December samples

It's December! The last four weeks of this year's project. So I decided to make them all a bit... seasonal. A bit of a challenge for  me, as I'm not mad about Christmas; I'm not about to do Santas and snowmen etc. For a bit of extra "spice", or incentive, each one had to use dissolvable fabric.

 

Each sample is free of background fabric, but shown against plain fabric or card for the photos.

 

2018/Week 49, Snowflake

This is a good start, everyone likes a snowflake and they're wintry, not Christmassy, right?!

 

I drew a design onto Solufleece with a vanishing marker and free machine embroidered it in mostly straight stitch plus a little narrow zigzag. I dissolved and pinned it out very carefully, and it seemed good... until I realised the pure white was marred by turquoise "vanishing" ink! So disappointing. I had to wet and rub it thoroughly, then pin it out all over again. Worth persisting though.

I can never resist the temptation to play with shadows...

It measures about 12cm point to point.

2018/50, Poinsettia

It's hard to remember that these spectacular (garish?!) plants are showing off brightly coloured leaves, not flowers. I wanted to create a simple, stylised version and stick to my rule of using soluble fabric. I didn't fancy just plain red, solid stitching... the solution was to use a sandwich of assorted thread scraps on AquaBond (sticky soluble) as the base.

I free machined the leaf outlines and veins, then cut them out before dissolving. They were assembled on a small disc of felt with hand stitch and finished off with a few chunky French knots in the centre.

Quite pleased, but it's a bit flat - perhaps I should've wired the edges. It measures 10cm across.     

2018/51,  Christmas Tree
OK, there's no avoiding Christmas this week! A decorated tree on soluble fabric seemed an interesting exercise.

I thought I'd try two or three layers of branches - wired this time!

A few fancy little Indian sequins were stitched in as I went along. And in the free space I had a few goes at little red buckets and stars for the top.

After dissolving I decide two layers worked best, and hand stitched them together. My favourite bucket and star were added too.

This is about 10cm tall. And looks a lot nicer in real life than my murky day photo!

2018/52, Christmas Detritus
The main event's over, all that's left is the mess! All that pretty wrapping paper, ribbons, cracker hats etc, crumpled up and forgotten... what can I do with it? 

I arranged satsuma netting, scraps of gift wrap, foil from chocolate coins, cracker hats and snaps, ribbon etc. on AquaBond and covered with thin clear dissolvable film. NO glitter mind, even my put-upon Bernina might object to that! Wide zigzag freely worked all over in red and green held it together.

From this I cut out rounded shapes, and stuck them onto more soluble film. I free machined spirals to fill the shapes, and linked them all.

There we are. About 10-11cm across. I could perhaps say it's all about waste spiralling out of control? But really it's just an abstract doodle.       

November samples

2018/Week 44, Hairy Loch
The reeds in this loch above Leverburgh on Harris have always appealed to me. Out of context they look like fine scratch marks on metal.

Thinking machine stitch would be too clumsy, I hand stitched a little section on silvery satin fabric. Not quite the effect I'd have liked but as much as I had patience for!

18/45 White Line
Once you start looking, there's inspiration everywhere... this was a badly eroded white line at the side of the road.

I free machined a section on Lutradur 70 over black cotton fabric, using a fine white cotton thread (Madeira Tanne 50). Then I zapped it with a heat gun. The unstitched areas vanish altogether.

18/46 Map Lichen
The last of my Harris inspirations, though this lichen grows locally on Skye too. Rhizocarpon geographicum is called map lichen because it looks like a map in an atlas, or an aerial view of a patchwork of fields.

I free machined my piece on Solufleece, filling the areas with different colours and patterns without worrying about realism. Some are dense and solid, others open and lacy. The challenge as always is linking everything together so it remains whole when the Solufleece is dissolved away! Only stitched thread is left, no fabric at all in this piece.

18/47 Full Moon
Binoculars gave a wonderful view of the scars and craters on a spectacular full moon this week.
I embroidered a circle completely filled with little star patterns to resemble craters.

The thread was shaded pale grey, though that doesn't really show up in the photo. I was disappointed that the white guideline made with a fine SewLine pencil wouldn't quite go away... lesson learned.  

18/48 Crocheted Blanket
Just had to commemorate this... I finally finished the blanket I've been crocheting on and off for 18 months or so! I never meant to make a blanket, didn't need one, I just started playing with yarn left over from a couple of cushion covers. Then I liked the hexagons so much I just kept going, and, well, we haven't got a single bed in the house so it had to fit a double to be any use at all...

So here it is - 425 hexagons, each in six colours so that was 5100 yarn ends to darn in, groan. Pretty, though.

And here's my stitched sample based on the hexagonal motif.

Free machine embroidery on Solufleece, of course. I domed the "popcorn" stitches by stitching round and round. 

Look, no fabric!

 

Now, what to do with all those yarn ends? Of course I saved them, wouldn't you?!