I have finally finished a piece of hand stitch that I have been working on throughout the summer. I got the idea to do this from a piece in Workshop on the Web by Jennifer McFarlane. It is stitched onto a single layer of muslin in a hoop, which allows the threads to make a hole in the middle of flower. As you can see I have used every type of neutral thread I possess and it was interesting to see the effect each type gave. Some were not that nice so after using up the thread in the needle it didn't get used again. Some others were very pleasing and so I used them a lot.
I started by just stitching whorls of flowers, usually with eyelet stitch, and added buttonhole wheels, woven and ribbed webs, lazy daisies, diagonal satin filling, bullion knots and pistil stitches. I also sewed french knots in between. I made some free-machined flowers and webs on water soluble fleece to add a different texture in places and stitched them on too.
I didn't set out to cover the whole area of the hoop but it felt right to carry on until I had!
When I had finished stitching there were still quite a lot of gaps so I raided the bead box and sewed a load of beads on too. I particularly like the seed pearls standing up on end in the middle, secured with a tiny pink rocaille - they look like insect eggs in the middle of it all. I'm not sure what I am going to do with it now it's done!
Otherwise, this week I have been doing practical sewing - making a roman blind for our bedroom. I have been meaning to do this for a year now but college work was always more interesting!
