2018 Needlecrafts Review

2018 saw one more embroidery finish tham 2017 with a grand total of six, but some of them were definitely  more labour intensive than those from the previous year.

I had two needlepainting finishes, again from the Trish Burr 'Beginners' book.  I changed the designs slightly in each case (the shape of one rose leaf spray and the purples of the pansies) and I was flattered that my husband told me that my shading skills had improved when he saw the leaves on the pansies.  Do you know, I think he may even be right.  Both pieces ended up in special cards.

Another special card was this window 'look through' one that was my own design for our 19th wedding anniversary.  She didn't have windows like this, but the garden was my idea of what mum's could be like when we'd finished renovating it.  Unlike a few of his cards to me, which contain photo collages of the previous year (and are great!), this one was meant to be a year forward.  Of course, the garden didn't develop to this point, but it was a fun project anyway.

I can't remember who got this card with the ribbon work in, but it was a kit from Crafty Ribbons.  It was quite hard work to stitch and I had to pad the backing in order to make it an even finish (the ribbons bunched up behind somewhat), but I thought it came out well.  I have a red one somewhere.  Poppies, I think....

This last project was these two lavender bags below - one for me, one for my mum.  To be honest, I have no idea where they are now.  Seriously, you can tell I've gone through the change in recent years as my previously flawless memory is annoyingly patchy!

Moving on to knitting, which is all adult garments this year, but still rather lacking some decent photos - or any at all of two projects.

Above is a Brett Marble Chunky cable knit I sized up from a girls' pattern and wear myself.  It's all acrylic, so it's good for mid-seasons rather than winter.

The one you see Sir modelling here is wool blend and this type of yarn has come to be a personal favourite.  It's King Cole's Tweed Chunky and it's 25 or 30% wool and is machine washable.  Both warm and easy care.

Both of the above ended up with sleeves slightly too short, but Sir doesn't mind as he says it's more jacket length and looks good with a shirt.  Later in the year I made him a matching scarf in double stocking stitch, which he gets good wear out of in the very cold weather.

I also did a new black cardigan for myself with simple, directional cables like the lemon baby one I did in 2017.  Again, the sleeves are too short, but it's very usable nonetheless.

This last piece was done for my late mother at her request.  During the last year or so of her life, she wore it as often as she could and loved it.  Medical visitors would often exclaim, "Oooh, I love your waistcoat!",  which was nice for me to hear.  As was her proudly explaining, "My daughter made it for me."  As you can see, it was made from oddments left over from the marble jumpers, and the edgings came from the purple jumper and black jacket that I mentioned in the 2017 review.

During this year I also ran up a couple of simple scatter cushion covers and finally hemmed a black/rose print raglan sleeved t-shirt I'd done most of at a sewing with knit fabrics workshop from the previous summer.  I'd put it off so long as I'm not good at sewing in a straight line, but I finally took myself in hand, but my double needle stuff in order, drew a line on the fabric as best I could and got on with it.  It waggled only once - right front and centre, where the dip actually looks like it could be part of the design!  

Look out for 2019 next Monday.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2021

2017 Needlecrafts Review

Welcome to 2017!!

This is the year the Big Blog Break began in, so those of you who are kind enough to have taken an interest in my creations over the years will have seen some of these pieces in progress.  I don't expect you to remember any of them though, as I had a couple of surprises when I went back through my Instagram feed to see what had been finished during the year!

It was more of a knitting than a stitching year, but I'll present the 4 embroidery finishes first as that's what most visitors are most interested in, I think.  There were only four finishes, all of which ended up in cards, but at least they were all different styles.

First above is the violets thread painting from Trish Burr's 'Needlepainting Embroidery - Fresh Ideas for Beginners'.  I had some trouble with the bud on this one and put it on hold for a while (from 2016, if I remember correctly), but I cracked it in the end and it served well as a baptism card for a Chinese friend.

The green based hardanger piece I believe was a sympathy card, but I can't quite remember for whom....  Anyway, it was nice to work with this colour scheme instead of always on white.

This beaded, coloured blackwork style piece I confess to having copied from a picture I saw somewhere.  Pinterest, probably.  It was quite hard going, but it made a nice anniversary card for Sir.

This last one, a cross stitch 'Forever Friends' bear, was for friends' 10th wedding anniversary.

Onto knitting, which was much more prolific.  If you're not interested in yarn crafts, feel free to exit here. 

In 2017, I knitted no less than seven baby jackets from two in premature sizes for charity, to two 6-12 months sizes.  One had a matching hat and several of them had embroidered trims on them.

There were also three adult garments, but I don't seem able to find any decent photographs of them.  

The first completed one was for a cold friend and was a simple chunky, purple jumper with a basic double cable up the front.  Started before that one, but finished afterwards was a black chunky jacket/cardy for me.  Both were done with budget yarns, but seemed to come out OK,

The third was worked with James C  Brett's marble chunky, which hasn't photographed well so far.  I'll have to try again some time.

Last up is the bamboo cotton scarf that I made for myself, but which really isn't warm enough for winter use.  It's really only useful as a trim,  but it's a glorious colour. 

That's it for 2017.  

Catching up slowly!  Look out for 2018's review this time next week.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2021

Welcome visitors from Pintangle!

Thank you very much for clicking over to see me. ☺

I was very flattered when Sharon asked to include me in her TAST interview series, especially as I haven't been able to join in as much as I'd have liked to.  Also, if you've read the interview you'll know I'm not very good at the exploratory process - I'm very different from many of the artists featured thus far!  However, I do like to learn new things and develop as much skill as I can, so TAST is one of the challenges that offer a constant opportunity to move forward.  I'm planning on looking more closely into the Embroiderer's Guild distance learning courses towards the end of this year, so they may provide the needed impetus.

If you'd like to know more about the wedding dress panel, you can see my series of seven posts on the project, or hop over to the Kreinik Threads Blog to read their interview with me about it. ☺♥☻

I'm having some technology problems at the moment - both my laptop and my digital camera urgently need replacing (the camera I can only use if I seal the battery door up with duct tape, and the laptop is exasperatingly slow, no matter how much I delete, disable or otherwise clean up), so blogging has been rather neglected of late.  It takes a lot of patience and planning to get anything done, so there are a few projects waiting to be published.  Assuming I get my tech up to speed in the next few weeks (as I very much hope to, and Sir has agreed the funds for it ☺) , here's a sneak peek at what's coming up soon:

Here you can see some previews of counted thread and freestyle embroideries, sewing and knitting projects, and preparation for entering some local summer shows.

I'll be blogging all of these projects and more in the near future, including my sewing workshop days and some overviews of all the handicrafts exhibits at the Bingley and Ryedale Shows held later this month and the Shadwell Flower Show in mid August.

You can subscribe using the e-mail service (just remember to complete the verification process, or you won't be signed up), or any of the usual reader services.  There are widgets for some of the most popular part way down in the side bar.  I'm also on Instagram.

If you'd like to know more about my work, please do feel free to have a look at the gallery pages which you can find links for just under the blog header image.

My apologies for a relatively short and dull intro post, but I seem to be in for a bout of tonsillitis (or a cold at least) and I'm feeling just that little bit ropey today. However, thanks very much again for calling in and I hope to host you in my web home often. ☺♥☻

If you haven't seen the interview I'm referring to in this post, click here for a look!


Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Work in Progress Wednesday - 15 February 2017

I confess, I'm not getting a lot of embroidery done at the moment.  To be honest, I'm more into knitting just now as I'm doing baby projects both for this year's Shows and also for friends' newborns.  I've also been stashing some yarn for some knits for myself.  More on those projects on Sunday...

At least I've got a little more progress on the everlasting violet thread painting to share.  I'm expecting to need this for a special greetings card in May, but there may be up to two more also needed, so I really should get back going with it.

I took this photos with my phone, so the colour isn't quite as faithful as I can get it using my camera.  I need a few things sorting on my technology - camera battery door fixing, new laptop battery and the power supply 'pin' thingy fixing, so I hope to get to that as soon as I can and be able to work more comfortably instead of having to compensate for some problem most of the time.  Frustrating!

Join me again on Friday for the next instalment in the wedding dress modesty panel series.

☺♥☻

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Autumn Leaves Wedding Pillow - Leaf 5 and Complete Sprig

Welcome to part four and we start with part of the outlining of the fifth leaf (and some lovely sheen on the silk threads).

This was the last section of thread painting on this project and here are a few shots of how it was done.

Not much out of the ordinary to report this time, except the usual working and re-working of the leaf veins.  I don't miss that, I can tell you!! ☻

Next time we add the metallic parts.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Work in Progress Wednesday - 25 Jan 2017

It's been a long time since I did a 'Work in Progress Wednesday' post, but I'd like to get back into it.  I really miss Sharon Boggon running it as a weekly challenge/link up event.  If you're reading this, Sharon, there are still people doing WIPW posts and I'm sure they'd love to join up with you again.  So, if you ever wanted to re-start it, you'd have some interest.  I always found it very helpful and I completed a number of stalled and slow projects in order to join in.☺

I last posted on this piece right at the beginning of last year, so here's a recap.  Fellow fans of Trish Burr's work and books may recognise this little violet embroidery from her 'Fresh Ideas for Beginners' needle painting book, which I'm slowly working through some of the projects from.  I first blogged my first - terrible - attempts at the bud back on 11 November 2015 and the last photo on blog was the one here with the part worked leaf.

Here's the leaf completed

I have since worked the purple parts of the bud again, but didn't realise that I hadn't photographed it yet.  My camera battery door is broken and I'm having to make do with holding it together with a combination of duct tape and main force when I need to take decent pictures, pending Sir having a look at some of the on-line tutes there are for fixing the problem.  I really don't want to bin my otherwise fully functional camera because of such a small, mend-able problem, but it does mean that I find taking just one more shot when I thought I'd done and uploaded them all a bit of a nuisance.

I've just finished a moderate revamp of this blog.  I changed some text colours, deleted some out of date sidebar stuff and finally got around to staging and photographing a new header image.  I'm not 100% happy with it, but it'll do for the time being.  The next digital skill I want to develop is banner and logo creation.  If anyone has any tips to do this cheaply - preferably free - please share!  I have Photoshop Elements v2.0 from about 15 years ago, MS Publisher 2007 and that's about it for creative software.

More on the autumn leaves project coming up on Friday.  I have 12 past project posts created and scheduled for publication between then and early March and there are still three to do.  Plenty to read on Sew in Love coming up!  Enjoy. ♥☺♥

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Autumn Leaves Wedding Pillow - Leaves 3 & 4

Welcome to the third part of this project series.  Today we'll take a simple photographic journey through the creation of the third and fourth leaves.

With the vein gauge sorted, it was time to move on to shading the next couple of leaves, both of which were green based.

I wasn't happy with the leaf veins on the the third one either - too straight.  It was rather hard to get them sorted though, and I'm not sure I cracked it in the long run, but you can see what you think in later photos.

On to leaf number four now and some lovely yellows and soft greens this time:

The end of the needle painting in sight.  Join me next time for the fifth leaf. ☺

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017

Autumn Leaves Wedding Pillow - Leaves 1 & 2

Thanks to all of you who commented on the last post.  It was a clear vote - one project at a time.

So, here's the first of a series of photo heavy posts showing most of the process of shading the leaves, then the numbering and then finally the whole piece made up.  Some stages didn't get photographed very much, so there are a few gaps, but I'm sure there's enough to get the idea. ☺

As it takes such a long time to choose, edit and upload the photos in order, (which is something that puts me off blogging a lot these days....), I'll be keeping text to a minimum - just the stuff that really adds something to the understanding of the project.

Let's make a start on leaves numbers one and two.

At this point I felt that the leaf veins were too heavy.  I'd been working them in the same thread as the shading was done - one strand of Madeira Silk, but it just seemed to overpower the leaves, especially the yellow and orange one.  Whilst walking up the road, I picked up a couple more leaves to have a look at the gauge of the leaf veins in nature and so decided to change to one strand of sewing cotton instead.

First came the delicate task of unpicking the original stitches, which wasn't easy!

Then came the re-stitching of the veins.  I know they're not a great deal finer, but, if nothing else, I got a chance to alter the colours and make the veins more curved and less stick-like.

Next time: Leaves three and four. ☺

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2017