Take A Stitch Tuesday

A quick post of my Take a Stitch Tuesday samples. First a grid based doodle using left over perle cotton. The picture is a bit crooked but the stitching is not. I used several different combinations of half chevron to form a border -- filled in with wheat ear and then experimented with different stitch sizes. I had to quit when I ran out of thread.

I also experimented with using this stitch for free embroidery on a piece of Silkweaver solo. The fabric color really does not come across well in the photograph -- it is more red. I used some random pieces of Gentle Arts Sampler threads with different ply to stitch with -- the shape is outlined in split stitch and filled with half chevrons and french knots. The idea is a rock or a piece of coral but I think it needs some more work to develop into anything other than a mess.

A reading weekend . . .

Not much stitching this weekend but a lot of reading. I finally finished Memoirs of Hadrian this weekend. Yourcenar writes beautifully in French and the book was beautifully translated into English but this is not a quick read. I read through most of the discussion from the Book Group List. Unlike most of the readers on that list, I found Yourcenar grounded in the tradition of old French heroic literature with Racine rather than writing a novel about ideas and philosophy or starting the modern historical novel/non-fiction biography. The difference could be that I studied French Literature in college rather than philosophy.

I went on to read Elizabeth Bowen's book The House in Paris and Ayn Rand's Anthem. The House in Paris does a good job of portraying the events through a child's eyes as Henrietta observes the adults and Leopold in the beginning and end of the book. I am not sure that it does as well with the adult characters in the middle. I need to think about it some more. Anthem seemed to me to fit in with 1984 and Animal Farm or even with C.S. Lewis's science fiction as a modern day retelling of the story of Adam and Eve. Maybe now I will be motivated enough to finish Team of Rivals.

More vegetables and a quilt . . .

I took the time to photograph my vegetable share this week -- red kale, romaine lettuce, spinach, kohlrabi, zucchini, radish and buckwheat sprouts and garlic. Next week I will start getting fruit and flowers as well as vegetables. I love the taste and smell of fruit that has a chance to get ripe on the tree or vine. I will have to use up the rhubarb in my garden while I wait for my fruit shares to start.

I also got my first package in the quilt block of the month program that I joined. I ordered it from Keepsake Quilting. I need to felt the wool and then I can start assembling the first block. I am pleased with the colors. The pieces are blanket stitched onto the background and will form a full size bed quilt when it is completed. I can either put it in the sewing room/spare bedroom or add more fabric around the edges to make a Queen sized quilt and put it on my bed.

Long and Short Stitch

It has been a week since I last posted anything to this blog -- since then I finished some samples for last week's Take a Stitch Tuesday Challenge. For this stitch, I went back to the grid of a piece of 18 count mono canvas and tried different orientations and combinations of long and short stitches using Appleton wool. The small medalion has long and short stitches rotated in different directions with double cross stitches in the center and long stitch accents.

This finished piece contains some other grid based applications of long and short stitch in different fibers -- I used a shiny rayon for the pot and cotton floss for the child's face. The hair is also a variation of long and short stitch in Medici wool. This canvas was painted by Sundance Designs. I normally have it hanging in my sewing room. I think that I completed it 18 years ago when I was living in Arizona. It is interesting that although I learned to embroider through crewel work and have quite a few books about crewel stitches and surface embroidery -- the completed pieces that I have are primarily needlepoint and cross stitch designs that are based on stitching over a grid. Maybe my mathematical background makes me more comfortable with order.

I have been making other needlework plans for the summer and recently purchased some Koigu sock yarn and yarn called Sea Silk dyed by Handmaiden to make a shawl. I tried to use a toe up sock pattern for the Koigu yarn but even after searching the internet, I could not figure out how to cast on and get started so I am going to go back to socks from the top down. Being left handed makes it even harder to follow a diagram when the written instructions don't quite make sense. The shawl will be based on a scarf pattern in the summer issue of Interweave Knits.