Christmas cracker

This is a cracker I've made for JoWynn. In fact, you should go to her blog: her pictures are far better than mine :-)

The idea comes from Stitch, the magazine of the English embroiderers guild and I've enjoyed making it.

It is a net machine-embroidered on hydrosoluble:(Blogger refuses to load this picture)

• You draw the shape of your cracker (the plane shape, I mean),
  You divide the shape in five parts, one for the top row, one to pass the top ribbon, one for the body, one for the bottom ribbon, one for the bottom row,
• You draw grids within those parts (diamond grid for top, bottom and body), rectangular for ribbons,
• Now, you set your machine for free embroidery, and you start by fixing a central motif, here a heart,
• Then you go to the grids themselves. I've made them of two passes of straight stitches, covered by one pass in zig-zag.
  Very important: when the grid comes near the central motif, make sure the grid overlaps the motif, otherwise it will fall when you dissolve the hydrosoluble.
  For the same reason, don't leave any stitch uncover and make sure each stitch is connected to the others.
• When your are finished, dissolve the hydrosoluble (if you leave a little bit, it'll act like starch) and let it dry.
• Now embellish as you wish and close the grid into a tube, using invisible stiches.
• Fill it like you want and finish by adding pretty ribbons.

JoWynn, I'm glad you liked it, and hope you will have fun with the threads and beads!

Pocket for a bag

At the end of the week, I have received the Xmas issue of Marie-Claire Idées, a French needle craft magazine. A very good issue, by the way.

In it, their was a pattern for a hand embroidery. I have decided to give it a try, but with machine embroidery. Here is the result:

This is mainly FME, with a few standard stitches, on black commercial felt.

It will become the front pocket of a bag.

I love weekends

... espacially those that last three days, like this one :-)



First, I want to thank you for the kind comments you have left on my blogs. I do appreciate them, and like many of you I'm glad to belong to this community!



This has been a quiet weekend, with a beautiful weather. My daughter was there, but she went out in the evenings to meet friends and came early in the mornings. So she has been sleeping most of the time. Leaving me plenty of free time for textile art.



At last, I've had some time to read Stitch. And the cracker inside was a good opportunity to see how the new machine does free embroidery. It is not finished yet, I have to put some embellishments. I like to make "lace" with hydrosoluble. So this is the first step,
and the result when the hydrosoluble is gone. In Stitch, they use soluble paper. But I think this one may be better: you can dissolve the hydrosoluble just enough to have the lace effect, and still have a stiff effect. I hope I will work on it next weekend. And more important, I love this machine, especially the possibility to select three sewing speeds. And to have the needle down anytime I stop pressing the pedal, with the foot lifted just enough to turn the fabric. My second priority for this weekend was sewing this lettuce. Quite a challence, especially as I drew the pattern on a support, and then cut the bits from that support. In fact, this produces defaults, small defaults, but added together, they end making a big one. The last seam was a bit difficult to achieve. So ladies, if you are sewing on paper and read in the instructions "photocopy", do photocopy :() Anyway, I like it. next vegetable is an artichocke. With curved seams too. I really must be insane to do that.
And the last picture for today is the TAST challenge, with the Lace Border Stitch. It looks complex but it is fun to do, and far more easier as it looks.

Chameleon

This was another challenge from our patchwork group. One of us had brought a book with modern illustrations. We had to choose one theme each and work on it.
This was my first try at woven background. It did not want a plain background and it seemed the perfect solution. Once I had made the background, the ideas for the chameleon itself came easily. It is made of scrap of leather, magazine pages that have been machine-embroidered on felt, then washed to remove the excess of paper, bits of zippers, washers, hanging hooks and pins. It was fun to do.

Little Yellow Box

You may wander what this is...


This is simply a box

It is made of Vilene painted in yellow on the outside, with a purple batick for the inside. The embellishements are made of angelina fibers, painted and heated tyvek (recycled from envelops), painted scrim and some beads. The whole has been machine embroidered with variegated threads along the lines that appeared. It is closed by a cord, also machine embroidered, that goes through holes on the two extreme corners. You have to pull the cord to form and close the box. In fact, the box cannot close exactly this way, and I must add some holes on other corners. Promise, I'll do that this weekend !

Fabric Weaving

My patchwork/textile art teacher has opened a patchwork shop, just one year ago.
I use to go there once a week and meet 7 other nice ladies to experiment, for ourselves or to find new ideas for the shop.

At our last meeting, we were given a piece of fabric, blue and chocolate, featuring a winter landscape with trees. And we had to do something with it. Preferably, a creative something.

I wanted to alter the fabric, and weaving seemed a good option. I had already used this technique, and an article in the Workshop on the Web reminded me of it. It is fun, versatile andquick and it provides some texture. To have more texture, I have even used two types of weaving.
For the background, I have used some brown batik, and cut wavy stripes in both fabrics. I've rotated the original fabric by 90 degrees, so that the trees are horizontal. I find they form a kind of landscape, while the stripes of batik are a reminder of the trunks.
With the leftovers of the first fabric, I've managed to weave a second piece, with straight stripes, and made it the center. This time, the trunks are vertical, but I've cut them in half and played with the disposition of the stripes to create a new pattern.

And here is the detail of the center (I could not resist the idea of snow flakes):

To stay in the winter mood, I've used some silver thread on the weaving itself, silver and blue/grey threads for the flakes.
The blue background of the fabric was a little bit flashy for the batik I had in mind, so I've dyed it with some tea to soften it.

Lutradur and Lace

In the new online magazine Fibre and Stitch, Carol McFee explained how to combine Lutradur and Lace. I could not resist and gave it a try.
Since I want to make a cover to keep my gardening catalogs, my piece is large and cut in two. The front will have the lace and scrim on it, the back will be just painted.
This is the first step: placing bit of lace and scrim on the lutradur.
I have applied a first layer of paint:
Then another layer of paint:
Then some foil rubbing and paint stick, and some FME. Below are pictures of the front and of the back of the cover.