DitG Tagore

In addition to the large embroidered blocks that anchor Leanne Beasley's stitchery quilt, Down in the Garden, there are little bits of stitching scattered all around it. I really like these little details that are stitched over printed fabric, so there are two layers of interest. The fabric is from Tamara Kate's 2013 collection, Flight Patterns.

I intended to use these medium dark blue flowers all over the quilt, but it turned out that they didn't work elsewhere, so this is the only place they remain:

The quote is from Indian writer and painter Rabindranath Tagore's Poems on Time. Wikipedia also has this nice piece of synchronicity, written exactly 100 years ago:

Who are you, reader, reading my poems a hundred years hence?
I cannot send you one single flower from this wealth of the spring, one single streak of gold from yonder clouds.
Open your doors and look abroad.
From your blossoming garden gather fragrant memories of the vanished flowers of an hundred years before.
In the joy of your heart may you feel the living joy that sang one spring morning, sending its glad voice across an hundred years.

— The Gardener, 1915.[165]

These butterfly sections will be scattered around the quilt, while the contrasting bee quote is featured in the large centre block. You haven't seen it since the end of Ink Week last fall, but it is now almost done. I just have a little of the lettering left. But, I also want to do it justice with some good photos, so it will need some sunshine as well. With luck, next week!

First Birdhouse

Here's the first birdhouse stitchery that I've finished for Leanne Beasley's stitchery quilt, Down in the Garden. It will finish at 7" square, and there will be four all together, placed around the corners of the quilt.

Back in November this was the first block that I used for my Ink Week experiment, and the birdhouses were the reason for the ink in the first place. I was very concerned that the flowering vines would over power the birdhouse. So, I thought that colouring it in with the ink would keep things organized and clear. Even though the ink turned out very pale, I think it still helps.

The last time you saw this block, it looked like this:

The leaves and flowers were all in stem stitch, and the purple was DMC 209. Normally I like that shade of purple, but against the almost fluorescent green and blue it looked surprisingly brown and drab. It has been sitting around for months, but this week I took it out in daylight, and realized that it had to change. Here's the same section now:

I changed the flower colour to the periwinkle DMC 340, and stitched everything in back stitch instead. The yellow is true in the second photo, it is very light. I think it was much better to keep the stitching light and fresh too. I've revised the colours for all the flowering vines several times, and I've realized now that it will be best to keep them all bluish and cool.

Now that's all decided, I have fresh motivation for these birdhouses. For a couple of months I've seriously considered redoing them completely in applique to give them more oomph. But I think the real problem is that all winter I was looking at them in artificial light. It all looks different in the daylight, and I think it's finally coming together. (In my head, I mean -- there's still plenty of stitching left to do!)

Country House Landscaping

Gosh, I see it is almost two months since I last showed this block! It's the centre block for Lynette Anderson's 2015 BOM, My Country House. I had to re-sew the roof seam on the machine before I could applique the trees. "I'll just wait until I have white thread in the machine," I thought. Did that happen? No. Finally I threaded the white thread specifically for that one seam. It only takes a minute -- silly, isn't it?

Anyway, it gave me lots of time to mull over the width of the strips for the trees. In the pattern the trees are a little Christmas-y, with stars at the top and an evergreen shape. The tree trunks are thicker than the branches. My version is smaller at 3/4 scale, decidedly summery, and I knew I wanted to change the tree shape and put leaves all the way around the top. Finally I decided to make all the stems everywhere on the quilt the same 1/4" size, using the Clover 1/4" bias tape maker. I like the feathery look to the trees. Plus, with the smaller scale I think consistency with the stems will be cleaner, and help to tie the whole quilt together.

The stems started out pretty wild...

...but they were soon pruned down to size. The leaves are big chunky detached chain stitches, done with four strands of floss, two medium and two light green. When you compare this with the first photo, you can see other changes as well. The doorknob was done in padded satin stitch:

While I was sewing the doorknob, the window above the door started to look too empty. As an experiment, I filled the space with the same motif as the gingerbread along the eaves. It seems like the obvious choice now that it's done, doesn't it?

But after that, the original gingerbread along the eaves looked very dingy, and I became convinced that I had used a different, less white, thread. After another day or so of dithering, I took out the original stitching. The new gingerbread was stitched with four strands of floss instead of the original two strands, and fewer "spokes" in the wheel:

I think it is better. With the heavier thread I thought the colonial knots in the original would be too much. Now that I am looking at the photos, though, the knots looked pretty good, so I may still try them. Without the knots, I did have to add an extra red brick on either side to fill the empty space.

The felted wool sheep were the last addition. Two of them are peacefully munching the daisies:

And the one on the far left is looking up...

...at the big blue chicken which will sit on the right chimney. But, the chicken will overlap the top seam, so it is still on hold.

With the trees for landscaping, and the sheep as landscapers, I think the block has really come to life. Given that I started this block on January 2, I am glad to have it done!

Final Line Up for BFF

Last time I posted about Best Friends Forever, I said that 23.5 of the stitcheries were done. Before I did the final wash and cut, I decided to finish up that last ".5:"

And it's a good thing I did! Look what happened here:

I used the acrylic cutting guide from Paper Pieces to centre each stitchery on the 3.5" hexagons I'm using for the setting. It turns out that these two motifs, the basket and the house, were printed too close together. It's the only place I had this problem for the whole quilt -- usually there was 1/2" or more in between.

I'm not upset, because I wasn't a big fan of the basket anyway. When I stitched it I worried that it was too big, which it isn't. But I guess I knew something was wrong!

I always wash my finished stitching (cross stitch too) in plain unscented dish soap (environmentally friendly) to get out any oil or dirt. It works great, and I've never had any colour run. The linen was hung to dry, and then ironed from the back on a clean pressing cloth:

Cute, eh? Even the grunt work has been fun on this project.

Then all the motifs were cut, backed with muslin, and basted to the big paper hexagons:

I miss stitching these, actually. It was fun to come up with different stitches and colours for each one. The stitching for Down in the Garden, which I'm doing now, is not as challenging and is starting to feel dull. I may need to add something else to the mix!

Anyway, here's a reminder of how the BFF setting works:

As fun and exciting as this all looks, I'm not sure I can work on this and Texas Star at the same time without a total English paper piecing overload. And I've kind of set myself a schedule for Texas Star... So it may be a while before you see any more.

Finally, one problem I often have with internet photos is that you lose the sense of scale. So, here's a last photo with one BFF block, one Texas Star, and one of the hexie flowers from My Country House:

Is it different than you thought? They are 3.5", 5/8" and 1/2" hexagon centres, respectively. I should have put a ruler in the photo too. Anyway, lots to do!

My Country House

3/4 scale -- 13.5" centre block

The new 2015 Block of the Month at The Quilt Show is Lynette Anderson's "My Country House." You can click here to see the whole quilt.

When the quilt was first revealed in late 2014 I was very tempted, but I decided that I already had enough similar projects on the go. Did I really need another? On December 31 I decided that I did. If I reduced it to 3/4 scale, it would make a nice wallhanging. BUT, I decided that I was not going to spend more than one week per month on it, so I would still have time for everything else.

That plan has failed completely, as you can see.

Regular readers know that I always like to give my projects a local flavour. A very typical 19th century brick building here in Southern Ontario is either red bricks with yellow bricks in the corners, or yellow bricks with red bricks in the corners. The library up in Uxbridge is a good example:

Most of the old farmhouses are mainly red with yellow corners, but for design purposes I thought red edges would read better. I made a template for the bricks with 1/4 inch graph paper:

I marked the bricks with erasable pencil:

My plan was to quickly work up the sides with some long legged blanket stitch to represent the bricks. But the fabrics were just too heavy to make neat blanket stitches. Plus the 1/2 inch "legs" were too long. So I have been satin stitching the bricks. For three days already.

I made a similar template with the graph paper for the white gingerbread across the eaves, but I guess I didn't take a picture. The gingerbread is stitched first with blanket stitch half pinwheels, and then I went back and put a Colonial knot at the end of each "spoke."

I know there is a loose thread there, which is driving me nuts. I will see if I can tighten it up without doing it over again.

I lost eight days to flu this month, so I have only spent about five days so far on this project. But there is a lot still to go -- windows and door, chimneys, trees, sheep, funny blue chicken, and the postage stamp border!

But -- don't laugh too hard -- I really believe I can catch up over the next few months!

(Actually, I think I can work ahead, because the piecing is all pretty straightforward. Time will tell!)

Last BFF Stitchery

Best Friends Forever, Month 8 motif

Woo hoo!! Insert happy dance here:

...if you sexy, then flaunt it!

23.5 of the Best Friends Forever stitcheries are done, but only 22 will go in the quilt. I might make a mini or two out of the leftovers, but, not any time soon!

Next up, the English paper pieced setting, then some applique for the finishing touches. Maybe another year!

New Approach

When I started blogging just over three years ago, I had a lot to say about stitching, and the creative process in general. It irritates me no end when people say that they are not creative, when really, everyone is creative. Creativity is just the courage to try new combinations of things we already know, and a whole lot of practice and persistence.

Best Friends Forever, Month 8 motif

I also believe that there is a lot of benefit in a cross-disciplinary approach, and that no matter how committed you are to one craft, you will improve your skill by trying something different.

So, covertly or overtly, that's what I've been trying to demonstrate with this blog, and it will continue to be my practice. Going forward, though, my plan is to talk about it less, and to just let the work stand on its own. I'm hoping that the reader experience will be more like the serene swan floating across the water, and less about all the frantic paddling going on underneath!

Best Friends Forever, Month 6 motif

There's no doubt that writing less will be a challenge, but I am thinking of it like a meditation practice -- if you are always thinking about how to meditate and analyzing what you're doing, then you're not doing it.

So that's the plan, and we'll see how it goes. I am still always happy to answer questions and discuss details in the comments. But for now, let's just enjoy the view!

Fresh, shiny new thread

Ink Week, Part 1

I have not been able to find any online information about how to use Tsukineko inks in a painterly way, so I thought I'd go in depth on my learning experiences with them this week. You can learn from my mistakes as well as my successes!

I'm making Leanne Beasley's stitchery quilt, Down the the Garden. A year ago I chose Tamara Kate's Flight Patterns fabric collection for this project. Inspired by the watercolour effects in the fabric, I thought it would be nice to "watercolour" the stitchery designs before I stitch them. Rather than use real watercolour paint, I chose Tsukineko inks for the job, which are water-based, but can be heat set to become permanent and washable.

I've had the ink for 10 months now, but it was never the "right time" to get started. Finally, to get over the first hurdle, I dredged up my science lab experience from a long time ago, and set it up like an experiment. I wrote down the things I wanted to learn:

• Test ink colours - Banana Cream, Cool Gray, Cerulean Blue (not the colours in the photo above, those are for later)
• Compare brushes with Tsukineko Fantastix
• Try various wet/dry wash techniques
• Test drying, heat setting

Then I made a test sheet with the same fabric, Kona PFD, and permanent lines, Pigma Micron, that I will use for the quilt:

I ironed a piece of freezer paper to the back of the fabric, to stabilize it while I worked. I picked up this tip from Linda M. Poole's book, Painted Applique, and it worked great!

Then I assembled all my equipment. Tsukineko Fantastix are blank foam pens that you can load with your ink:

I also bought a cheap set of brushes, and single-use eyedroppers to transfer the ink from the bottle to the mixing cups. I'm calling this "Ink Week," by the way, because my sewing machine is packed away until I finish this phase of the project.

Here's how my experiment progressed:

1. I started with the undiluted blue ink, and a small brush. The Kona PFD fabric really sucks up the ink, and the more you hesitate, the wider the line.
2. I wetted the corner of the fabric with water, and used the brush to paint a line of pure ink, then pull it back into the water. The wash took time to really soak back through the fabric.
3. I decided the pure pigment was too dark for the effect I wanted to achieve, so I diluted the ink, and tried to repeat #2 along the edge of the first square. The diluted ink really soaks in fast! 
4. I still felt the ink was too dark, so I diluted it more and loaded it onto one of the Tsukineko Fantastix. They are much easier to control!  I found that if I drew about 1/8" away from the line, the ink soaked up to the line but not usually past it. It is easiest to just dip the Fantastix in your ink, and hold the tip up for a few seconds to let it soak in.
5. I used the same technique as #4 to colour around the birdhouse. The colour was flatter than I would have preferred, but I was ready to move on!
6. Same as the blue, I started with the Cool Gray diluted and loaded onto a Fantastix for the flat area of colour in the first circle.
7. For the second circle I soaked a little water into the centre first, and then filled in the edges with the same Fantastix as #6, and blended it back into the centre. Success! 
8. I tried the same blended technique in the roof, with moderate success. At this point I got out the blow dryer and dried all the blue and grey bits before I started with the yellow. Waiting for the paint to dry is worst part of a watercolour technique!
9. The yellow square was done the same way as #7, with a little water in the centre, diluted ink and a fresh Fantastix. There was no problem at all with the wet yellow ink picking up any of the dry blue ink.
10. I went ahead and finished the birdhouse with the yellow.

Feeling pretty confident, and with the inks all set up, I decided to forge ahead and colour the four birdhouse blocks for the real quilt.

I started with the yellow this time, dried it, and painted the grey. The real grey roofs were narrower than my test one, so I gave up on the wash after two of them, and just filled them in with solid grey. The block above has been heat set with the iron, and I found that the yellow and grey both faded away more than I wanted.

The blue, however, was a little too dark! I wasn't totally happy with the flat blue colour around the birdhouse in the test piece, so I loaded the edges of the fabric with plain water, and tried to use the Fantastix to blend the ink back. However, I ran out of the first batch of diluted ink, and you can see I made the second batch too dark.

For the third and fourth houses, I was getting impatient, and I decided to use a wider brush to ink around the edges of the fabric:

You can really see how the ink carries out to the edges of the brushstroke! Then I used a Fantastix with the same mix to fill in the gaps along the line. I like these ones the best -- the blotches look a little like clouds to me.

All of them have some bleeding of the blue over the line. My hope is that with the stitchery added, it will not be too noticeable. I made a start with the embroidery on the worst one first, just to see if I can live with it:

 

It certainly has the "loose" feeling of some watercolours! I bought enough fabric to redo everything if the experiment failed, but at this point I want to keep moving forward. The others will be better, and once it is part of the whole quilt, I think it will just be a minor quibble.

Next up, the watering cans, and all the larger flowers around the quilt. I think it will be a couple more days!

Click here for Part 2!

Sashiko Inspiration

Best Friends Forever Month 5.4

Back in July I was just starting Month 5 of Best Friends Forever, and looking for a new way to fill in the large circle in the centre of this motif, when my blogging friend Jillian took a class on Kantha embroidery. The criss crossing running stitch of that technique reminded me of some Japanese sashiko stitch designs:

I reviewed this book back in 2012. I decided to try out one of my favourite sashiko patterns for this motif. The grid was marked with a water erasable marker:

I stitched around the circle with stem stitch first.  This gave me an anchor for the lines of sashiko:

The stitches look loose here because I tried to blot out the blue ink before I took the photo. Not very well! But they are fine after a proper rinse. The back is cute too:

You can see how I was able to weave the ends into the stem stitch border.

This was the first part of Month 5 to be stitched, and then the motif languished while I stitched all the others. I really was low on ideas on how to colour and stitch the rest of it. In the end it is a little different - the first motif that doesn't have any yellow - and I am satisfied with it.

Plus, after my six week holiday from this project, I am refreshed and full of new ideas for Month 6! Three months left. :)

Semi-new project - Down in the Garden

Darn, darn, double darn. I'm rolling along, sewing my circles for last week's new project, Jacks and Cats, when I catch a glimpse of a familiar project in the Sweet P sidebar, which takes me to Kaaren's blog, The Painted Quilt. The familiar project is Down in the Garden by Leanne Beasley, which I bought at the same time as Best Friends Forever (and Scandinavian Rose too, which is still in my stash), and which I have been working on now and then for the past nine months.

I showed it to you here, without properly introducing the project. There's been a lot of waffling since then! I said as much to Kaaren in the comments, and she encouraged me to just start anyway. I sent her a considered reply, explaining that I had just started a new quilt, and that although it was tempting, I could not possibly pick up this one too.

But here I am! With another new project to officially add to the books.

This summer I did most of the herb pots (two are left) that are scattered around the quilt, in addition to the Dresdens that I previewed back in March. I have used the same floss for all the herbs, DMC 4047 from their Color Variations line. I tried to differentiate the herbs by using different stitches -- fly stitch for the rosemary, stem stitch for the chives, round detached chain stitches for the basil, and backstitch on the sage.

I've been thinking about it constantly since I saw Kaaren's blog post.  She has started with Block Five, which has been the source of all my angst.

The designer has written a number of thoughts that are meaningful to her and framed them in the centre block. I'd like to keep this wall quilt in my studio space, so I thought the words should be meaningful to me. The core fabrics for my quilt will be Tamara Kate's Flight Patterns collection...

...which include a lot of butterflies. Four of the other blocks also have butterflies. I really want to include bees as well, because I think they will be a good industrious symbol for the studio. After many searches on keywords like "butterfly," "bee," and "garden," I've finally settled on two quotes. Andrew Marvell for the Block Five centre:

And, as it works,

the industrious bee

Computes its time

as well as we.

How could such sweet

and wholesome hours

Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!

...and this great contrasting quote by Tagore for the surrounding blocks:

The butterfly counts

not months

but moments,

and has time enough.

Sometimes decision paralysis is the biggest obstacle for me. Now that's decided, maybe things will start to move along!

And hey, since it's still Wednesday, I'll link up with WIP Wednesday at The Needle and Thread Network as well.

Wordless WIP Wednesday -- BFF 5.3

WIP Wednesday Link Up