Acorn Ornament

Woot, just finished the pattern part of the ornament, now just to sew it into a pouch so I can fill with yummy scents to hang on a tree.......

Acorn Christmas Ornament

I officially started working on Christmas Ornaments a week or so ago and finalized a pattern.  The original pattern was from a book called "A New Modelbook for Spanish Stitch" by Kathleen Epstein and is the part in ink in the photo.  I then had to modify it make it more square so that I can stuff some smelly stuff in it after the whole pouch is completed.  The whole idea is to be able to put Cinnamon sticks or something in it and hang it on the Christmas tree or on a mantle.  As of right now it has taken me a week (been working on the table linens as well) to get the pattern finalized and almost all the black thread on the linen background.  All I have left to do is do the gold thread and the outer black band, then assemble the pouch/ornament.

Working Again

I was slacking for a while but have started to work on the first band again.  So far I have connected the first unicorn to the next set, so overall I have about 30% of the first band done.  I have timed completing one unicorn and it takes about 4 hours of casual stitching (complete with interuptions from my husband and child and Olympics).  I will admit that I had been delaying doing the second set of unicorns due to me not being sure where to put the next grouping and how to decide it.  However, now that I am over that hump, I can proceed again.  I will have one more large band to do like this one, then I will have two medium bands to complete the tablecloth trim.  After that I have four napkins to do with one set of unicorns/cross per side but that will not take as much to do I think, they will go quicker so I will feel more accomplished quickly.  I also think the quarters of the cross are missing an element of filling of some sort, so I will try to find some filling that will work for them.  I will post that idea as soon as I get it figured out for sure.  Look for more pictures coming soon of the progress........

The Official Beginning of the Unicorn Table Linens and Gulf Wars results

So it is official, I started work on the first band of the tablecloth today.  I didn't spend a bunch of time working on it, but I did finish one unicorn and one cross.  It really gives me a much better idea of how it will look.  I am still not a huge fan of this specific type of unicorn, I prefer the one with the lion-like mane, but once again this is not for me but is a gift for someone else whose coat of arms has that specific type of unicorn on it.

As to other notes, I learned about using a salt bath to make the dye on the thread stay and actually used it on this thread.  I also went back and gave the lion napkins a salt bath and set them out to air dry.  It was a bit trying on my nerves as I didn't know if the thread would shrink or not and so all that work I had done was potentially wasted.  The good news is that there is no dye that ran onto the linen and stuck and the thread didn't seem to shrink.  Yay for being able to use the Lion Napkins and launder them....

As to the scores for Gulf Wars, I received a 22.5 and 24, with the max score of 25.  Here is a album that someone posted of the entries at Gulf Wars, both champions competition and open competition.  One person stated that they thought I was the person there that received the highest scores total.  Any which way you look at it, it is pretty darn good for my first project, lol.....

Unicorn Table Linens

Okay I am starting an even larger project then my last one.  I finally graphed out my design and concept.  The unicorn and cross are of my own graphing, the background border is from The New Carolingian Modelbook.  These are going to be combined to make a gift for someone, and is a combination of two coats of arms.  *Crossing fingers* hopefully this won't make it back to the people I am making them for, lol.  I am not sure what stitch to fill in the large cross with, but everything else is double-running stitch.  Now I will be measuring my fabric width and pulling a thread to make sure I have it straight.  then it will be time to cut the linen and run a line of thread down the edges so they don't fray as much (the thought kinda scares me).  I don't have a serger, but am going to use another stitch on my sewing machine that I think will work.  I guess we will find out as we go.  I guess, first I need to set the dye on my thread (didn't do that on the last batch, but I have heard how to do it post completion), then I can get to work on it.  Now I am kinda getting excited, lol.......

And they're off........

Well, last night I passed off my napkin/display/documentation to the friend who is taking it up to Gulf Wars.  I had a momentary nervous moment when handing them off, but it is more the unknown as my entry may not be in the point battle.  Worse comes to worse, my friend will enter it into the static competition the following day and I will still end up with a bag of largess (loot).  I am attaching a picture of the display as it was during the Kingdom A&S, and the set-up will still be the same.  I finished the second napkin on Monday evening, all I did Tuesday was iron everything and pass it off.
At this point it is on to the next project officially, a set of four napkins and a matching tablecloth from this template.  I am not worried as much about making it as perfectly historically accurate as I am not planning on competing with them.  I learned alot about blackwork just on this last set of napkins, so I imagine that it will get easier until I add additional elements to the designs other then just Holbein stitch.  The fun part is I will be trying to to work two different projects at once, not sure what the second one will be though, as the tablecloth and napkins will be a custom gift.  I know I need to make a collar and cuffs for a chemise, but not sure what designs to use.  Yay for tough decisions.

Busy Busy Busy

Sorry about the delay in getting a new post up, I have been horrendously busy.  I finally got my documentation paper updated/finished for Gulf Wars today.  Since my last post I have completed one side of filling (leaving one to go), 24 continuing education credits (for mundane life/work), and increased my documentation paper from 6 pages to 10.  I added a list of images used and sited them in a separate part of the bibliography which used up a page and a half, but the rest is all added information and the images themselves.  At this point I have until Wednesday before I need to have the stuff to the lady bringing my project to the event.  All I really need to do between now and then is complete the filling on one side, which should not be a problem, and print out my new paper and place them in binders.  As an optional thing, I will hem up a 2 yard piece of black linen to use as my base for my project.  I figured that since the napkins are linen, a tablecloth of the same fabric would be good to have.  Either way I will post again later after I get more done.......