, if not more!

Here you can see some error correction taking place.  As I worked this first butterfly, I noticed that the stem above it didn't quite meet the edge of the wing, requiring three stitches to be re-worked.  Also, the bottom edge had caught on the stem there, so that also needing taking out and replacing.

These two 'whole butterfly' shots were taken before those mistakes were corrected,  but I don't think they're too visible. =)

Moving onto the second butterfly now:

The butterflies were worked in Anchor stranded cotton with Kreinik Cord 102C for the 'feelers' (what are those called?!)

And the whole piece?  Coming up soon....

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Ring Cushion - moving towards completion

Of course, the whole cushion is already finished and handed over as the wedding is tomorrow at noon, but there are still so many photos etc, that I've decided to split the last stages in to two posts.

The first thing to do was to complete the smaller plant elements, leaf veins and stems that were left over from the stage you saw last weekend.  This is the first 'attempt' at it, but the pink main stems for the evening primroses, whilst they looked passable on the left hand side, were really wishy-washy on the right and were lost amongst the brighter herb robert stems.  So, my next move was to replace them with something darker and more easy to distinguish among a mass of stems.  I used one strand each of a green and a brown - the only part of the project worked in two strands.  Here's the result, complete with my dummy yellow paper butterfly.

Moving on now to the creation of the brimstone butterfly (in keeping with the yellow theme of the flowers for the ceremony etc).  After a false start trying to work some wings directly onto the yellow silk fabric that I used for the cushion back with some 34 gauge beading wire and some Pipers Silk floss, I decided to try them on a piece of fine cotton lawn, some white paper covered 30 gauge wire and good old stranded cotton instead.  I needed the fabric to be yellow all through, so as to avoid the all too common white edges that can be seen on some wired stumpwork pieces.  I remembered that my silk dyes could also be used on cotton, so I mixed together my warm and cool yellow shades to get something that would match well and soaked the fabric well with it.  Once it was dry, the whole thing was dyed through and I could attach the wires as you can see here.  The shapes were taken from Jane Nicholas' latest book, 'Stumpwork Butterflies and Moths', but scaled down a tiny bit.  (The body area I created myself with simple padded satin stitch and a few straight stitches.)

Here you can see the next stage, the filling in of the embroidery of the wings.  You can see that I added a little grey on the inner edge to try and make it as realistic as possible.  I carried this all the way through to the edging and that left me with a slight colour mismatch problem along the inner edge as you can see in this next shot:

Not a major problem though.  I found a silver gel pen that was just right for colouring in the yellow edges that were sticking through the grey and eliminated that problem altogether.=)  Here's the finished butterfly in position on the piece:

What about the whole of the finished piece?  Look out for that next week!=)

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2014

Needlequest Update - 21 April 2014

Is it really almost two weeks since I last posted?  Goodness!  Well, I'm OK, although health has been a problem of late.  I still can't wear my glasses, but am taking antibiotics for the sinus infection and will see the doctor tomorrow about it.  It does make computer use very challenging and so I've hardly had my machine on at all.  Actually, it's been rather nice....=)

So, where am I with Needlequest work?  I thought I'd try and merge March and April's themes and do my goldwork butterflies as fitting 'Spring' as well.  So, I made a start with the most appalling bullion knots  done very badly with Coats Ophir, as you can see here!  There's an extra loop just hanging around on each of the three knots and they looked so bad, that all I could do was take them out again.  To be honest, bullions aren't my forté even with cotton threads.  With metallics, they're dreadful.  I'd need a lot of patient practice before I could make this look good.  Then I got to asking myself if the reason I'd neglected this piece didn't have something to do with not really wanting to stitch it, and realised that I really didn't want to do it. So, I took the fabric out of the hoop, erased the outline and put it aside for something else later on.  Basically, I like using metallic threads as trims etc, but I'm not into pure goldwork after all.  Something valuable learned there!=)

So, what next?  I decided as I love butterflies and am thinking of using a Helen M Stevens' inspired design for the wedding ring cushion (more on that another day), I would work a small piece of hers in silks.  Anyone who has her 'Embroidered Butterflies' may recognise this piece from early on in the book.  I decided to take the two elements marked out here:

And turn them into a nice, small scale study.

As you can see from this tracing, I've deleted the caterpillar part as it would have made the whole thing a bit too wide.

The two butterflies here are very springlike indeed as we actually saw them in a garden in Gloucestershire where we were guests last Sunday.=)  So, here are one brimstone and one male orange tip.

This is the green fabric I've chosen to work it on and the Pipers silks ready to go.  I've transferred the outline, which is a bit faint, but workable with, I think.  Just need to fish out one more colour for one of the butterflies and then get started.  The fabric is quite interesting as, although you can't really see it here, it's a bit discoloured and a darker, blue-er green at the bottom than the rest.  I'm hoping that that subtle shade change will enhance the finish, making it more lifelike.

I really haven't felt much like stitching of late, so I hope I can get on with this during the week and have something to share next week.

What about you?  What have you been doing?

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2014

Completed DMC Stumpwork Butterfly Kit

So, the DMC Butterfly stumpwork kit is finished!

It's a shame these kits were discontinued, even though the designs are nothing to write home about and some of the details in the insects etc shaky to say the least.  For instance, in this one, the butterfly wings were meant to be worked in padded satin stitch.  Padded satin stitch - for thin, delicate butterfly wings.  Hmmm!  The kits are fun and fairly simple to work - even though they say 'Advanced' on the box.

Here are all the wires for the wings couched onto the white fabric provided, which was first mounted in my tiny, 4" hoop - the smallest I have.  (Are smaller ones made, does anyone know?)

Above you can see the blue sections of the wings worked and below shows part way through adding in the brown edging.  From comparing the colours to my butterfly guide, I would say this was a Green Underside Blue butterfly!!

These are the finished wings, the edges done in white overcast stitch, all ready to be cut out and attached.  After they were, the piece looked like this:

Hope you've enjoyed seeing this one progress.  I just have one more of these kits to work - the dragonfly, and it's already out on my table to be started soon, although I have a card to do before that.

(PS Jules: This kit was sent to me as part of an old cross stitch newsgroup exchange game, it wasn't a magazine freebie.  I've never known a mag give away anything of this ilk!)

A tutorial is coming up for wired fabric elements for stumpwork, so look out for that on Friday, (this wasn't it...!)

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2013

5 Smalls, 3 Styles

Here are all my other recent finishes, most of which were worked on whilst I was working in Leeds recently.

The first is a cross stitched bookmark made for an elderly friend of ours, Charlie. He was delighted with it when we gave it to him last night.=)


Next we have the two printed canvas needlepoint kits that my mum found a few months before we went to Taiwan (about two years ago now!) and that I recently finished off and 'repaired'. On looking at the top one again the other day, I realised that there are more repairs to make, i.e. when I decided, in my 11 year old wisdom, that it wouldn't matter if one or two stitches went \ when all the others were / as it filled in the shape better....




Here's a wedding card done well in advance of the big day on 20 August this year. Now like me to get things done in good time (Prince Albert would have approved: 'It's always better to complete a task well ahead of schedule.'), so I now have this to keep clean and safe (in its envelope) for the next 2 months and to think of a gift to make.


The last photo shows the circular card mount I chose to put the silver and purple heart in. I took pix of both this and in a square mount and, as soon as I could see them side by side in my photo package, there was no contest on which looked best. (I'll post a better photo when I've taken one.)


Next task is to get on with the blackberries and make up the two cushion/pillow covers etc, but I'm rather busy preparing for software and secretarial exams (plus going to classes and so on) just now, so I mayn't get on as quickly as I'd like... So what's new, huh?!

More pencils, stitching mags and viola-versary

Ooof, yes, I've been buying again. I seriously suspect myself of engaging in retail therapy.... Here's the latest addition to the pencils collection, Derwent's Inktense the full range. You use them like a pencil, then you can go over the marks with water and it turns into an ink-like quality. If you use the colour lightly to start with, it looks more like watercolour. They're really good, it's just a shame I'm not brill at drawing yet!! Here's what I did last night to experiment with them. It's just a copy of this photo and far from marvellous, but it was late and I'm no great shakes at paper based art. This sort of thing takes a lot of patience and practise and I think that could well be why I tend towards needlework where you can get it right first time!!!















I've also been hoarding more stitching mags. Went to WHSmiths and found the latest issue of 'Inspirations' there, much to my surprise! I didn't think it would arrive for another week or ten days, but here it is along with the current 'Stitch'. I also got a copy of this book from the Country Bumpkin designer series. Don't know that I'll ever make it up as is, but it's a very interesting book and a brilliant design. Got the weekly CB webletter this morning, which was full of all the new books they're planning to release this year. There's to be a 'Needlebook Cottage' in this designers series and an 'A-Z of Goldwork and Silkwork', which I am going to be totally unable to resist buying. BAD Country Bumpkin!!!













Today is my viola-versary. I am officially now a second year viola student. Given how little ground I've managed to cover, part of me finds that a bit disappointing, esp. as someone I 'met' on the ABRSM forums started violin a month before me, got a distinction in her Grade 1 exam last June and is already preparing for her Grade 3 in March! However, then I remembered the kind of year I've just had - about 3 months lost to illness, if not more when all added together, narrowly avoiding a nervous breakdown owing to an ill-suited (to me) job and various other hassles. Put in that light, I'm doing OK and, yes, I'm quite reconciled to the fact that I'm going to learn slowly. As DH rightly says, it's the fact that I enjoy it that matters, not the race to get to Grade 8 standard!!! Funny thing is that I've been unable to practise the last week and had to cancel my lesson on Tuesday thanks to having hurt my neck! It happens from time to time and is on the mend now, so onwards and upwards!

The weather is odd at the mo, JK. The forecast promised snow, but it's lovely and sunny right now with only light clouds. We've had stormlike winds, fit almost to take you off your feet, (I nearly did take off last Friday!!!), but at least not too much rain. Hmm, actually, I prefer rain to wind and I really get fed up with both at the same time!!!

Heidi asked what my plans were. Well, I've nothing set in concrete just yet, but lots of ideas and so forth. First and foremost, (as without it I can't really do anything else), is to get my strength back. Whilst that's in progress, I intend to build slowly up on other things, esp the Bible teaching work I do. When I was language teaching and it was stealing all my time and strength, it just became so hard to remember my real priorities in life. Felt like I was living in two conflicting worlds and I was beginning to feel more at home in (and spending vast amounts more time on) the one I didn't belong to! Most uncomfortable! So, now that's getting back to normal again, I can get on with what matters most. Doubt I'll get another job, but I might help DH with some of his admin work as he's very busy and earns more than enough to keep us both. I want to make some progress with my musical studies, pick my languages back up (nothing killed my Chinese ability as stone dead as teaching it for a year!!!), maybe even work through some of the Open University science courses I have copies of and, of course, stitch! We're going to Taiwan for 3 weeks in March/April and, after that, I'll be making moves on starting some needlecraft studies. Problem with most of the stuff on offer is that it's so contemporary and, frankly, I don't like that kind of style. I prefer traditional, detailed work, so I daresay a lot of the City & Guilds programmes on offer aren't going to work for me. The stumpwork ones look good though, so we'll see. Will let you know when I do, basically!! One thing's for sure, I'm not going to suffer boredom or lack of challenge and purpose!=)

A Finish! Wow!=)

So, here's the only thing I managed to stitch during June. It was very enthusiastically received by it's new owner this afternoon, who practically wore my right cheek away with rapturous kisses!!!=) Always nice that, isn't it? Quite a contrast to the person who I stitched a nice picture for, who not only never framed and hung it, but had to be reminded to even tell me it had arrived and say 'Thank you'! Pah! Not stitching for him again, you can rely on that!

Thanks for all the 'Blog-a-versary' wishes and nice comments on the new layout. Ann/Anita, when I wanted to do it this way, I just looked at the source code of some blogs that I admired and copied the relevant ideas, but you do have to have some idea of what you're looking for, so it wouldn't be easy for me to explain how here.

Von, God surely does appreciate our sense of humour as he created it! I often imagine Jesus having a really good laugh with his disciples and taking the Pharisees off!!!! You only have to watch the antics of baby animals and small children to be sure that God has a rich sense of humour all of his own too.=)

I've already started on a picture for our bedroom walls - once they're newly papered. I doubt that will happen this month, so I have plenty of time to stitch both it and its partner by the time the walls are fit to host anything!!! Planning to get on with the neglected projects from tomorrow as well. Get them out of the way, then I can get on with some more of those nice impressive looking pieces like my 3 best at the top of the blog now! I only wish they reflected my regular work!!

Stitched in Exile!!!

Here's my latest stitching WIP as a break from all the renovation work. I've been doing a bit here and there whilst at mum's, but it's been taking a while. Haven't had much time for it, understandably. Shouldn't take much longer though as there's only a tiny bit of the blue left to do, (which is done in single strand), then the BS and the knots.

No, I don't use beads for French knots!!!!!=)

Got the card done in time.....

Here is the finished rose card. The recipient liked it very much, but I must say that it was hard to give that one away. I really wanted to keep it!!!

Not yet put in so much as one more stitch on the hardanger bookmarks for days, (although I had already done a lot more of the border than shows in the last photo), but I hope to get those done this week as well as the XS bookmark and needlecase made up. Lots to do.....