misc from Friday & Sat a.m.

[helwen]

Picked up night guard then went to Webs and Stop&Shop. Picked up nice yarns for future weaving projects, as well as some stuff for a surprise.

Sundry correspondence items, personal, baronial, Yule, NS/BB (some more possible teachers!), etc. Worked on cross-stitch patterns for baronial awards. I know cross-stitch as a standalone isn't period (or at least I'm pretty sure...), but it's a start and there're some very eager embroiderers chomping at the bit. Still have one more to go, then color key charts (Anchor & DMC), then uploading them to the Berg web site. Then maybe I'll redo them all as outlines that can be done on counted fabric and filled in...hmm. What I'd like is to make traceable patterns for freehand, but I have to find out what's available for doing that. There's always coloring on the back of the paper design with a pencil...

We did a bit of work on the studio and printshop. I got the warping board hung up between two of the big windows and hung some of my yarns off of it. Looks pretty and gets them out of the way for now. I think we need to get a few more storage bins. The solid Rubbermaids are okay for some of the stuff, but I'd prefer clear-sided for most things. We won't get a lot of strong direct sunlight in there, so sunfade isn't really an issue.

Dropped off the surprise package at MacCarthaigh-MacMinn for them to finish up, and looked at some of the scrolls the new folks have been doing, and they're all looking great! Emma is especially amazing, D.Moiselle's doing well but will need to do some future work on strokes with Phred and/or me -- with a little bit of work on that, she'll be doing kingdom scrolls. Phred thinks Emma should be doing some of those as well, and I agree. ellid did a very nice capital as well, which will be seen at Yule :)

Made jello salad, which we'll be taking to the farm today. fitzw's pie didn't turn out, unfortunately. See his post on that. Did a little spinning while watching Numbers.

We're about to set out for the farm. We're meeting Gryff and Azure up there to cut down the trees for the 'forest', before going to the family Thanksgiving dinner. Then we'll be leaving that at about 3pm to head down to Ernie's place for a little bit.

Comments

[tashabear.livejournal.com]

What I'd like is to make traceable patterns for freehand, but I have to find out what's available for doing that. There's always coloring on the back of the paper design with a pencil...

I like tear-away embroidery stabilizer. I trace the outline, stitch through the stabilizer, the tear the stabilizer away, leaving the outline behind. It's how I did the outlines for Operation Fix Wolfie's Cloak (his cloak got eaten, and he wouldn't let me shorten it, so I covered it with a wide strip of embroidered fabric). The pictures are here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/tashabear/sets/72157594348061791/); I don't have any photos of the finished product because I'm not done sewing the strip onto the cloak yet.

[helwen.livejournal.com]

Hmm, that sounds interesting. Is this stuff available at Jo-Ann's?

[tashabear.livejournal.com]

Absolutely -- that's where I bought it. It's on the notions wall. I used Solvy brand, but there are others. I like it because while it's tearable, it's more like tearing intefacing than tearing paper, and it crumples nicely.

The best part is, it comes in rolls (8" or 12") or it comes in large sheets, so if you're doing a large motif (say, a peerage cloak), you don't have to piece the stabilizer together. By the same token, you don't have to cut small motifs out of a large sheet, either.

One thing I discovered while working on the cloak project is that heavier fabrics, like wool or linen, don't require the use of a hoop. I pinned the stabilizer down, carefully stitched the stem which ran through the center of the motif, and then pulled out the pins and stitched the rest. The whole thing went a lot quicker once I stopped screwing around with the hoop.

[helwen.livejournal.com]

Thanks!