Hoarder's Charter?

"Keep a thing for seven years, and you'll find a use for it".  Or so my granny used to say.  Repeatedly.  I'm not convinced.  Particularly given the amount of stuff we managed to get rid of before we moved, none of which we've missed.  I was reminded of her saying while working on Borderlines yesterday... here's how far I've got...

I've picked a couple of colours to stitch in the remaining areas.  One of the things I wanted to do, though, was to deal with the puffiness in that circular area.  You expect a bit of relief to appear when quilting, but there are several sections where there's more relief than I'd like, and it's a distraction.  I don't want more coloured stitch in those areas, so white seemed the only option, to pull the area down, but not make the area appear more densely stitched. 

When I went to find the thread to do that, I found this...

It's white perle thread, which I was given as part of a lace making kit, many, many years ago.  The .  rest of the kit is long gone; pillow lace is a beautiful thing, but the making of it is Not My Thing...too fiddly  I kept the thread, though, intending to dye it.  Fortunately, I didn't get round to it (as is the way with so many things).  It must be at least 25 years old, looks fine, feels fine, so I'm using it. 

And here's the result.  I'm not stitching every single white area; just those that are overly puffy.  So far, it's working just as I hoped.  Phew.

I'm not changing my mind about keeping things, though; if I don't have a use for it now, or in the next few months, out it goes.  That thread was definitely the exception that proves the rule. 

Prep And Play

It's not all stitch, you know... sometimes you have to do a bit of prep work.  Yesterday, I sat with one of the pieces I'm working with and selected the threads to use with it.  And then I wound the skeins into balls.  I never used to bother, but they get horrendously tangled, which is wasteful.  My grandmother was a knitter; I can remember sitting, arms outstretched, with a hank of wool wrapped around them, as she wound balls from it.  It's not so simple when it's small skeins of thread, and no human available to hold them.  The first two went fine, though... the third, not so good.

From this, to this.  It tangled from the very beginning, and got progressively worse.  Sigh.  My own incompetence, I'm sure.  I did consider ditching it, at one point, but remembered I might need more than the one skein, so persevered; it's ready to stitch with now, as are they all. 

I thought, after that, I deserved to play a bit.  In the UFOs there was something I'd prepared when I was still teaching, as a possible sample for a possible course on abstract work.  Three ovals, cut from Evolon, and then cut into randomly, like this. 

They're placed on grey hand dye, one of the few bits remaining to me (yes, I know, I've got a shelf full of fabric for dyeing' anyone want to come and play with me?).  Looking at this image, it strikes me that this would be a good way of making semi abstract flowers... but that wasn't my intention here.  I wanted to rearrange the cut pieces to make an interesting pattern.  The evolon has fusible on the back; it's a cross between Matisse papercuts and tweets quilts, now that I think about it.  There really is no idea that's completely new.

Looking at these, I decided the individual elements were too thick, and so cut into them again. 

That's better.  This, is better still...

I may fiddle with it a bit more, add some space between the individual elements, perhaps adjust one of them that's pulling my eye as an exception to the way the others have been cut (see if you notice it, a kind of textile Where's Wally?).  Or maybe I'll leave it as it is.  I like it. 

Progress

At last, a clear wall, ready for bookcases...and the first one in situ.  I managed to drag this one out of the garage by myself, albeit I did need a long sit down afterwards...  I couldn't find the loose shelves, either.  That proved to be a bonus; it allowed me to pile up the transparent shoe boxes, using the space effectively.  I suspect I might not have thought to remove the shelves, had they been there with the carcass.  Yes, that's all thread.  Yes, there's a lot of it.  In front, is the boxes I have already filled, ready for the next bookcase.  That may take some time to achieve, but at least I've managed to get this far.

I decided to empty a large wooden chest that was upstairs, which was full of sewing 'stuff'.  In the Norfolk house, it lived downstairs in the conservatory, and I thought it was full of projects that I'd bagged up ready to go.  Apparently not, though I did find a couple of those.  Mostly, though, there were pieces of lutradur and evolon in various sizes and shapes, some more vintage lace, mostly still attached to tray cloths and the like, and some bits of scrap canvas from Bertha.   I'll tell you more about what I found, later on in the week, but my favourite find today has to be this;

At first glance, I thought it was a tulip, but actually, I think it's a partial magnolia blossom, manipulated a little in Paintshop Pro.  I'm still not convinced that spring is here, despite the clocks leaping forward at the weekend, but this did lift my spirits quite considerably.  It's printed on canvas from the Bertha era, but will have to wait for stitch until the studio table is clear enough for me to set up a sewing machine.  More about my finds as the week progresses.

Sample Stitching

I've been a bit of a tart when it comes to thread, mixing and matching to suit myself.  A bit like a child in a sweetshop, I've bought a bit of this lovely lemon, a bit of that tantalising turquoise... ignoring the brand, except where I've had problems; one problem means no more thread from that manufacturer.  It isn't very forgiving, perhaps, but I don't want the hassle of complaining, too much time and effort.  I'd rather buy from manufacturers who won't give me problems.  But there's been so much fanfare about Aurifil over the last wee while, that I thought I ought to try it when I saw it for sale on Sunday at Chilford.  There wasn't a huge selection, as we were at show end, rather than show beginning, so none of my beloved variegated threads, but I did buy three spools...the three spools in the picture above, to be precise...  I couldn't resist the purple, and the other two seemed interesting, so that was that.  It was only when I got them home that I realised they don't really go with anything I'm working on at the moment...right colours, wrong shades.  An object lesson in thread buying, really. 

So I looked out a piece of very vintage linen which I had dyed, and started trying out the threads on that.  I had bought the heaviest of the threads available; I'm not a traditional quilter by any means (actually, I'm not a quilter at all, except in that I have a tendency to work in layers...more of that in another post, maybe).  I draw with my threads, and I like them to contrast well with what's on the cloth, and to be distinctive.  The thicker the better, really.  And here's what I made of them. 

Really, all I wanted to do was a bit of mark making, but as I made some circles to start with, echoing the circles on the cloth, I found myself looking at a cairn.  I was really impressed by the thread; no problems whatsoever with machine embroidery, even where things started getting denser.  In fact, there are four layers of stitch on the cairn area, as I tried to make up for only having three colours.  I wanted a shadow effect, but the purple by itself was too strong, so layers of the other colours were added to break it up.  It's not the best piece I've ever made in my life (it'll probably end up in the bin...), but it really did serve its purpose.  Now, of course, all that remains is to get more Aurifil...  watch this space.  I think it'll be ideal for the stitched photographs, just the right weight.

Economics...

...dictate that you use up every little scrap of material. And if you don't, you tend to hand it on to someone who will, I know I do. It's not so easy with thread. I've been quilting this morning, and decided that this piece, Cave Paintings, needed a hint of burgundy. Problem was, the only burgundy thread I had was a wee bit on a reel. So there I am, nursing it along, focussing on making it go as far as possible...when the bobbin thread ran out! There's nothing more frustrating than having hardly any thread, stitching carefully and realising that actually, you're only making holes in the lutradur! Still, as you can see from the finished piece, I did indeed have enough thread to complete the piece. It is hand dyed lutradur on top of discharge dyed cloth, which makes an interesting piece, I think (I hope...).

Now all I have to do is find somewhere with burgundy thread... I only have about six inches left, and that's not going to do anything, is it...sigh. Even better if it's variegated...I love variegated threads, and use them extensively. Yes, there is some in this piece, too!