mega needlework swap post

This is going to be a long one, seriously you might want to go fetch yourself a cup of tea or something...

I already posted about the Anything Goes Needlework swap I participated in on Craftster, well as the swap was wrapping up the organiser let us know that a couple of people had gone missing without sending anything and asked for volunteers to pair up with their partners. I couldn't resist the opportunity for some bonus needlework swapping so I was partnered up with Spidermom - and can I just say how glad I am her partner flaked because it meant I got to swap with her!

She made me a great retro mermaid hoopla- what is that mermaid up to? I like to think she is about to bludgeon the lady in the boat with that fish! It was hard to get a photo of this the colours are much brighter in real life. I have quite a collection of mermaids now, most of them are displayed in the bathroom, which is predictable I know but the ones that are in hoops are on my hoopla wall. I don't want to risk them getting all soggy and mildewed. Every embroidery fan should start a hoopla wall - I love how my hoops look all hung together although there is a risk of it overflowing on to other walls at some point.

Spidermom also made me a crossstitched notepad to use for those lightbulb moments- or for my many lists!

 And how cute is this mini felt toadstool girl? I have a feeling this may have been based on something on my pinterest- I have a lot of cute felt things pinned. I think I will add a hanging loop and hang it in a window, she is just adorable and I love the little bead details

And here is what I sent her, one of her themes was woodland critters. I made a little felt fox picture based on an ornament from falalafelt. I've had the mini brass frame for ages and this was the perfect project to use it. I think orange, teal and lime green might be my new favourite colour combination :) I didn't change the pattern much but it would be fairly easy to create similar designs to do in felt- I think a selection of critters with victorian styling could be cute; a badger with a monocle, stoat with a pipe, bird in a top hat etc... very quick to make too, will have to get sketching some ideas

 The main item I made was this stumpwork owl hoop. I designed this myself but aimed to learn a few new stitches along the way. The owl is a padded embroidered slip and the branch is raised stem band with raised leaf stitch for the... ummmm... leaves  The raised leaf stitch is very easy to learn and looks very pretty, maybe I should have added more leaves to this piece. The raised stem band didn't turn out all that raised- I'll pad it with felt next time. I was a bit unsure about the blue cotton I stitched it on but I think it turned out to be a good choice as white would have looked wrong and I think black wouldn't look as nice. I need to get some fabric paints so I can tint or crate a backdrop on my fabric prior to stitching I think.

 Then I made a simple crewel wool hoop. Again my own design, stitched mainly in gorgeous appleton crewel wool- look teal and orange again, just missing a splash of lime green! I was inspired by a design on my sons jumper and stole  based the tree on that. I haven't done any wool embroidery for a while and had forgotten how quickly it stitches up.

And now a confession- I did try to make a mini spiderman felt embroidery but had to bin it halfway through- he had wonky eyes and his web was all over the place. I think the fox I ended up doing instead is cute though and embroidery shouldn't be too stressful should it? (says she who is constantly doing battle with knots and who cannot finish any piece without much cursing and bodging). In the past I hated to abandon things I'd started as I'd already invested so much time but now if something starts to feel too much like hard work into the bin it goes (wheeee!)- life is too short!

You still here? I told you it was going to be long didn't I?  sorry about that- but thanks for reading xxx

craft swaps

I've been doing a lot of swapping recently and wanted to share some of the awesome stuff I've received.

Catherine at Busy Squirrel sent me this adorable little chick.It has such a cute face- cheep cheep!  I love it and it sits on top of my cookery book shelf (although on occasion it likes to hang out in my egg bowl or on a pebble in the avocado tree pot). Catherine has a great crafty blog where she writes about her home, vintage children's books and the lovely toys, jewelry and clothes she makes- but don't take my word for it, go take a look for yourself!

You might have seen my felt badges, well I received two needlefelted beauties in return:

 

Thankyou to Craftsters Wulf and Onegroovyday for these they are gorgeous and I've now added needlefelting to the list of crafts I need to learn. Reasons as follows; 1) it looks really cool, Wulf's moth is like a painting in wool 2) you can make 3-D things 3) it's stabby and I need an outlet for my rage

  Round 2 of the felt badge swap should be opening soon so if you are on craftster look out for it you don't want to miss this!

If you like felty stuff  you NEED to read LimeRiot's blog - think of her as a felt guru, so much love for the felt on her blog :)

There is still more I need to share but I'm rationing it out people, watch this space xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

boxing hares

Hellooo, I didn't mean to leave it so long between posts but casa threadhead has been visited by the pox. Poorly kidshapes :(
Anyhow they are both having a snooze so I thought I'd do a quick post. I have so much to share, have had lots of happy, crafty mail recently so expect lots of posts  over the next few days!
For starters here is an embroidery I made for a swap over on Phat Quarter the theme was spring. I had planned to do a traditional boxing hares image but then this idea occurred to me and wouldn't shift!

I used a vintage photo of bare knuckle boxers I found online to base the bodies on. I love how it turned out I think it is equal parts funny and creepy. The best thing was learning to do the shading in a woodcut/etching type style. It was very difficult to get the shading right so I'm really happy with how it looks. I wanted it to look like the sort of image you'd find in an antique book - I have stitched something similar before based on an antique book image;

Not a human/hare hybrid but still humanlike in that its action and stance - I think this probably was the inspiration for the newer one although I wasn't aware of it at the time. 

and some hare linkys I like

youtube video of boxing hares

love this hare cushion

breathtaking embroidery

Enjoy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx