Feather stitch and TAST update

I have been slowly working on my gingerbread house.  And sorting through my stash.  I have done the buttonhole edge (my royal icing) around 3 of the 5 pieces of the house with white perle 8.  I have added the single feather stitch (TAST Week 3).  It is shown below in perle 8 DMC 902. 

Single feather stitch

 I added number 8 hex cut beads which I think are these from Whimbeads

Single feather stitch with beads

current view of the house

I still need to get TAST week 4 (Cretan stitch) on the house.  Week 5 is the herringbone, which I have already used in the roof ridge.  So really I am only one week behind schedule.  Once I get the rest of the buttonhole edging done, I should be able to keep up.

Playing with candy canes

I am continuing to play on my doodle cloth trying to decide how to do the candy canes that I want to put by the front door of my gingerbread house.  Some of my possibilities are in my previous post.  I could not find any white beads in my stash.  However, in talking to a friend, I remembered that I have a whole box of beads I had not searched yet.  When you have been collecting stash your entire life, it adds up. 

bead possibilites for candy canes

I found some fake pearls in my stash.  I think they will work for my candy canes.  They are a pain to work with because the holes are not regular, so I will need to dig out the tiny beading needles.

I have not decided what to do with my Cretan stitch on the house.  I played with it a bit on the doodle cloth.  The bottom left corner is Scotish Cretan stitch from here.  The right side is two rows of single feather stitch.  These two stitches are weeks 3 and 4 of Take a Stitch Tuesday.

Cretan stitch samples and feather stitch sample

Playing with samples - want feedback

I have been working on my gingerbread house.  I have done the background for the roof.

I was hoping the glittery thread would show up better in the sunshine, but it really didn't. 

roof in progress

close up of the detatched buttonhole edge - beads will be added later

Now comes the fun part - I will be putting peppermints on the roof. You can see my test peppermints below.  They are made with perle cotton #8. 

test fabric

 The one on the left is needleweaving. The one on the right is detached buttonhole. I like the buttonhole one better.

sample 1

sample 2

                 These are test samples for peppermint sticks that go by the front door.  On the right is feather stitch over knit weight yarn (sample 1). Left is is feather stitch over a lighter weight yarn (sample 2).  And the last is beaded feather stitch over perle 8. If I use that one I will have to dig out some perle 5, or I might try the beads over a yarn (sample 3). Leave comments and tell me which you like and why.

sample 3

Shiny new threads

Kreinik has put a sneak peek of new products for 2012 on their blog here:
http://kreinikthread.blogspot.com/2011/12/looking-ahead-to-2012.html

Facets is a couchable thread that is supposed to look like beads.  They show Copper and Pearl on the blog.  There will also be some new metallic colors.

Just what I need: more stash.

TAST Week 2 - Buttonhole stitch

Week 2 for Take a Stitch Tuesday is up and it is buttonhole stitch.  This works out for me, since I plan to use quite a bit of buttonhole stitch on the edges of my gingerbread house. So far I have put in just a little bit on the roof edge.

Roof of Gingerbread house

You can see the buttonhole down the left edge. And below you can see a close up of just my simple buttonhole edging.


Closeup of buttonhole edge

Paula Heckman Iris

 This is one of my pieces from the finished but never "finished" box.  It is a Paula Heckman cutwork design from *cough* over 20 years ago *cough*. In the extreme closeup below you can see the buttonhole connector bars and the buttonhole edges.

Paula passed away recently.  She used to have a website, but it seems to be no longer active. The only link I found to Paula's embroidery is to EGA Notecards made from her interpretation of the EGA logo.

Gingerbread House roof

I am adding two pictures of my progress on my Gingerbread House roof. I am doing pattern darning using one strand DMC 433 combined with one strand of a metallic sewing thread Bijoux MMT 429 Jasper. The idea is to make it look like roof tiles.  I have not decided if I am happy with the look or not.  It is supposed to give me a background to add to.

 

Roof of my gingerbread house so far



close up of darning pattern

If you are not familiar with pattern darning, a quick tutorial is here at the ANG site.

Pinterest

I have joined Pinterest.  It is a virtual pinboard where you can gather together images from the web and save the links back to them. I made two pinterest boards so far:

TAST pieces I wanted to find later
and Gingerbread house ideas

I don't really know what I am doing and some of the pictures don't show up on the board right.  Maybe eventually I will get it figured out.

Basting and Fly Stitch

I got the basting on my gingerbread house complete.  As I was basting, I was thinking about the fact that I automatically started to the left of the vertical.  If you have no clue what I am talking about, it is illustrated here. 

Basting is done

You can see the fly stitch/ herringbone on the left sort of.  It is at the bend in the roof piece of the house, so it will be highest point of the roof.

Herringbone with fly stitch

I know it is hard to see. I may try again with the camera. What you are looking at is a herringbone base done in perle cotton #8 which is 2 threads "wide" and 8 threads "high". You can see that on the right side of the picture. Then a fly stitch is done over the top of the herringbone with Krenik braid #16 in 032. The fly stitch is supposed to glint like snow on the roof. The #16 is really too heavy for this fabric, but I wanted the snow to show up.

Herringbone with fly stitch

In this picture I played with the contrast and color to try to make the fly stitch show up. White on white is pretty in person but just does not work well for the camera.

Wow, just wow

After I made my last post, I visited the Facebook page for TAST.  I found a link posted by Nathalie Locquen of her fly stitch.  It is truly impressive.  Nathalie's blog is in French, but it is well worth looking at.

Not ready to stitch yet

Since my last post, I have been getting ready to start my gingerbread house.  First I decided that I want a good size house.  I eventually want to use this piece as a Christmas Card Holder.  So I got out my trusty ruler and cereal boxes and I made a sample house.

Mock up of Gingerbread House

Yes, I know it looks silly.

My next step was to go on a stash hunt.  I found a yard of 28 count linen in my stash.  I do not now remember who made it or where I bought it or why.  But there it is.  The next step for me is to place my cardboard pieces on my linen. 

Pieces of Gingerbread House laid out

I want to have a 3/4 inch seam allowance around each piece. 

Next step: BASTING which I am currently in the middle of.  Then I can finally get to actual stitching.

TAST 2012 is up!

Sharon from Pin Tangle has posted her first stitch for TAST.  It is fly stitch. 

Take A Stitch Tuesday Week One for Sharon's post
Fly Stitch in Sharon B's Dictionary for Sharon's instructions for fly stitch.

Both have some examples of innovative uses of fly stitch.

Now I just need to decide how to use the fly stitch on my gingerbread house.