Embroidered Frame for Mom

 Hideous pics, I know, they were taken with my phone, because silly me forgot my camera so here it is.... Christmas gift for my mamá. Pics don't do justice to the color at all, but I have to say the pleats are horrible lol, I think I'll make a pleat board next time. I just finished it before I had to travel to my hometown so it was clumsy and not perfect.
 But... my mom was happy with it, I think she didn't see it coming, my brother gave her a plant and my other brother a gift card so she was like "look what she gave me, she must have spent so much time in it, it's so thoughtful and it's so me" and of course my brothers were killing me with their eyes but truth is... men don't know much about gifts so they shouldn't feel so touchy, right?

Embroidery Books... and moving ugh

It's been a crazy month, with exams and what it looked like an eternal search for a new apartment.  Luckily I've found it so now to the next crazy step which is, pack and move, I don't even know where to start, I only know it'll be a mess for a few days.

In other news, I'm excited because I've received a book (ok not an embroidery one) I ordered on Etsy back in October, The Flight of the Dragons by Peter Dickinson, I have a thing for dragons so when I found this vintage book for $10, I didn't think much, although I had to pay more than twice the price in shipping but I think it was worth it.

Another book that recently arrived after a super loooong wait (I've ordered it on sept 29th and it was supposed to arrive on Nov 10th, it finally did on December 1st. Amazon refund me the shipping money so I gotta say 5 stars for their customer service!) is Needle Painting Embroidery: Fresh ideas for beginners by Trish Burr  I found out about the book in a review at Needle n' Thread's blog, that blue and brown bird was love at first sight, so I knew I had to get the book, that project is for advanced embroiderers  but a girl can dream. I'm not really into flowers in general but I know my mom would love each project in this book, so I'm sort of buying this book to make things only for her.

I don't think I'm ready to make a book review because I've not tried any project in the book yet, but I think this is definitely a good book for beginners, she explains everything in detail and with pics.
A nice detail I saw is... Trish uses metric system and imperial between brackets, I love that! it's a tiny detail but it's a detail that matters to me, I've seen other embroidery books at Amazon and it's all about inches and 1/4, and 1/8 inch and cm and mm are nowhere, as an English student I'm supposed to know or study the imperial system as well but I think authors should use both like Trish.

A few days ago, I found out Trish Burr released a new book, Colour Confindence in Embroidery*. It looks very very interesting, but I think it will have to wait till next year because I've gone crazy with Spoonflower's sales last month :p, I think I've bought enough for what I'd not bought in the previous months.

Another book review I found out about is the one for Embroider Everything Workshop at Wild Olive, it looked very interesting as well, so I went to Amazon to check if they had the Look inside feature, they did so I had a look, what I like about the book is that it has history facts and curious tips, also there is a wide explanation about the materials, like needles, threads, fabrics and it comes with iron on transfers, on the other side, the author uses imperial system (but I'm just being picky there) and also, the projects I was able to see are not thaaat stunning, but I'm more into realistic embroidery, so I guess it's fine and I might take that back when the book is in my hands, so it goes to my wish list for next year!

*Colour with U, color, elevator, among others, yeah, I'm weird, I write in American English and yet I don't use the Imperial system.

A sweet book to "cover" in stitches

I got myself into a new "stitch along" project again (like if I don't have enough "half wips" already!), this time, a very very interesting and challenging one, The Covered in Stitches Contest. I'll try to get to the deadline, but it'll be hard with all the term tests coming but, again, I don't mind not winning, since I never do and I'm relatively still a noob at embroidery, I like challenges though, best part of it is learning and discovering new things. I've not even started and discovered a bunch already.

Like the book I "chose" or more like, it "chose" me. It's called "El prisma del Lenguaje", Through the Language glass by Guy Deustcher, it's a very interesting book, I'm a language junkie, so I instantly felt like this is my book. I'm very excited about it, it's very well written and it catches my attention (and I have short attention span!) and sometimes the author pulls out a linguistic joke so it's very entertained to read. 

I always look for pictures in books, (like a kid!), this book doesn't have many but it has some graphics about colors which was also a plus, I'm not too deep in the book yet but it seems the essence of the book is how people from other countries define or have different terms for colors, which is very very interesting, I can't wait to get there.

I'm buying the English version soon and nah, I'm not crazy to buy the "same" book twice, as a wannabe translator I'm aware of the fact that, specially in literature or language books, the original meaning and the creativity behind the words can become lost in translation so I'm really looking forward to do so, buy the original.

Oh... so back to the point (see, I have short attention span) I chose this book for the Feeling Stitchy contest I was talking about up there and at the moment I'm starting with the "foundations", I'm testing some colors and they are drying, so since I don't have pics, here is a kitty.

                                                                        Source: animalblog.me via Melina on Pinterest

Embroidery in progress and lots of words

 This is the design I chose (I actually changed a few things of the original) to embroider for the embroidered frame for my mom, inspired by the beautiful work of my grandma Luisa.

 At first I was going to embroider a rose with satin stitch or a filling stitch, but then my dad bought me a new crochet magazine which is part of a weekly collection and in the last page I saw a pretty embroidery project and I instantly thought it was my inspiration for this.

 It's funny how things happen, I remember being worried about finding the right frame, I went store after store and nothing, and then one day as I was walking with my dad in BA, we came across a store with lots and lots of frames, they were wide and plain, perfect, like I had pictured in my head.
 And before that, when the project was still a vague idea, I was at a craft store waiting to check out, when I saw DMC 967 "calling my name",  it's a tricky color and they didn't have darker tones to go with but I just knew it was the one so I bought it and then after a lot of walking I found the other two tones, 3824 and 3341.

  About my stitches, well, I'm definitively getting better at french knots, I said I hated them but now I really like them, it's just matter to choose the right needle, the right number of threads and how you hold the hoop. My bullion are kind of ugly, I still can't get them perfect but, it's matter of practice and keep on trying.

 I like leaving the "ugly" stitches on purpose, I like getting a perspective of my evolution in this... in everything actually, my first posts here are a mess, ugly pics, and confusing words, I'll probably think the same of this post in the future but I think it's important to look back and find that you are getting better everyday.

Back to the coincidence of my findings I know it's a lot to write over embroidery floss and a wooden frame but, I feel the concept applies to every aspect of our lives. All this just makes me think: If it is meant to happen, it will happen.
Life is kind of a puzzle, you find a little piece to fill it everyday, you just have to open your eyes and follow your heart.

More words (really? aren't you tired, I write a lot :S) and creative images that need no words at ourcreativespaces

Stitch Along

 This is one of the stitch along projects I mentioned before and forgot to blog. Welovefrenchknots Sewing Room Sampler, there were prizes for those who completed at least 2 squares until August 25th.
  So I joined but not because of the prizes (I never win anything :/ ) but because this was just what I was looking for after blogging about my grandma Luisa's antique embroidery. I thought it was a great opportunity to get back to embroidery, so I did and I didn't win a thing but I don't mind, I wasn't expecting to anyways :)

I plan on making a cardboard box to store my hoops and wips so this will make a great lid.
This is not an updated pic, actually I started to embroider the bullion roses, also to practice for the embroidered frame I'm making for my mom. And to test the colors, I finally found the DMC colors I was looking for so, everything seems to be as planned.

First stitches after 15 years...

 I couldn't get out my head the beautiful work of my grandma Luisa, so I've decided to return to embroidery after 15 years* (I was 8 when I was taught how to, actually this is the same hoop I used back then)

At first my idea was to make an embroidered frame (to put Luisa's picture in it) with some pleats and peach roses (my mom's favorite), sadly I couldn't find the right dark colors to go with DMC 967, I didn't know it was such a tricky color, Anchor's are too dark but I think I'll figure something out.

 For this rose I watched Wendi's long & short video tutorial (among many many others, it's awesome how she explains everything) and also I had the help of Sarah's stem tutorial, she also has a great site, I didn't even know there were so many different stitches for a stitch family.
 The rose embroidery is based on a drawing I made years ago, I think I was 13, (hey it's here) I tried to make some shadows and light with different colors, I'm not quite happy with the whole rose but I do like the first petal I made, it's the bottom left one, I really like how the colors worked there and all the stitches are very close to each other. I also played a little with stem stich, half of the rose was made using stem stitch as an outline after filling and the other half, the other way around.

I already joined two stitch along projects so I'll see what happens.
First one is Feeling Stitchy's August Stitch-Along. I don't think I'll get this done on time but I think it's a great idea, I chose a sleeping mask I've made back in February and never blogged about, (woops) it has only 3 colors, white, dark teal and turquoise.
Second one is welovefrenchknots Sewing Room Sampler, actually I'm somehow 30% done, it's a very amusing project, I've learned a lot so far... but I gotta say, I hate french knots :p ... I think it's all matter of practice though.



*15 years... sounds like a lot to me but I'll be 23 in exactly 2 weeks, I'm still young but time is ticking for all the stuff I want to get done before 25: au pair experience, trips, my translator degree *sigh

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 4

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 3

  And this is the last (but not least) part of this series I've shared in honor of my grandmother Luisa. She also made and embroidered huge blankets, of course using wool instead of embroidery floss, someday I'll take pics of them.

This is my second favorite of all, this rose was made with satin stitch and no idea how the grid is made, bt I'd love to learn how to, love the look of this.

This chalice (is it?) was made with cross stitch, an easy one to guess :)

I'm not sure about this fleur de lys, seems to be herringbone stitch.

And the center of this flower is obviously made with satin stitch, not sure about the rest though.

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 3

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 2

Another sample of my grandma's, this looks so modern, specially the butterfly and the purple work at the end, let's see what I identify.

This one was easy, different types of smock stitch.

Curved pleats, leaf made with stem stitch, pretty butterfly made with french knots, satin stitch and stem stitch, I'm not sure about the brown stitch though. Edit Aug/12 I think the brown stitches are blanket stitches very close to each other.

Those two blue lines are made with chain stitch and I have no idea about the yellow and light blue ones.

No idea about these ones... I think my mom told me the last ones were called "fly stitch" but I looked it up and it's not the one, they look like bunnies to me :p

And this is one of my favorites, it looks like a satin cord, I saw something like this at Shiny Happy World with the name of Couching

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 4

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 2

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 1

Yesterday I started talking about my grandma's Luisa embroidery swatches, this is a second part since they have so much detail and I'm still trying to figure out some stitches.

Different types of buttonholes, different ways to sew buttons, then flowers and stems made with satin stitch, the other stem is made with stem stitch and that's how far I got to guess this part, I'd love to know how that grid is made, though. I will have to google this up.

More pretty buttonholes, mending sample. Edit Aug/12 I think the buttonholes are made using blanket stitch so as the pink petals below.

More of what appears to be french knots but I'm not sure, they are not that bumpy.

The yellow line is chain stitch and that's all I know :p

That orange line in the back appears to be satin stitch and then pleats and lace.

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 3

Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 1

 When I went back home a few weeks ago, I brought with me these embroidery swatches my grandmother Luisa made in the 30's (or that is what my mom told me, my grandma was born in 1913, she was still in school, so it makes sense) I'm amazed the colors are still bright and there isn't a single loose strand on the back... that's what I call a neat work! They swatches are wrinkled and with some yellow stains but I'd be scared to wash them or iron them even with a damp cloth. Actually I don't want to touch them so much, my idea is to put them on a frame but even so I'd not want the sun to ruin their color so I still don't know what I'm going to do with them. And I just saw at my dashboard that this is my post nº 100, I don't think there will be a nicer way to "celebrate" than sharing my grandmother's craft.

 I don't remember much of my grandma Luisa, only that she loved rocking me to sleep (I even have a picture of this), I'd really like to have her with me, I share so many things with her and my other grandma. Luisa was more of embroidering and sewing and my other grandma, María, liked painting, cooking and baking, and both shared the love for knitting and crochet, pretty much like me. I think in those years it was a must for women to have those skills but I think they would have done the same if it was today, they were skilled women with passion and perfection for crafts.

 I always wanted to keep these swatches, good thing my mom didn't let me play with them when I was a kid and liked (I still do?) to play with her sewing supplies and my grandma's clothing and suitcases.

 These are practice swatches, they are so neat that I can't even imagine what was the real work like! I wish they would still teach this in school (actually I was taught how to embroider back in 3rd grade but it wasn't for real, just plain chain stitch on a printed piece of fabric and I wasn't good at it :p)

 I never get tired of staring at my grandma's work, everytime I find a new stitch.
A few days ago I started to embroider -"again" for real- to make a project for my mom, I'm still practising and who knows... someday my own grandchildren will stare at my own swatches, I hope the craft lineage will still run in their blood.

Anyways, here are some closer pictures of the swatches I brought.

So far I could identified: pleats, zig zag and satin stitch and the others I'm still not sure about

I think the geometric figures are made with french knots


Abuela Luisa: Embroidery from 1930 pt 2