03.18.11

Funny?

Posted in General at 7:00 am by deRomilly

I’ve been thinking about comedy and humor recently. Remember way back when in my Welcome post, when I said I wasn’t a needlework humorist? I’ve been trying to figure out why. Some of my current thoughts on the subject make me think that while embroidery is inherently healing, friendly, and beautiful, it doesn’t lend itself to humor like knitting or sewing… Why? I asked.

I’ve come to the conclusion that the only way to really write humor well may be from a position of pain. Pain is where we find the truths about ourselves, and that kind of truth is whence humor really stems.  Even the Yarn Harlot’s humor stems from the mistakes that happen with gauge or with working through a misunderstood pattern.  Maybe that’s why it’s hard for embroiderer’s to move to humor about their work — when I don’t get gauge on a sweater I can end up with a finished project that would alternately fit André the Giant or a Barbie doll. When I mis-stitch a flower petal in a piece of embroidery, I end up with… a misshapen flower petal. Or, when the sampler threads bleed all over the bottom of the fabric and it never comes out… is that funny or just sad?

Yet I can see many opportunities for humor in my sewing – the T-Rex T-tunic for example (always remember to put eas in the arm measurements or you will have T-Rex arms when you put it on!) Turning something flat into something 3-D is ripe for humor. Whereas flat work, like the misshapen flower petal, choosing the wrong color in a needle painting, or my struggle to get the eye in the right place on a profile figure doesn’t have quite the hilarity factor (for the record, I just now realized that my problem is always putting it too far back on the facial profile — drawings will now improve, probably dramatically. Funny though? Probably more pathetic.)

So I’m still trying to find humor in my stitching. Anybody know any funny stitching stories you want to share?

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03.11.11

Beauty in the House…

Posted in Finished Projects at 11:13 am by deRomilly

Yesterday on  whim, after telling the staff at my Father’s favorite restaurant about his passing, I stopped at the local antique store, with the hope of finding a copy of Priscilla Magazine or Home Needlework or somesuch (I’m an antique publications fanatic).

Instead, I found this treasure. As usual, you can click the pictures for more detail. I highly recommend it. The stitching is exquisite.) It’s  about 22 by 22 inches, still with the original price tag of 50 cents from Kindall. So I need to go do some research and track it down.

The design reflects much of the art needlework done in the 1890s through about 1910 in the U.S. This one is poppies. It’s stitched on linen in a thick filament silk – not twisted at all,  it looks like they put enough strands in the needle to be about the equivalent of 4-5 strands of cotton floss. But because it’s so much softer, it blends much better than that much cotton would.  I’m sure that this was packaged in this size as thread… I’ve seen the advertisements for it.

As you can see, it’s not faded at all, and the stitching is exquisite. There is a small triangular  voided area in the poppies shown above, where the petals meet, that I thought was an error, but then I realized that all of the poppies in that position have identical voided areas.  It was designed to be made into a pillow – the linen to back the pillow is attached to the embroidered linen, ready to be made.

Coveting the threads I can no longer get, and feeling very pleased with myself for finding this.

Edited 3/12/11 to add the photo of the poppy with the voided spot.

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03.04.11

Dad’s Sweater

Posted in General at 7:00 am by deRomilly

My father passed away on February 18, having worn his new sweater constantly since Christmas. His 77th birthday would have been on Sunday.

I mentioned  back in December that I’d been knitting, not stitching. This was the result. A month and a half of frantic knitting produced a sweater that my father wore constantly. I think he likes that it’s darker than the light arans Mom and I have given him over the years.

On the other hand, knitting in the evening does produce some problems. The skeins I used were all the same “dye lot” (they’re natural colored wool) but NOT the same shade. That works really well when the lighter piece is the button band, or both sleeves. Not so much when the shade changes noticeably in the middle of the back.  Yet, I doubt anyone will notice it but me…

The pattern is one from Patons: appropriately, “Dad’s Cardigan.” Apart from some very strangely worded instructions and a couple of typos that changed the pattern from the way it was shown, it went together pretty easily.  Find the mini-cable twist pattern instructions somewhere else, though.  It’s also a pretty loose stitch count for an Aran knit. But it turned out warm and well-loved, so I’m happy. And so was Dad, which is what really matters!

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