Stitching Idyllic

Stitching Idyllic by Ann Bernard

Archives for August 2018

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More Summer Flowers – a Second Peek

Lavender  Lavender is featured in Water Garden and Briarwood Garden.

Lavender is a bushy plant with long, delicate stems and leaves. The blue/mauve flowers form long spikes with a knobby  texture. It looks to be related to Veronica but the structure and colour of the leaves are different.

Stalks and Leaves: Green 988 (2).

Flowers: Blue/Mauve 340 (1) + 210 (1) = 2.

Stalks: Stitch some stalks in Straight Stitch adding a few shorter straight stitches as leaves to fill out the base of the plant. Add some flowers to the stalks. Create bends or curves in the stalks by displacing the stalk to one side with the point of an awl or with another needle. This is done while the flower spikes are being stitched. Add until a lavender bush of the size and shape you wish is achieved.

Flowers: Use one thread each of the blue and light mauve. Stitch with Open Herringbone stitch. Start at the upper end of the stalk and cover the desired length of the stem. Note that the stitching is narrow in width and that the stem forms padding for the flower spike. Start stitching  just above the tip of the stem, or start slightly below the tip for a flower spike that is not yet fully open.

Water Garden, stitched by Ann Bernard (original is 4″ x 6″)

This garden  includes both Lavender and Veronica. These two plants are visually similar except for the colour of the blooms. Also, the leaves are different in both form and colour.  Start by stitching the green stalks and leaves of all the plants you wish to include in your garden. Leave the threads posted to the spare cloth border so that you can recapture the thread and add or make alterations easily. When you are satisfied on the placement in terms of position and balance, return to each group and complete the basic stalks and leaves.

The directions for stitching Alyssum are included in the book.  The plants need a base of green stitching behind the french knot flowers.

Contents:  Hand Stitch Recognizable Summer Flowers

Fabrics for your Garden: Batik, dyed fabric, photo print, paint the fabric, silk and wool rovings, silk fusion, machine embellishing, machine pieced quilting.

Backing fabric and back-basting : Straight of grain: Supporting your frame.

Frames: Dressing Your Frame: Staples, thumbtacks, Q-Snap Frames, Grip-n-Stitch Frames. Ring or hoop frames. Supporting your frame on a table

Threads: Stranding, Stripping, Mixing and Saving. Threading your needle, thread management, Resources such as Google, DMC  Thread Colour Cards, Tools.

Stitch Directions: Split, overstitching, seeding, stem, detached chain, enhanced chain, fly, feather, cretan, herringbone, woven spider web wheels, french knots.

Summer Garden Flowers:

Border Plants: Alyssum, dandelions, impatiens, lily of the valley, portulaca.

Daisy Family of Plants Stitch directions: Asters, black eyed susans, cosmos, english daisies, purple coneflower, pyrethrums, shasta daisies.

South African Daisies: Gazanias, gerbera daisies, osteospermum.

Herringbone Flowers: Delphiniums, lavender, liatris, veronica.

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Roses – Stitched with bullion knots, woven spider web wheels, stem stitch.

Tall Plants: Double Hollyhocks, lupins, peonies, sunflowers.

Small Projects: Coasters, card inserts. Distorted straight stitch.

Cover Story: Come Stitch With Me:

Silk Flower Conversion: Technique; Clematis, hibiscus, single hollyhocks, petunias, leaves.

Funtasy Flowers: Poppies, and creating. Coasters.

Mounting Your Garden Ready For Framing:

This book is published as an ebook.  Commercial colour printing is expensive and there are a huge number of colour photos and diagrams.  An ebook makes the price affordable.  You can print it on your printer for your own personal use.  Priced at $12.99, this is a bargain and the information included makes it a good investment for both experienced and new stitchers.

Go to eBookIt.com.  Bookstore is at the top of the home page.  Go down to Crafts and Hobbies, Select and proceed to Purchase.  Select the format that is compatible with your computer.  You can also download it onto a tablet or iPad.

If you have any problems with purchase or downloading, email ryan@ebookit.com

I hope that you enjoy this book, use the preparation strategies and try out the flowers.

Nothing, particularly stitching, is very difficult once you know how!!!

Thank you,  Ann B.

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Summer Garden Flowers – Take a Peek

Hello Friends and Fellow Stitchers,

Lazy Daisy stitches and French Knots have been used forever for portraying flowers.  Using alternative but basic stitches was my mission when I developed and then published Hand Stitching Recognizable Summer Flowers.  After much experimentation and, many failures, here are the results.  You will not have to do what I had to do.  You can pick up your needle, the correct coloured thread and stitch up any of the flowers in this book knowing that the result will be as pictured or, your own personal interpretation of the information.   I am  including one if the 23 flowers in this ebook as more is content overload for one entry.

Purple Coneflower

The Purple Coneflower grows in clumps and reaches a height between 2′ and 4′. It blooms from mid summer into the autumn. Each flower opens with pink/purple petals and a flat center similar to a Shasta Daisy. As the flower ages and the seeds in the center ripen, the petals droop down to become vertical and the center becomes larger and domed, eventually becoming cone shaped. One plant can have many flowers in different stages of development. The birds and bees love this plant.

Stalks: Green 987 (6).   Leaves: Green 702 (2) + 988 (1) + 987 (1) = 4.

Petals: Pink 3609 (2), 3608 (3), 3607 (1). Explained in Petal directions.

Centers: Brown 433 (1) + 938 (1) = 2.Orange 721 (1 doubled in the needle) = 2

Stalks: Using long Straight stitch the stalks of the plant.  Indicate the centers of each of the flowers with a small Cross stitch in either of the two brown threads.

Petals: Stitch a few Straight stitch petals in each bloom using 3609 (2). Add more petals using 3608 (3). Note that the petals are uneven in length and that the petals can be darker towards the center of the flower. You can Overstitch the base of the petals with one thread of 3607 but this is not essential.

Centers: 433 (1) + 938 (1) + 721 (1) = 3. Overstitch a few horizontal Straight Stitches across the central brown Cross Stitch. Using 721(1) doubled in the needle = 2, Overstitch a few French Knots on the centers using a fine needle for this such as a Crewel 9 or 10.

Leaves: 702 (2) + 987 (1) + 988 (1) = 4.

Detached Chain stitch with the catch stitch towards the stalks of the plant. The upper leaves are stitched with 702 (2) + 988 (1) = 3. The foliage on this plant is fairly dense with the leaves being an oval with a point at the tip of the leaf.

The angles of the leaves vary considerably.

                               Stitched size is 2″ wide x 2 1/4″ high.

Briarwood Garden, stitched by Janet Sunderani (original is 6 1/2″ x 5 1/2″)

Briarwood Garden

This delightful garden reminded Janet of, and is named after, the garden she had to leave behind when the little used road next to her property became a four lane highway. All that noise would not suit this peaceful scene.

The background fabric was created using loose silk threads that were machine needle felted into a scrim background.  We generally used pale green batik cotton fabric for the backgrounds which is easy to stitch on. We also used photo prints on fabric for many of the gardens.  The directions on how to do this are included in the book.

The flowers in the above garden are Purple Coneflowers, Black Eyed Susan, Lavender and Roses.  You will find them all in the book Hand Stitch Recognizable Summer Flowers.    eBookIt.com   Go to Bookstore – Crafts and Hobbies and select this book and/or Spring Flowers.  Choose your download method and then go to purchase.  eBook format makes these books very affordable.

Learning by trial and error can be missed experience by those who follow the information in the section on preparation of fabric and threads.  Few embroidery texts include all this information which is why I included it. The assumption is that everyone already knows the whys and hows which is not always true.   You will jump ahead in embroidery skills and be delighted with improved results when you follow the directions that are included in both these books.  Knowing exactly how to do things can make learning the skill of embroidery enjoyable rather stressful.

Tune in tomorrow for the second part of this posting.

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Stamford Bridge Tapestry Project 1066- updated.

Here is a new video that updates us on the progress made to the Stamford Bridge Tapestry.  I wrote about this project a few months ago.  The video will tell you and show you the embroidery in progress. Here is a repeat of  the historical background.

1066 was a bad year for England.  Very bad in fact.  King Edward the Confessor died in January.  There were three contenders to the throne of England which, at that time, was a prosperous agricultural country.  First, there was Duke William of Normandy to whom King Edward had promised the throne.  Secondly, there was King Hadrada of Norway who was a Viking and was eager to increase his territory.  Thirdly, there was Duke Harold of England who was a statesman for King Edward.  He had no royal blood in him but had run the country for many years.

In Duke Harold’s travels as chronicled in the Bayeux Tapestry, he vowed allegiance to Duke William and said that he would not make a claim to the throne in England.  Well; that was famous last words.  No sooner had King Edward died than Harold did just that.

It was a summer of unrest in England.  Duke William  in Normandy prepared an army and fleet to invade England and claim his throne.  He was ready to invade but had to wait for the tides and winds to be right.

In England, Duke/King Harold also prepared for battle.  They both waited. It also happened to be a very hot summer,

In Norway, King Hadrada of the Vikings took advantage of the weather and tides which happened to be favourable for him.  In early September, he landed on the Yorkshire coast and invaded the city of York and fought the English/Saxon army at the Battle of Fulford Bridge.  The Vikings won. This historical event has been recorded in the Battle of Fulford Bridge Tapestry.

The Norwegian/Viking army withdrew to the area of Stamford Bridge which is east of York. They were resting before proceeding to London to claim the throne for their king.  King Hadrada was abetted in this by one Duke Harold’s brothers.

Duke/King Harold was waiting in Sussex for the Norman invasion.  Upon hearing of the rout at Fulford Bridge, he took some/all of his army and rode north to Yorkshire.  This took him four days – which for the time, transportation available, and road conditions, was an incredible achievement.  The Viking army was taken by surprise.  What followed was the Battle of Stamford Bridge which is now being chronicled in the tapestry. It was a decisive victory for Duke/King Harold.  The Vikings retreated back to Norway and never invaded anywhere again.

The video will show this panel which now completed.

Meanwhile, the Norman army had landed on the coast of Sussex and were  preparing for battle.  This battle, the Battle of Hastings, together with the Norman preparations, are the subject of the Bayeux Tapestry.

Duke William and the Norman army won the the Battle of Hastings. Duke/King Harold and his brothers were killed leaving England without a leader.  Duke William had himself declared King of England and was crowned in the newly built Westminster Abbey.  The English population were not happy about this and only the participating officials were present at his crowning.  There was essential crowd control outside the Abbey.  King William built many fortresses and prisons around England including the Tower of London.

It is possible that, if King Hadrada of Norway had not invaded England and diverted the English/Saxon army north to Yorkshire, that the Normans would not have won the Battle of Hastings and history of the western world would have been different..

Interestingly, King William returned to Normandy and visited England infrequently during his reign.  He had a large number of children whom he married off all over Europe.  It is said that King William’s blood flows in all the royal families of Europe.

Chris Maudsley, videographer, has re-edited and added to the original video.    It is good to see the progress, the stitching up close, how well the colours all blend and contrast and, to hear how much more remains to be done.  It is going to be a fabulous Embroidery that Records History.  I hope that there will be more video updates in the future.

Thank you Heater Cawte for posting the video and giving me permission to share it with you.