a mingled yarn
The Celtic Swirl is coming along – slowly and wonkily. I’m not sure that it will ever be possible to pull it into square, but as I’ve practically never managed to frame/mount/hang anything I’ve made, I don’t suppose this will matter.
If I carry on at this rate, I’ll probably have it done before Christmas. Tart that I am, I’m probably going back to the linen scrim for the next piece – well I am a woman and I am allowed to change my mind.
Happy stitching…
There is much whooping with joy chez Dreaming In Stitches this morning.
Courtesy of my new phone, I can now listen to Radio 4 Extra while sewing in the sitting room.
I know, I am very easily pleased, as I often tell my husband.
Little things…
It was half term for my daughters last week and inevitably my normal routine – in as much as you can call what I generally do a routine – went up the proverbial Swanee River.
There was some stitching of the Celtic Swirl, but as of this morning this is what it looks like…
All the ribbons are done – I’m working on the backgrounds. I’m not a fan of huge areas of plain colours, so I’m experimenting with swirls and shading.
I’ve also given in to temptation and included some sparkly gold thread – although it doesn’t photograph well.
I’ve been stitching this morning in the office/dining room/studio/junk room, because I missed huge chunks of the play on Radio 4 extra on Saturday and was determined to hear it properly on iPlayer. The only way I can do that is on the Mac – I really must see if there’s any way to get a comfy chair in here – it just doesn’t feel right, sewing in the office chair.
In typical English fashion, the moment the children go back to school, the sun comes out, but we had a good week, even managing a trip to London, so can’t complain. Now we have the run up to Christmas to contend with – oh joy.
Happy stitching.
It’s impossible to photograph anything here in natural daylight, as someone/thing has turned off the sun – we haven’t seen anything remotely bright in the sky for days now – and I’m getting moderately fed-up with it, arrrgh!
Okay, rant over – ish.
So anyway, (deep breath), moving on, just to say that there is some progress on the Celtic Swirl tapestry.
Having gone back to the hessian (burlap), for this one, I’m finding that although the stitches cover more quickly than in the last scrim piece, I’m having to stop and start a lot, moving the canvas around in my frame.
I know it’s not the way it’s normally done, but I just don’t like the idea of having the design rolled away so I can’t see it as you would on a traditional frame – I need to be able to see the whole design as I’m working, so I use a large square clip-on plastic frame – great, but it slows me down a little.
(I have considered making a much bigger frame, especially now that I have the floor stand, but I’m not convinced it would suit the ways I like to work, and would probably end up with a saggy middle – never a good thing!).
I treated myself to a handful of balls of knitting cotton last week – mostly Rowan Cotton Glace. I needed to find something that stitches up with a sheen, but without having to buy hundreds of embroidery skeins. The best thing I ever found was Debbie Bliss Pure Silk, but my local retailer has stopped stocking it. I might have to trawl Webland to find some more.
But I’m happy with the Rowan cotton – it stitches well and has a reasonable sheen, it also comes in the shades I wanted – something that’s not always easy to find. I never realised before I got heavily into needlepoint art, how much painters take for granted the ability to be able to go out and choose the colours they want off the shelf and then go home and mix up precisely what they want – we have to hope that we can find the shades we want, in a yarn that suits and at a price we can afford.
Yep, I think the day when I bite the bullet and try dyeing, might not be all that far away…
Anyway, the Celtic Swirl is definitely in progress – just don’t hold your breath.
Happy stitching.
I started by stitching in the ‘lead lines’, so that I’d have some structure to work into. I’ve learned from previous pieces, that trying too hard to put a lot of heavy lines doesn’t work well, so I’ve been a little more restrained this time and varied the colour too.
Then I began to fill in the shapes created by the lead lines. This feels a bit like stitching by numbers and is actually very relaxing.
But one of the things I love about old stained glass, is the imperfections in the glass itself, which create wonderful colour textures. I’ve tried to produce this effect in some of the sections.
Of course the other thing which appeals to me about stained glass, is the way that light plays through the glass, making some pieces glow, while others remain dull.
So it seems like the perfect excuse to add perles and silks into the tapestry. They catch the light so differently to wool, adding a tingle of translucency.
I’d say I was about half way now with this piece. With any luck I’ll finish it before we hit the road with our little tents and go on our Scottish Odyssey, timed – rather deliberately – to coincide with the Olympics.
Happy creating!
Remember this?
I started trying out hessian as a needlepoint canvas, back in February. For the 10oz hessian, I sketched out a design roughly inspired be the shape and colour textures found in some shells.
Since I finished the Tree on the 7.5oz hessian, I’ve been back to the shell piece.
Every large tapestry I work, goes through development stages. In the beginning, every stitch stands alone, putting just a small area of yarn into the canvas. The unstitched area vastly out measures the stitched sections.
Then, gradually, sometimes achingly slowly, patches of stitching start to acquire their own texture – they become something promising, firm, solid.
And then, if you are prepared to stick at it, there comes the delicious moment, when you realise that the piece has acquired a life of its own – it suddenly possesses its own energy and you know for sure that you will fill every square in the canvas and that when you do, it will have knitted together to make something strong.
It feels like a kind of alchemy that transforms simple strands of wool and weak loose canvas, into something that firm and resolute.
This is the stage of stitching I love the most. Every new stitch, binds the whole together more and more. I’m seized by an urgency to see what it will finally look like. I get grumpy if I can’t find time to put in the missing stitches and I start turning down visits to the pub so I can stay in and sew instead.
I’ve just reached that stage with the shell piece.
But…
You know what it’s like when you’ve been absorbed in a really good book and you can see that it’s coming to the end and although you want to know the ending, you also begin to wonder what you can possibly read next to fill the gap.
Well, I’ve found that with tapestry sewing, I need to have the next piece ready for me to start as soon as I finish the last one.
The shell is a big piece – roughly 45cm x 80cm – so the next one will be smaller. I need to have a rest from the big ones for a few weeks.
I’ve also decided to use up the white canvas, so I’ve spent the morning sketching out a new tapestry.
Stained glass continues to send trigger messages to my brain – I think that’s where this came from.
So I can see what I’ll be up to for the coming days.
Happy stiching etc.
This is the 10oz hessian, with a considerably tighter weave than the 7.5oz, although still soft and quite variable. I don’t know what it is about working on this material, it certainly has its frustrations, but I really like it – perhaps it’s the drapier texture, I’m still not sure. Perhaps it’s because it’s irregular, and that appeals to the bit of me that doesn’t like to play by the rules. Anyhow, I’ve picked up The Shell again and am making some progress on it. 
I think I may have mentioned before that this is not my normal palette, and I’m finding out about these more subtle colours as I go along, but it makes a change, and as I’m currently brooding on developing a stained glass inspired piece, this one is keeping all those glorious exuberant shades under control until I’m ready to let them loose.
Happy stitching, drawing, quilting etc.
The tree might be finished…
I persevered – it was lovely to stitch, soft, yielding, warm. But it has given a whole new definition to wonky.
It hasn’t told me what it wants to be – I thought perhaps a rather arty wall hanging…
It would however need the skills of a remarkable magician, to overcome the wonkiness.
Years ago I made some clay pieces that might lend themselves to weighting the bottom edge.
But right now I think I’ll put it away and move on to something else. Maybe inspiration will strike if I stop trying to force it.
Scotland in stitches…
I could hardly believe my ears this morning, listening to Radio 4. There was a piece about a new tapestry, to rival the Bayeux in length – describing the history of Scotland.
Apparently, it is the brainchild of the author Alexander McCall Smith – he who gave us the Number One Ladies’ Detective Agency – and who must be one of the most engaging Scots alive today, together with the artist Andrew Crummy (what a splendid name for any artist), and history writer Alistair Moffat.
The work will comprise over 100 panels, each being worked by volunteer stitchers from around Scotland. It is to go on display in August 2013.
I had a quick trawl around Google this morning, looking for pictures or more information, but so far, nothing substantial – just the link at the bottom of this post – perhaps we’ll see more later today, since at last, needlework has hit the major news programme of the day!
So a huge thumbs up to McCall Smith for having the vision and will to put this project into action – and I really look forward to seeing what the finished piece looks like. What a wonderful legacy for future generations of proud Scots.
Glad to see that someone still appreciates the value and the art of tapestry.
Typical isn’t it – can’t finish a piece of tapestry for months, then complete two in two weeks.
Well, alright, a bit of a cheat really, as the Dunstanburgh Castle piece was much smaller and I was trying to see how long an A4 sized tapestry could take.
Here it is…
It’s a mix of tapestry wool, crewel wool, space-dyed rayon and pure silk (courtesy of the sale of Debbie Bliss silk, at my local shop).
Although I painted the canvas before working it, I found the white squares very off-putting while I was sewing. I had to take regular breaks because I was developing a nasty fuzzy sight effect – presumably from constantly looking at all those squares.
I really am going to have to make the effort to find a more sympathetic canvas.
It used to be fairly easy to get different types of canvas, but lately, it’s become much more difficult. The local wool shop used to carry a reasonable stock, but now, they’ve almost given up on canvas completely. You can buy a small range of kits and they still have Anchor or DMS wools, but that’s pretty much it.
I’m going to have to do some research to find suppliers – preferably in real shops – I just need to feel the canvas and see the yarns, which is very hard to do from websites – although websites seem to be the only places I can get most of my materials now. Are we such a dying breed, that it’s not worth stocking yarns and canvasses?
Still making progress on the tapestry. Are you offended if I call it a tapestry? I know that technically it’s a piece of needlepoint, but I was brought up calling it tapestry and it’s a hard habit to kick. Plus, tapestry is easy to say, whereas needlepoint sounds more like a verb than a noun to me, whatever the dictionary says.
Anyway, this is what it’s looking like today. Please forgive the light – it’s November and I live in a north facing house.
There are still some juicy bits to do, but most of the large sections are in place now. The canvas is warping as you can see, but this is no problem, I’m sure I can stretch it when it’s finished, and considering the canvas is upholstery canvas, I’m very pleased with the way it’s held up.
I started this piece without too much attachment, but I’ve really fallen in love with it. I think the fact that it’s soft to handle, and the way it’s acquired a texture as I’ve worked it, have produced a tactile quality I haven’t felt before from standard needlepoint canvas.
It’s also far too big and thick now to fit into any frame that I have, so I’ve been stitching it in my hands, and draped across my legs most of the time, which I suppose helps you get close to the feeling of the piece.
Anyway, this was the last of the upholstery canvas I bought from the local car boot sale. I had a cursory look on the internet to see if I could source any more, but no luck. Does anyone know where I could get offcuts? I’ve become rather attached to this stuff and would like to explore it further.
Dreaming In Stitches 