A Postcard from Tuscany

Many years ago, I came across Sue Newhouse's Creative Hand Embroidery.

I liked her techniques and ideas, and completed this daisy field based on the project in her book:

I then looked around for an idea to use the techniques in a work of my own design. When a friend showed me a photo she had taken while holidaying in Tuscany, I knew I'd found a good subject for my work. However, while I knew what I wanted to do in the foreground, it took me ages to figure out how to do the background and the stone building. I eventually solved those issues (I drew the background trees and stone building with water colour pencils, rows of running stitches give the stone effect for the building and a few small straight stitches for the door and windows) but had just started stitching the grass when I started having problems with my hands. So once again it got put on hold.

It finally resurfaced last year and I've now completed it - after 3 attempts at the olive tree. Unfortunately, I've mislaid the original photo but here is my completed piece:

And here it is framed:

I enjoyed handing it over to my friend recently. She didn't know I'd been working on it, so I think it was a bit of a surprise.

Recycled

I recently took part in another fabric postcard swap with the theme 'Recycled' and received this lovely postcard.

My effort was somewhat simpler - although hand-stitching into denim isn't easy, I managed to do it in an afternoon.

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I really like the way denim ages and for me it's an obvious choice for recycling but I was very amused recently when I picked up a pair of new jeans, which my nephew had left here to be hemmed. I said that I must do something with them and 4-year-old Emma beamed up at me, "Make a postcard?" I usually let people wear their jeans a few times before I start trying to turn them into something else. After all, they need to be worn and washed repeatedly to get that wonderful unevenly faded effect. :)

Poppy bag

A few years ago, I started making this bag for a friend but decided to make a journal cover for her instead. I came across the machine-embroidered front a few days ago and decided to finish making it up.

I attached the red poppy with fusible webbing and then machine stitched over it, using a free motion zigzig for the centre. I drew the other poppies with a marking pen before stitching them.

Mothers' Day Gift

Emma helped me dye this fabric, which I made up into a coin purse with a flex frame for her to give to her mother. It is lined with purple fabric (pink and purple are Emma's favourite colours, although her mother might have preferred blue) and filled with chocolates.

The perplexity of interfacing

I tend to use this blog as a way of recording things I have completed, whether they be sewn, knitted, embroidered or any other technique. However, things don't always go to plan. Sometimes I'm busy and don't get much time to do anything creative. And sometimes I spend a lot of time and energy working on things that don't work out how I wanted them to.

This week, I've been looking at the best support structure for bags. I've tried out some of the products I had in my stash, browsed the bewildering array of information available online (and found very good advice at nicolemdesign.com.au and u-handbag.com), acquired additional interfacings and tried them out.

But I haven't finished anything, although this bag is almost finished. I miscalculated when I cut it out and it's quite small, plus I made the buttonhole loop too small. I was going to discard it but a friend wanted it - she wanted to take it as it was but I persuaded her to leave it for me sew up the gap in the lining. And I replaced the buttonhole loop. Now I just need to attach a button. It's big enough for a mobile phone and a small purse but not much else.

Pa Ywel's quilt

When my friend Pa Ywel said that she wanted to make a quilt, I invited her to choose some fabrics from my stash. I had bought these purple/red/orange fabrics to make a quilt but then got cold feet about how to put them together. As you can see, Pa Ywel did a great job with her first quilt. And I managed to reduce my stash a little without actually doing any work. :)

Silk purses

I found a small piece of blue-green handpainted silk, left over from an earlier project, which I used for an experiment in free-motion pintucking, making it even smaller. However, despite the small size of the final piece of fabric, I managed to make a croissant bag:

And two coin purses, with beaded zipper pulls (they look rather large compared with the croissant bag but they are about 12 cm across):

And a card:

I even have some other small pieces left over that might turn into something else eventually.