My tailor tacking foot.

 

My tailor tacking foot. 

More paper stitching, more white.

 

Sewing machine

 

The past couple of days have been spent on my sewing machine creating surfaces, paper and cloth as a base for hand embroidery.

The paper ones are much needed at the moment as I'm currently working on a few more of these.

Hand embroidery on these pieces is the next stage.

There will be lots of bullion and French knots along with buttonhole stitch edges and vintage fabric snippets. 

 

five out of twenty

I'm spending a lot of time doing this at the moment. I need twenty pieces of lace cloth for my workshops in France. There are five here but since I took these pictures the number is up to seven. It's doable, fourteen days before I leave. No problem, a couple of night shifts and we're good to go.

I have to go out today......but when I get back I will work on these little books some more, five pages? Five pages to match the five pieces of lace on here....

Read about my new class here....stitch and books and all things embroidery. - See more at: http://karenannruane.typepad.com/karen_ruane/#sthash.ttOCbdmK.dpuf

Saturday and Sunday

This weekend has mostly been about the sewing machine...and cloth of course. I've made lace cloth and pin pillow cloth. The pin pillow cloth needs more work, it's in its very early stages here, that's my plan for later......more time spent with the sewing machine finishing the pin pillow cloth.

Oh yes, almost forgot.....I made more puffs for this....

- See more at: http://karenannruane.typepad.com/karen_ruane/#sthash.4TvminGT.dpuf

my sewing machine...

I have a very strange relationship with my sewing machine. I don't like it much really truth be told. There's nothing wrong with it, it's a posh sewing machine, a Bernina, It's not the fault of the sewing machine that it's my least favourite tool, my last method of choice. Thing is though, If I can bring myself to use it it's fantastic for creating surfaces that are unusual and unique and it's also the quickest way I know of creating delicate, lacy scraps of cloth too.

I have been virtually abandoned this weekend, the house to myself. At times like this I make big plans that very rarely come off. I plan lots of hand stitch with hours alone and nobody to cook for. They never turn out that way though. Something in my head clicks and it says, ''you can make a mess''. So that's what happened last night, papers spread everywhere, some old ones out of files and some new ones created using the sewing machine. Why?? Don't know really, just because I could. Then the composition department of my brain kicked in and at midnight there I was putting a couple of pages together. These have no real purpose. I don't think any stitched pieces will come from them but I had fun so who cares....

I won't put these away today, I will ponder on them for a while.....my hook and eye pieces will be finished soon, I need a focus after that and at the moment I have no idea what that will be. Maybe looking at these little pieces will spark something. Do you ever get those moments when your brain just won't work?? I hope so or I need to see a doctor!!

and now for the winners of the big tat give away....you will have to trust me that I really did do this fairly. I normally ask my son to pick a number but he's not here so I did the random number thingy online. I'm not one for putting screen shots on here so you will have to trust that there's no cheating going on...the winner of the mini design sheet or shopping list fodder is Marlene from stitching by the lake.

The pinkish pin pillow now belongs to Sharyn Mallow Woerz and the white one to Betsy, (Elizabeth Dockhorn) get in touch with your postal details and I will get them all out of the rubbish bin and send them off to you!!