I Cut My Embroidery In Half! On purpose!

I started working on this embroidery (fabric from the Moda Minick & Simpson Snowfall collection) in November, and I finished it awhile ago. I had no real idea where it was going, but this morning, I figured out what to do with the small, highly detailed piece.

 Yes, cutting it apart was every bit as scary as steeking!

Little blank journals  (approx. 4" x 6") from Oriental Trading Company.

1 Year of Stitches Project 2 Finished but not Assembled

I haven't put it together yet, but the white-on-white stocking embroidery is done. This piece will be auctioned later, and all money donated to the ACLU.

1-11 1 Year of Stitches

I missed a day posting somewhere along the line, but I've been stitching every day.

Tertiary Color snowflakes finished

Blue Green detail

I won't get to them for awhile, but the stamped hearts are in place. I'll probably fill in a lot of the area up to them first.

1 Year of Stitches 1-9

Blue Purple detail

1-7 1 Year of Stitches

I fixed the placement of the too-close snowflake.

1-6 1 Year of Stitches

Tertiary color snowflakes...

Year of Stitches 1-5

Posting a day behind, but stitching right on time.

1 Year of Stitches 1-3

Even though this area is only about 3" across, it's already too big for me to work every color every day. Right now, I can do two colors, but I suspect it'll be down to one (and not always finishing a single motif  or section every day).

Stopping before I am ready is totally out of my comfort zone, but it's giving me time to plan ahead (never my strong suit). This is going to be quite an adventure.

1 Year of Stitches 1-2

1 Year of Stitches 1-1

I don't suppose I'll stitch on this every single day, and I am pretty sure I will not post every single day, but I will post as often as I can (and sometimes, it'll be every day). I have been very excited to begin this project, and it was fairly difficult to wait until today to begin.

And I'm glad I did, because I found this button in a jar of vintage bone buttons this morning.

Skeptical Vintage Button is Skeptical.

It gave me the perfect center for the start of this year-long project.

The nice thing about only doing a little bit every day, is that it gives me time to think about where I want the design to go next.

See ya tomorrow! (probably)

1 Year of Stitches

The blog Brown Paper Bag is sponsoring a year-long embroidery project called 1 Year of Stitches. The goal is to fill a hoop entirely with stitching (any color, any design, any theme) by working on it a little bit every single day for an entire year. You can read the details here.

I decided to play too, and I'm ready to start on January 1.This is a 12" hoop, and the fabric is plain bleached muslin cotton. I will use regular embroidery floss, though I might add beads here and there. I have no idea what I'll do with the piece when it's done, but in this case the *doing* is the point.

Though I will free-form-make-it-up-as-I-go, I also choose a loose design scheme: a ROYGBIV color wheel, which each wedge predominantly shades of that color, hopefully fading and transforming into the next color. I drew the lines to give me a notion of the wedge size, and I wrote the color names on the fabric just to remind myself what goes where. All of the ink will be covered by stitching.

You can use any size hoop, any background fabric, any floss, any color, any theme, any stitches.

I think it's going to be great fun, and I will, of course, update pics. I don't anticipate working on it every single day, since I'm kind of a *burst* crafter. But however it happens, it'll be an adventure.

I don't do Twitter, but I'll post on Instagram and Facebook. They ask for posts to be tagged thusly:  #1yearofstitches; @1yearofstitches; #bpbstitches so everyone can watch everyone's progress!

I hope you will play along too!

Folk Art Santas Fat Quarter 2 Done!

Woot!

All of my Spoonflower fabric designs are available here!

(btw- the fabric is white, the cream color is just a camera trick)

Folk Art Santa Fat Quarter #2!

I've been busy with other stuff during the day, but in the evenings, I'm still embroidering. My Folk Art Santa Fat Quarter #2 arrived from Spoonflower (it's available for ordering now, also as wrapping paper). Again, I suggest the Basic Cotton for embroidery, and Kona Cotton or Canvas for painting or coloring.

I am really happy with how this one came out, and as always, I'm delighted with Spoonflower's service and quality.

I decided to go mostly monochrome reds with this entire fat quarter. It would have been ALL red, but the thread showed through from snowflake to snowflake, and as much as I love embroidery, I'm not tying the thread off for every snowflake...

I also decided to leave the faces white, with just a crayon circle for the pink cheeks.

I still have the two Santa motifs to embroider. I might do some table runners with this one.