RSN Canvaswork: More Stitches Have Gone In!

Yesterday I decided to finish the bottom portion of the bodice before attempting to fix/redo the collar bone area that is not working.  So for the moment, more stitches have gone in.  Surgery to remove the three stripes at the collar bone is scheduled for later this evening!

Operation "Finish RSN Canvaswork" has commenced ...

I am hoping beyond hope to get this lovely lady stitched up by the time I go to Durham in a few weeks to see Tracy.  I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am to get on the train to stitch with her and my other friends!  I've even started thinking about what I might have for lunch at Leonard's! 

Here's where I ended today, keeping in mind that the left shoulder may come out-- my tweezers and scissors are on standy-by.  The tricky bit is that I do not know of a good way to solve the muddled-up bit around her collar bone (photo below).  

I may try some playing around with the colors I'm plying up.  I thought maybe I could cleverly strand inside the needle to make the transitions more delicate but honestly, I think that may cause more problems because then the jumps will seem bigger.  I've also considered dropping from a 4-2 horizontal Parisian to a 3-1 horizontal Parisian around the collar bone to shoulder.  However, I'm afraid of creating more distracting noise from that change in pattern and I'm not certain if that will actually solve anything.  It is at this moment that I would tell my students to stop saying "but I'm afraid it will" and to sample it out and actually see what it does.  Then again, maybe after I sleep things will miraculously look better in the morning (don't laugh it could happen... usually does not but it could!).  

 

 Progress at end of today.

Problem area.

How I was keeping track with which stripe I was working on.  Seriously, the black and white starts to make you a bit dizzy after a while!  I'm really enjoying all the delicate shading of it and the challenge of the draping on the blouse.  I just have to adjust my eyes more regularly because of the high contrast.

 What happens when your 3 year old discovers the Post It Note arrows.  I can't really blame him as they are pretty fun to play with!

EAC: Inspiring Threads

I just got back last week from teaching in Toronto at the EAC Inspiring Threads Seminar.  It was so much fun!  I taught my Dandelion and Beehive workshops and presented at the Saturday night banquet.  I had two groups of wonderful and enthusiastic students and got to meet many, many interesting stitchers. 

They had a wonderful group of faculty too.  It was such an interesting mix of teachers incorporating very non-traditional techniques and very traditional techniques.  I finally got to meet Alison Cole!  I have followed her work for a number of years and have heard so much (all good!) about her from people that have taken her classes or taught with her at different events.  I would really love to take one of her stumpwork classes and one of the thread painting classes with Margot Kearney (I do not have a website for her but you can see an example of her work on the Canadian Embroiderer's Guild London, Ontario Facebook Page).

It constantly amazes me the generosity of the people that I meet at stitching events, from the students, organizers and teachers.  It has been humbling experiencing it from the "teacher" side in St. Petersburg, FL and in Toronto.  I look forward to teaching and participating at many more seminars to come!

And, a few photos of my student's work in the workshops I taught:
"All the Buzz" Beehive Goldwork Sampler workshop (2 days)

 Jayne finished her piece a few days after Seminar!  Check it out her beautiful final piece on the Ottawa Valley Guild of Stitchery's Facebook Page.

 Natalie finished hers too!  Check it out here on her Facebook Page, "Sew By Hand".    She experimented with variations on the basketweave and the couching colors to darken the beehive up. 

 "Dandelion of a Thousand Wishes" workshop (2 days): 

 My wonderful group of students picked me dandelions while at lunch! 

 I've already sketched up ideas to submit for EAC 2018 Seminar in Prince Edward Island (crossing my fingers I get to go back!).  And, (though this will not surprise anyone here) I've already looked up plane tickets to St. John's just "to check it out" because the seminar next year looks like it is going to be wonderful!

EGA Sun Region: Red Sails in the Sunset Seminar 2016

This past weekend I had the amazing opportunity to teach at the EGA Sun Region "Red Sails in the Sunset" Seminar.  I really enjoyed meeting and stitching with some pretty wonderful stitchers!  The closing speaker was Gwen Nelson (former President of the EGA) who presented a showcase of some of the pieces from the EGA collection.  It was my first experience teaching for the EGA and I already am looking forward to the next!  Below are some images from the two workshops that I taught and the awesome students that I had in class with me.

Day 1:  Interpretations of Moss workshop

The students were responding to a photograph of moss digitally printed on Kona cotton (from Spoonflower) and re-embroidering the patterns of the moss and lichen with creative metal and basic embroidery techniques.  Techniques included (but I did not limit them to):  long straight stitches, french knots (with cotton floss and with smooth purl), bullion knots, stem stitch, s-ing and chipping.  It was a lot of fun seeing which techniques they enjoyed and how different each student's moss and lichen became. 

 

Days 2 and 3:  Dandelion of a Thousand Wishes workshop
 Students learned creative metal techniques using my Dandelion design.  The techniques they learned included:  a variation of burden stitch, couching, silk wrapped purl, stretched pearl purl, cutwork, cutwork over string padding and chipping.  It was a very non-traditional approach to goldwork and the students seemed to really enjoy themselves (it was a super group!).  I've included a few photos here of some of the student's in progress work.  It was so different seeing how shiny their dandelions were using the new metal threads (I had used tarnished and old bits for mine).  It was also great fun seeing how they clipped and pinned back the dandelion fringed pieces as their pieces blossomed!

Some More Affirmations for "You Are So Very Beautiful"

I stitched two more affirmations for Betsy at Craftivism.com for her You Are So Very Beautiful project.  This time she is preparing to share her project at Fuller Craft Museum as part of their show CounterCraft: Voices of the Indie Craft Community running from May 7- July 10, 2016.

 

For this piece, I used DMC Diamant in stem stitch for the top text and gilt bright check chipping for the "incandescent".   It is backed with a printed fabric from Liberty with DMC Diamant whip-stitched edges. 

For this piece, I used gilt smooth passing and couched the "you are" and couched gilt super pearl purl down for the "radiant" with gilt bright check chipping for a little embellishment.  It is also backed in a printed fabric from Liberty with DMC Diamant whip-stitched edges.

Prepping to Stitch and a Note on Kits

The past couple days, I have been prepping to finish up my RSN Canvaswork piece and the canvaswork gradient sampler for my FRPD grant.  I've been organizing baggies of the different thread mixtures so that I can sit down and just stitch and make progress a wee bit quicker.  It also allows me to continue making progress when I need something a bit mindless to do (unlike the stitching) and allows me to know what I need to order to make sure that I'm not missing any threads to finish the pieces up-- that really stinks when you run out of a thread and are super close to finishing!  I thought I would just share a couple photos of how I organize my threads.    

Baggies for my color samples.  These baggies are then put in a larger bag that is labeled with the primary purple color number.

Through my courses with Tracy and the RSN, I have not only learned a lot about embroidery and stitching technique.  I have also learned a lot about best practices for stitching efficiently.  When you are participating in an intensive course, you have 8 days of class over 2 weeks, which means you want to try to figure out as many ways as possible to make the most of that classroom time.   Last summer, I found that I could prep my threads at night, allowing me to focus on the actual stitch technique and execution during class hours.  Mixing your threads is usually way more time consuming than the actual stitching with canvaswork.  It is also a lot less time consuming to prep multiple sets of threads at one time than to do it one at a time while stitching.  I find the start/stop of mixing as I go breaks up the rhythm of stitching too.  Finally, it also helps you feel like you're making progress a bit quicker as you can say, "Ok, all my blouse threads are ready" and then "My blouse is stitched". 

I have kept extensive notes on each color recipe for my RSN Canvaswork piece because it helps me to see how complex the design and colors are and how much work it is.  I've learned that there are a lot of steps and details that shortly after completion, my brain edits out.  For example, that white and black blouse is not just "white" and "black" embroidery floss, especially since I wanted to maintain the painterly quality of the original Vogue cover.  In general, I try to maintain a very detailed approach to my process so that if I ever wanted to look back and reference something for either myself or a student, I could.  It also keeps me open to seeing everything as a learning opportunity instead of a frustration or failure as my notes allow me to reflect on what I am doing. 

Above is my baggie of threads for the blouse on my RSN Canvaswork piece.  An example of the thread color recipes:  the "white" stripes in the blouse is actually composed of 7 strands of DMC Blanc + 1 strand of DMC 648 + 3 strands of DMC 762.

Now I know all this organizing may seem a bit overkill.  I know it is not for everyone.   But honestly I promise it helps--or at least it helps me!

Finally, a note on kits:
I've received a number of wonderful emails asking me if I will be selling my kits so I thought I would put the answer here.  Yes, I will be selling some of them but not until mid-summer, early Fall (depending on the specific kit).  When I have everything up and running to sell them, I will definitely be posting a link on here to my online shop! 

An Oldie But Goodie: "Underneath a Dogwood Tree"

In graduate school, I took an amazing class, Pre-Industrial World Textiles, with Professor Susan Brandeis.  It was held at the Gregg Museum and we were introduced to historic textile techniques and traditions across the globe.  I enjoyed the class for many reasons--examining primary examples of the topics we were studying from the Gregg Collection and rich discussion with my peers and Susan about textile heritage. Additionally, each student was assigned a weekly topic or geographic area to serve as discussion leader.  I was assigned Western Europe!

Our final project for the class was to pick a piece from the Gregg Collection to study and then create a textile-based artifact inspired by it.  I chose a Callot Soeurs gown that remains one of my all time favorite pieces in the Gregg Collection.  I decided to take inspiration from the gown and combine it with my research into 17th Century stumpwork panels and caskets.

The research I did for leading the Western European week shaped this project.  In reading about British embroidered pictures of the 17^th Century, I was surprised by the fact that contemporary clothing was used for all the characters even though most of the stories portrayed were Biblical stories.  This detail added a quirkiness to the compositions that made them even more interesting to me as such care was taken in ensuring that Esther or whichever character they were embroidering was properly attired according to 17^th Century standards. 

Because there is so little written about Callot Soeurs, I focused more of my research on the embroidered pictures.  I decided to create an embroidered picture using the 1909 Callot Soeurs gown as my inspiration for the “contemporary” costume.  I wanted to maintain the sampler feel and keep the composition very informal.  I taught myself how to make needle lace and other detached buttonhole techniques.  I wanted the final piece to be a “sampler” for myself.  I used the traditional ground fabric of natural silk and combined metal thread techniques with needle lace, needle weaving, split stitch, and stem stitch combinations. 

I chose not to depict a Biblical scene as when I saw the dress, the image that popped into my mind was of a girl wearing the gown at an evening ball in the South in the early 1900s.   I saw a group of girls under a big tree with lots of twinkle lights around the yard chatting about which guy they were hoping would ask them to dance.  I decided to make the tree and the dresses the focus and use scattered spangles to re-create the twinkle lights. 

The colors I chose were from an antique Rococo couch that was passed from my grandmother to my mom that I absolutely love.  It is dark cherry or mahogany wood with soft green silk damask upholstery.  Because Callot Soeurs was known for incorporating antique textiles into their garments, I felt the color inspiration coming from a personal antique was appropriate.  I made the embroidered picture into a pillow so it could live on the antique couch. 

 

Now, I'm not going to lie here-- part of me wants to go back and replace those twisting purls.  The other part of me kind of loves that they are all twisty and thinks it feels more tree like.  I think the problem is that is needs to either be more twisty (or twisty in more areas) or not twisty at all.  Regardless, it has me really wanting to attempt a goldwork tree sometime in the near future.  I'll add that to another back burner!