February 2015

Welcome to another year of show & tell by Stitcher's Plus. We are a creative group of the Embroiderer's Guild NSW and play with all kinds of art. This year is the year of the personal challenge. 

Congratulations go out to our member Susan, who applied for, and received, the position of Guild Secretary at our headquarters in Concord West. 

Last Saturday was our first official meeting for the year, with seven of us in attendance. Show and tell is a major part of our day, and as our last official meeting was way back in November,  there was some great show and tell to be feasted on.

Robyn had finished stitching her lady, who will eventually adorn the lid of a work box.

Robyn had also finished her needle case featuring Afghanistan reversible stitch.

Donna had been playing with running stitch, exploring what could be done with it. The little bird at the top of this set was inspired by a Mexican ceramic tile, while the remainder were inspired from doodles. Exploring running stitch is Donna's personal challenge for 2015.

Jenny's personal challenge for 2015 is to explore the technique of filet lace. In this sample, Jenny has made her own mesh by withdrawing threads from fabric, bound them into a mesh formation, then worked a dragonfly in linen stitch. The dragonfly was first drawn, then charted into a graph which was then used to chart the linen stitch working order. The working order of the linen stitch has to be precise for the under/over sequence of the linen stitch to happen.

Jenny had also been adding to her sampler with a band of Wessex stitching. The sampler began eight years ago, and Jenny has decided that 2015 is the year to finish it. The whole back story can be found here, and by following the links within the post on Jenny's personal blog.

 This table mat is being worked by Jenny  from a Christine Bishop workshop that she had attended back in September 2014. The piece is inspired by Dresden Embroidery, and features both pulled work and surface stitching.

Annette had been busy making her daughter's wedding dress. The hand beading on the sleeve and bodice echoed the pattern in the lace.

Sheila had made a new plaque for a young relative, using constructions by Jenny Cochran Lee in the September/October 2014 issue of Cloth Paper Scissors

Sheila's personal commitment for the year is to draw every day. At the moment she is drawing in a day book/calender.

This is Susan's sample of "Cross Plus Two Stitch", worked on Aida cloth. The piece is for the Embroiderer's Guild installation at the Craft and Quilt Fair, later this year in June.

Robyn was beginning to stitch on this Aboriginal panel, purchased from the Black Arts Markets. The fabric has been screen printed and will be made into a bag. This is one of four personal challenges that Robyn has listed for herself.

This bag was made by a talented Guild member and raffled as a second prize at the Guild's Summer School. It was won by Sheila.

Such a great start to 2015 by all our talented members. Come back for another visit in March to see how we are all progressing on our personal challenges.

November 2014

It was our last Meeting of the year last Saturday. Being this time of the year, a few of us had other commitments so there was only five of us for the day.

Our Collaborative Project had been shown in late October at "Surprise", an exhibition of the Embroiderer's Guild NSW Inc. For anyone who missed this delightful exhibition and our group display, our pieces can be seen below. Our theme - "Houses". All pieces were to have the same angle, so when placed in a row, a curved "Thread Needle Street" was formed.

"Little Green House" by Robyn

Painted artist canvas with surface stitching and stumpwork. 

H 18cm, W 36cm.

"House - Lost World" by Susan

Relief panel of mono print and appliqué.  House in shallow relief with embroidered details, and a 'sleeping beauty' garden in various couched threads and french knots.

H 15 cm, W 29cm

"Small Double Fronted House" by Wendy

Surface stitchery on linen.

"Holiday House" by Jenny

Coloured pulled work using blended threads and worked on linen.

H 31cm,  W 28cm

"Wicked Van" by Annette

"Tree House" by Sheila

Surface stitching, appliqué and  machine embroidery. Using her own hand dyed threads of various sicknesses, the tree trunk is stitched in raised chain band while the windows& doors are raised stem stitch and have appliquéd separately. The leaves are machine stitched using commercial threads on hand dyed fabric, mounted on wire. The ladder is machine stitching over wire.

H 44cm W 37cm

"No 23" by Robyn

Machine embroidery on red felt with beading.

H 41cm, W 17cm

"Windmill Home" by Gerri

"Road To Where ?" by Dianne

A birds eye view of a street scene. Surface stitching on Linen.

H 44cm. W 37cm

"Dog House" by Donna

Painted canvas, clay figure, appliquéd felt, and free form embroidery.

H 74cm , W 21 cm.

Show and tell for the day included the following:-

A page from Sheila's travel journal - watching people in the Flower Dome in the gardens by the bay in Singapore. Her husband was snoozing at the time.

Donna's crazy patchwork project incorporating her "An Apple A Day" personal challenge that she has set herself. On Saturday Donna managed to draw, stitch, and print an apple, and hopes to have a journal full of apples by this time next year.

A sample of Jenny's travel  knitting. Jenny needed something mind numbing to do on a recent trip away, but creative enough not to get bored. This drop stitch pattern provided enough interest without needing too much thinking, especially when incorporating three different colours.  Using all pure wool in a combination of 2ply and 4 ply, the end result will be a tubular scarf knitted sideways on circular needles.

Robyns Canvas work embroidery playing with stitches and threads.

Sheila brought in a little fun for us to participate in for the morning. Making stamps with some cheap foam pads and a ball point pen. The following are our efforts for a small part of the morning.

Following our fun with our own hand crafted stamps and stamp pads, discussions were held  as to our program for next year. We are all set on our thinking path, but to find out what this is you will all have to come back next year to continue to follow us in our journey.  Until then, we wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and creative 2015.

October 14

A short blog post today catching up for our October meeting. Show & tell for the day included the following:-

Above is Susans's 'Earth Stripe' bag. It is her own design, which she has crocheted in a variety of yarns. It has been lined with fabric, which has  also used to make the shoulder straps.  The finished bag has been decorated with a variety of beads and buttons.

This is Gerri's Russian doll  which has been worked from a pattern in Knitting and Crochet magazine.  The doll was completed in a couple of days.

These faces are Sheila's Travel stitching project. They are hand appliqued  using scraps from previous quilting projects, and were inspired inspired by Charla Khanna.

These two pieces are by Wendy, who has been having fun playing with thread, fabric and stitch.

This is Annette's work in progress after  misreading/misremembering the instructions for using thin fabric, wool fleece, dyed cheesecloth and kantha  stitching.  Unknown end result at this stage.

This is Dianne's 'Backyard View' - a class sample in development.

The beginnings of Robyn's Dresden embroidery begun in a class with Christine Bishop.

Our group will be meeting again in a few days. Our collaborative project has been shown & exhibited & we should have our pieces back at our meeting. So come back in a few days and all may well be revealed.

September 14

It was a small group of only five of us last Saturday. Some of us were working on our collaborative project, while others had finished, and were setting into other projects. All will be revealed on this project in the near future.

Show and  tell on the day included the following:-

Jenny had finished a Bedfordshire lace (a form of bobbin lace) bookmark. The pattern is by  Olwyn Scott and  Robyn Hueppauff, published in Australian lace, 2005, and came with no instruction at all. Jenny is grateful to all the members of this group for all their help and encouragement.

Wendy had started her "New Life", a tree fern bud found in Bermagui at the "Four Winds" music festival.

Donna had been given some lovely black and white fabric scraps by Wendy. After looking at them for a while, she decided to work a free form pattern in white on black, incorporating the fabric scraps. The plan is to continue to stitch for a while, add batting, a backing and a bind.

Donna had also made these cacti by binding aluminium wire with Paverpol  (a water based fabric hardener) dipped cloth. The first one has been  made by wrapping aluminium wire around a polystyrene ball, then covering with T-shirt fabric. Inspiration for these two cacti came from a wool wrapped cactus that Donna had seen on-line.

This is Susan's "Earth Stripe Bag" in the making. Using double crochet stitch variations in the round in a variety of yarns, improvizing the stripes as it is worked.

Next month may be the big reveal of our collaborative project. Please come back for another visit to see what this could possibly be.