Stitch at Home Challenge

I learned about the San Francisco School of Needlework and Design (what a mouthful!) a couple of months ago via the Fiber Talk podcasts. I was especially intrigued by their Stitch at Home Challenges because, obviously, stitching at home is what I do most - as opposed to taking classes in public or traveling or anything much outside of my home. I couldn't pull anything together for the challenge that was in place when I first learned about the School although I did have an idea I would have liked to have brought into existence. The new challenge, however, is right up my alley. The theme is Healing and Reflection.

At first I found this theme a bit overwhelming. There are so many possibilities, so many facets to this topic (which is why it makes such a good theme I suppose). But it wasn't long before I was rescued by something I've done nearly every day for the past 18 years: Morning Pages.

If you've read The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron you'll know what I'm talking about. Her book is basically a self-help manual for stuck artists or those who don't think of themselves as artists but are besieged by creative urges. A friend of mine introduced me to the book and suggested we get together with a couple of other like-minded friends to work our way through the book. This was back before my MCS diagnosis. We were a small group, only four of us consistently as I recall. It was very helpful to have the group though. Without the accountability they provided I would never have done some of the exercises suggested at the end of the chapters. But by far the most valuable thing I took away from my time with Julia and her book was Morning Pages. 

Essentially Morning Pages is 30 to 40 minutes spent writing, by hand, first thing in the morning. Before there's been any input from the outside world to influence your thoughts or feelings. It can be a difficult practice to establish but I've come to rely on it for a variety of reasons. I write three pages a day in a cheap, 10.5" x 8" spiral-bound notebook. I vent anger or frustration, I come up with ideas for new projects or solutions for current efforts, I confess my fears and anxieties. There are days when it's hard to come up with anything to say and days when my pages are full of gratitude. Not only have Morning Pages and the Artist's Way helped me to feel more confident in myself as an artist, it's helped me to come to terms with my circumstances. In short, I dump or dream on the page and am healed in so doing. But how to represent that with fabric and thread?

I decided to make a textile book, a sort of replica of the notebooks I have filled over the years. There may not be a lot of needlework on the pages but this is one place where I don't feel the pressure to do more than is necessary. I have selected text prints from my stash to create the pages for my book.

Each print is symbolic of one way Morning Pages have helped me to heal. My intention is to use embroidery to clarify or label the pages.

Obviously I've used some ribbon and trims too. Most of the decorative needlework will be on the cover, I think. Right now I'm not sure what the cover is going to look like. That will come in time. Probably when I've finished with the pages. 😉

First SAL of November

This Stitch Along group checks in every three weeks. That means there will be two opportunities this month to see what our fellow stitchers are up to. We each work on our own projects, and we're all in different time zones. It's fun to see what needle artists are doing all across the globe. And to see how much we have in common. 😊

The last time we got together I'd been working on the foxes pillow cover.

I haven't touched it since. But what I have done is another sprig of embroidery on a dish towel.

This is the first corner I stitched - which has been shown previously.

And this is the opposite corner:

It's the same pattern, just reversed. I used stitches in different places as well as different colors. It's all done in hand dyed floss from Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe. That purple was hard to get a clear photo of so I'm afraid there are no detail shots for you. Those petals were done in the fishbone stitch. There are some fly stitches between the petals and the French knots in the middle of the flower. The pink flowers were made with a buttonhole ring and then straight stitch fillers. There's stem stitch in places, and wrapped back stitches, some fern stitching and more French knots. Now the decision is whether to move on to the next pre-stamped dish towel (from Mary Corbet) with a little more intricate design or whether to figure out something to put in the middle of this towel along the lower edge to tie the two sprigs together visually. Or I could return to the foxes. 😉

Oh, and on another note, my name was drawn to receive a free month in Nancy's floss club! Woohoo! Happy dancing of a different variety. 😀 I really can't resist her floss for some reason. We don't have a local needlework shop anymore so there's no temptation in that regard. I didn't have the chance to get hooked on another line of threads before I took needlework back up again after some 40 years away from it either.

Oh, and on yet another note, if you're interested in my current needlepoint obsession check out this post.

To see what the others have been working on for the past three weeks just click on their names below. If you'd like to join us you can leave a note on Avis' blog. Welcome back Connie!

Avis, Claire, Gun, Carole, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, Margaret, Cindy, Linda, 
Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Hayley, Megan, Deborah, 
Mary Margaret, Renee, Jenny, Carmela, Jocelyn, Sharon, Daisy, Anne, Connie

Boo! Bee, Myself and I in October

Bee, Myself and I is a forum for selfish sewing, instigated by Grannie Maud's Girl. For me that usually means some form of needlework. Although, technically, the Disappearing 9 Patch quilt I've been working on would qualify since it's going to be staying here in The Magpie's Nest. 😀

However, I have been doing some selfish stitching. Remember Pumpkin Jack?

I think this is what he looked like the last time you saw him. I'd just figured out how I was going to handle the background area. I want to create shadowy corners, at least at the top, with this dark purple from the Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe. There isn't enough of that to cover all the background, plus it would be too dark up against the dark sections of Jack's hat. Now I have two skeins of lighter purples, also from VMSS. I've been using the two, sometimes one alone and sometimes blending strands from both of them.

I really like the random shading I'm getting. In fact, I've decided to include a strand or two of the darker purple as I approach the bottom edge of the background.

This is18 mesh canvas. I'm using four strands of cotton floss in the needle for the background. At the rate I've been stitching lately this may very well be done for the next Bee, Myself and I post at the end of November!

... And A Flimsy!

So, about a week ago I showed you the start of yet another Halloween-themed quilt. Gotta love how quickly a Disappearing 9 Patch can come together!

I had 20 blocks, made of 5" (raw) patches, similar to this one:

Which I then quartered.

The next step was to sort these units into groups according to where the "cornerstone" landed relative to the focal patch. That helped when it came to putting the units on the design wall.

I was surprised at how easy it was to keep all the directional images right side up. When I was making the 9 Patch blocks I rather randomly turned images so they were sideways in the 9 Patch or not. Now that I've made this pattern a few times I have a better idea how things will turn out in the end. Still, I wasn't being all that careful, and most of the patches are directional. There were just enough patches with overall, nondirectional imagery to compensate for those spots where a focal patch wouldn't work right side up.

I took my time getting the units sewn into blocks and then rows. When the bits were all together I decided this quilt needed a narrow inner border and then a wider outer border to finish it off. It took some doing, but eventually I came across two old prints that worked. A lot of what's in this quilt is from the early days of my stash building so that was appropriate.

That's a homespun plaid for the inner border. It looks like black and gold by itself. The jack o'lantern print is actually a coppery metallic. Oddly enough, they work together beautifully.

This flimsy measures about 61" wide by 74.5" long. The next trick will be to come up with backing and then binding. I have my eye on a couple of more recent purchases for those applications. This won't be a finished quilt for this year's Halloween but it will certainly be ready for next year! 😊

Three Finishes

Yup, three. 😀

Of course, they're all smaller quilts. There's this baby/toddler quilt:

It's about 62" square. That bright, wild binding isn't too much after all. 😊

Next up is the Pinwheels baby quilt.

It's about 44" wide and 54" long. It has a flannel back, which I didn't get a picture of. I used the same gray of the background and borders to bind it.

James did swirls in the gray patches to make the print patches stand out.

Both of those quilts have been laundered so they're nice and fluffy. This last one has not been through the washer and dryer yet.

It measures about 48" across by 60" long. (I admit to not taking a tape measure to any of these quilts yet.) This one was bound with the remnants of the backing fabric.

I had James quilt it with large, open feathers. I like to use open quilting so the quilts will be that much fluffier and warmer. The denser the quilting, the flatter the end product and the fewer pockets there are for air to be trapped in to retain heat. I intend my quilts to be used! I plan to donate this one to our local hospice group.

I apply my bindings by machine but still hand sew them down on the backs of the quilts. That provides me with mindless sewing when I need it. Plus, I find it soothing - most of the time anyway. There are those occasions when I prick myself or can't thread the needle or whatever. Nothing in this world is perfect!