Sources, Sources and the joy of more Sources

Hullo! Before we move on to start another project, I would like to share with you where I go look for my sources on-line as someone had asked in the comments awhile back.

When I began, I downloaded most of the embroidery books from Project Guttenberg. Eventually I moved on to the Antique Pattern Library, and well, I am still stuck on this site for there is just so much of everything here! But in the days where I get too overwhelmed there, I pop into the Embroidery Archives of the University of Arizona, or find some gems in Google books, or searching embroidery on the Internet Archives. And I must include The Little Grey Bungalow blog even though it has just a few embroidery titles, for it always puts a smile on my face with all the public domain gems she finds!

But the best source discovery so far is from Feeling Stitchy reader Cathy! She found where our little children from the doll quilt project came from!!

She shared that it is an illustration by Jessie Willcox Smith and the original link she sent is from Pennelainer's flickr, where it describes it as coming from "A Child's Garden of Verses" by Robert Louis Stevenson. And thanks to Cathy, we now know that the 4 kids are "Little Japanee, Little Turk, Little Eskimo and Little Indian" from the curious poem called "Foreign Children"!

How wonderful this place called the Internet! :-) I hope you all continue to leave comments and share here on Feeling Stitchy, it is such a lovely surprise when one thing leads to another!

Now I must prepare for the next little project! I will be making the pattern this week for an adorable play apron from Priscilla Embroidery Patterns so I will be able to share it with you next Monday. It comes from a catalog so there are no instructions or pattern, but this photo looks promising :-).

Until then, have a happy week everyone and enjoy getting lost in the embroidery of the past!

Handicraft for Girls: Finishing the Doll Quilt

Hullo! Finally, we are finishing this doll quilt! :-) All the patterns have been stitched up, and overhanded together. Now it says in the book to baste it to lining, turn in and overhand together. Well, as much as I did start to enjoy overhanding, I regret to report that I did not finish it this way as I was not looking forward to overhanding for the rest of my days (it's quite tedious if the fabric is thick!)

Instead I decided to use some bias tape I had laying around and used some left-over fabric for the lining.

Now, I must admit I have never applied bias binding to a quilt all by myself before! So I kind of had to google my way on this one :-) I found this tutorial by the Sew to Speak blog to be just right for my newbie comprehension skills.

In reaching my corners, I marked where I should stop or begin with a pen as I was afraid my estimation skills would mess it up.

After sewing on the bias tape, I trimmed all 3 layers close to the stitch line since my bias tape was not that wide and would appreciate not having all that bulk when turning over.

After the binding was put on, I then prepared some yarn cut to 4" length to use for tacking the quilt.

I tried using just a needle to do this, but goodness! I had such a battle making it go thru all the layers! So, a better idea had to be conjured. A few weeks ago I had picked up a setting tool at a local bookstore for no particular reason. Okay, the reason is always "might need this one day" :-) Well, that and it looked cute. Anyways, I took it out and made some holes for my yarn to gracefully glide into.

And it worked beautifully! (Although it was so efficient, it was punching the holes straight thru my cutting mat!)

After putting in all the tacking, it looked quite a bit sparse so I put one more thread in. This time just going under the stitch and not thru the hole.

And that is the end of the doll quilt :-) I don't have any daughters with dolls, and my dolls are a little too small for this quilt... but I do have a real live baby boy who will enjoy pulling all the yarn on this :-)

If there is anything in old embroidery ebooks that you would like me to feature here, or someone who makes stuff from them, do let me know! It would be great to share with everyone else the treasure trove in these books. Have a lovely week ahead everyone!

(To get all the patterns and see the work in progress: click here)

Handicraft for Girls: Doll Quilt Pt. 4

Hullo! Happy Monday everyone. We are finally on our last pattern for the doll quilt. I am still stitching up Kid #3 and have finished the overhand stitches of the first two pieces.

Here is a more detailed shot of the finished overhand stitches (and yes, the thread color did grow on me and some of you were kind enough to leave a comment about it, thank you!):

And here I go on the 3rd pattern. To recap, I have veered away from the original instructions by adding backstitches for my details. I will also be adding some satin stitching in the last two patterns to cover solid areas. Like this one has button details that will look better satin stitched I think.

If you are just catching up now, you can find the first 3 patterns here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and the joining with the Overhand stitch.

Download the PDF.

Thank you to those that replied with great embroidery and traveling tips on the last post! Enjoy your week everyone and happy stitching!

Handicraft for Girls: Doll's Quilt Pt. 2

Hullo! We are now on to the second embroidery pattern from the Handicraft for Girls book. For those who want to catch up and make this doll quilt, check out Part 1. 

Download the PDF.

It does not state in the book which cultures these costumes are from, and since it is a school instruction book I presume that the patterns were reflective of the other lessons. Thus, they probably did not feel the need to elaborate. Maybe it's that vagueness that makes old books written in the language of their time so romantic and mysterious for some of us :-) 

Have a happy stitchy week up ahead!  

Handicraft for Girls: Children in Native Costume Doll's Quilt Pt. 1

Hullo! Our next project is from the book Handicraft for Girls by Idabelle McGlauflin, published in 1910.

In Chapter 2 of the book, an embroidery pattern of 4 children in native costume are provided and to be used in the different exercises.

Each design is embroidered with running stitches on a 6" x 8" piece of unbleached muslin. Now, it says to use "colored thread No. 50", and once again I have no idea what color that will be so enlightenment is welcome of course.

When done with the designs, we will continue to make the elective exercise which is a doll's quilt:

To attach the designs together, it states that they are to be "overhanded together" by turning a quarter-inch fold on the long side of both pieces and basting the folded pieces together and overhand.

The stitch is not shown in the book, only described so I went to look for an illustration and found this from ChestofBooks.com. It is the overhand stitch as described and illustrated in School of Needlework. A Course Study in Sewing designed for use in Schools:

Should you wish to make this too, a pattern will be provided after each part every Monday. We will begin this week with Child in Native Costume No. 1:

Download the PDF.

Have a lovely week ahead everyone and keep on stitching!

Part 2.

More Doll Quilts

The Doll Quilt Swap (9) on Flickr is wrapping up, and I thought it was a good time to share some of the many quilts featuring beautiful stitching. As usual, the creativity and talent that oozes out of this swap is simply jaw-dropping. So sit back and enjoy the show.

First up, another amazing mini quilt made by the talented cathygaubert:

Here's a detailed shot of some of Cathy's stitching:

This amazing piece of art was made by Louise (lululollylegs) ... quite fittingly, for cathygaubert!:

Here's a closer look at the detail of Mr. Big Bad himself:

And here's the quilt being enjoyed by Cathy's daughter (I LOVE this picture):

Here's a fairy-tale themed quilt made by Sylvie (Vivie95) with some of Heather Ross' Far Far Away 2 line of fabric:

This beauty was made by Sunny (onetexsun):

Here's a close-up of the heart detail:

This one's by Dolores (DeeRoo G):

Here's a beauty made by Krista (lolablueocean):

This more traditional quilt block features an amazing embroidered center, stitched and quilted by Marilyn (marilynkb):

Kelly (redcleo) featured little elves in her doll quilt:

Karen (crazyfun01) quilted this up and sent it to her partner with some fun extras:

Finally, here's a sweet little quilt made by Dena (Denawayne):

French Knot Highlights

Having now completed countless mini & doll quilt swaps over on Flickr, I can still look back and point to the single piece of inspiration that got me interested in joining my very first swap. It was this little lovely, created by Jennifer (who also blogs at Mama Urchin):


I coveted this quilt something fierce! The emphasis here is definitely more on the quilting side than the embroidery side, but look at how much just little touches of brilliant embroidery adds to the overall design of this mini:


The small french knot discs in a perfectly coordinated color are subtle, but manage to take this quilt from great to WOW WOW WOW! It helps that this was made from one of my all-time favorite fabric lines. Check out the little buttons, too.

Sigh. Three years later and I still covet this quilt.

Mini Quilt Month on Whip Up

Have you been following along with Mini Quilt month over at Whip Up? To celebrate the release of the new Whip Up Mini Quilts book, the team has been featuring mini quilts and quilt artists all throughout the month of April.

Here's a little more information taken from Whip Up's introductory post:

Mini Quilts have been around for over 100 years, and served a couple of different purposes. They were a fun way for young girls to learn how to sew, sewing simple quilt designs for their dolls. They also were also a great educational tool that mothers and grandmothers could make for their children and grandchildren – these often had letters or motifs appliqued or embroidered onto them. I find it wonderful that mini quilts are still made today, as teaching/learning tools and as play things. And now added to these two uses comes a third – as pieces of contemporary art.

For your viewing pleasure, I've curated a small collection of quilts that have been featured so far and incorporate an element of stitching or embroidery into the overall design. They're great inspiration pieces for combining the two mediums of quilting and embroidery into art pieces that can accentuate your home decor.

Which one is your favorite?

Photo from Flickr user paddlefish

Photo from Flickr user joybucket

Photo from Flickr user mrsmcporkchop

Made by Flickr user Katie Aaberg, who also blogs at Made by Katie

Photo from Flickr user CB Handmade

Photo from Flickr user mamacjt

PS. You can see one of my minis featured here. It's #12!

Woodland Sampler Wall Hanging

I'm loving this wall hanging comprised of some of my favorite embroidery patterns. Joely from Australia (aka Flickr user twolittlefishes) combined these woodland-themed stitcheries with a selection of bright, fun quilting fabrics. Notice how she even coordinated her floss selections?

I was so inspired by this project that I'm hoping to create my own quilt blanket version comprised of the embroidered pieces that I'm receiving as part of the Hoop Up swap. More on that soon!

Blogged (with links to all patterns) here.

Quilting Bee Stitchettes Mini Quilt

I wanted to share this beautiful mini quilt made by Liz, which I am sure all of you fellow quilting stitchers will appreciate.

The embroidery pattern is a favorite from the Wee Wonderfuls store. So do you participate in a quilting bee? I'd love to hear about it!

Great job, Liz!

Hope you're all having a wonderful week.

Embroidered Doll Quilt

Another wonderful marriage of color, pattern, fabric and flawless stitching!

Photo courtesy of craftjunk

This wonderful mini quilt was created by Donna (aka craftjunk) for an early round of the Doll Quilt Swap on Flickr. I spy some Denyse Schmidt and Heather Ross fabrics reminiscent of citrus and sunshine.

You can read more about the quilt on Donna's blog.

Stories and Thread.........

"I love all things small"....starts the introduction page to Shelece's etsy profile. "Tiny little treasures, little pieces of paper, a plastic charm, the weave of fabric........and so I live with jars and tins filled with all of these small beautiful things......" Sound familiar? I think to love embroidery one must love small things, and probably collect them......

Though I was wooed by the images of Shelece's little quilts made from repurposed, recycled vintage fabric, hand-quilted and appliqued, I became connected by her stories. We all have them, don't we? Stories that sound vaguely familiar when someone tells them. I wanted to share some of Shelece's work and some of her stories because they look so much like the fabric of our lives......

I Cut My Own Hair

This one made me laugh because all five of my kids did this one time at least, and one boy insisted on it several times. I loved how Shelece sprinkled the hair all over the ground! Check out how she describes this event in her life in her etsy store.

Blanket for Dolly

Shelece says: "My grandma deeply instilled in me the idea that dolls must be kept warm. I remember when I was little taking my doll over to Grandma's house for Thanksgiving dinner. I arrived all bundled up in my red wool coat with my doll tucked under my arm. Grandma met me at the door and gasped 'get that baby in here this minute, she's only dressed in a swim suit and a dish towel, she'll get sick and die in this weather!' Horrified I hurriedly bundled her under my coat to keep back the certain death my grandma knew was lurking around the corner for my unprotected doll."

Chicken Races

Shelece didn't explain this one, but I have enough imagination left from childhood that it needs no explaining. There are so many wonderful creations that, of course, I can't post them all, but maybe a few.

Best Big Sister Ever

Shelece says: "I was the youngest of six kids and I always wished I had a little sister to love and dress up and push around in a stroller. My older sister assured me that having a little sister was anything but fun, she said, "it's like having a dog with no legs permanently tied to your waist and you have to drag it everywhere you go." All that did was make me really want a dog! And if I could get one with no legs, all the better, it would be easier to dress and would never run away!

Well, this is just a taste of Shelece's view of life from an embroidery standpoint. I think it's wonderful and asked her if I could share it. Here are a few more without the story, perhaps I have peaked your interest?

Jumprope

Fighting for Dolly

Okay, I guess you have the idea of why I was so smitten with these. They are made with the idea that someday they will be framed. I love the stories of people, and I really enjoyed Shelece's walk through a familiar world in her eyes. Thanks for sharing, Shelece.