Annies Crazy World

 
 
 
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    This is Annie Whitsed's Crazy World a world where I stitch the joys and chaos of life into beautifull crazy quilts. email annie@loopylace.com
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My Band Sampler 159 – Stitch Explorer Trellis Stitchea Teddy Bear – Detail 904 and 905 February 23rd, 2009

Boo Bo my Trellis Stitch Teddy BearLast week when sewing with Sharon she pulled some brown chenille out of my box and suggested that I could stitch a teddy bear with it…I drew a bear shape and used pearl thread to back stitch around it, I was glad that I thought to do longer back stitches because the chenille needed the extra space…for the legs and arms I trellis stited down one side and then as I stitched the second side I laced the thread through the first side between each stitch, for the body I die a row of trellis down both sides and then laced the 2 sides together down the centre, the head is spiral trellis stitch, the ears, which are not attached to the fabric are a row of 3 sitches and a row of 2 stitches.

An overview of part of my samplerI named him Boo Boo because he reminded me of my child hood bear who was in turn named after Boo Boo, Yogi Bear’s offsider…And what did Boo Boo do? I blamed my child hood bear for the naughty things that I did and this little Boo Boo left brown fluff on Sharon’s floor.

How to stitch a trellis stitch teddy bear

My Band Sampler 159 – Stitch Explorer Trellis Stitch Tea Cup – Detail 903 February 22nd, 2009

Trellis Stitch Tea Cup with fingers to show sizeI used a fine silk thread for this little Tea Cup and Saucer and it was somewhat tedious to stitch but I will do tedious if it means I can make cute things.

I started with a flat spiral trellis stitch circle for the centre of the saucer and worked a couple of extra rows around the outside edge, next time I will do a smaller circle to start and more rows around the edge.

For the cup I stitched a circle of back stitch on the saucer stitched a row into them, increased a little on the second and third rows to give the cup shape and continued to add rows until the cup was high enough…For the handle I made some loops of thread the size of the handle and worked trellis stitch over them, it similar to a buttonhole loop but the trellis stitch doesn’t twist like buttonhole stitch does

Trellis Stitch Tea Cup

My Band Sampler 158 – Stitch Explorer Trellis Stitch Hat – Detail 902 February 21st, 2009

Trellis Stitch HatWhen I was Stitching the tree I kept looking at my wonky pyramid and thinking that if it was round it would look like a hat…ummm a hat couldn’t be to difficult to do, actually it turned out to be very easy.

To stitch a Hat start by following Just String Blogspot’s Trellis Stitch Instructions and stitch 2 rows, decrease from the first row so that the hat brim sits flat on the fabric, stitch 2 rows without decreasing, then decrease to the centre of the hat crown, adjust number of rows in each section to make different sizes and styles of hat…decorate to taste, I used silk ribbon which I stitched on so that it wouldn’t slip of and then formed a bow by making a loop and hold it in place with a stitch and then making a second loop and stitch it in place, I then threaded the ends of the ribbon to the back.

Hats come in many styles and can be decorated in such a multitude of ways I would love to see any hats that others make so if you do make a trellis stitch hat could you drop back and leave a comment with a link to where we can see yours?

My Band Sampler 157 – Stitch Explorer Febuary Trellis Stitch – Details 900 and 901 February 20th, 2009

Trellis Stitch

When Sharon showed me her Trellis stitch samples I was excited because I immediately thought of some cute things that I could do with it and I have had more ideas since…but first things first I have to learn how to do Trellis Stitch instructions.
Thank you Just String Blogspot for the clear instructions.

The mechanics of the stitch, wrapping the thread over and under the needle is much the same as a twisted chain so that bit was easy, getting the tension and when/how much to increase/decrease took a little practice although I am finding that it is very forgiving and a missed stitch or an extra stitch doesn’t stand out.

I started with a ring and a couple of circles, the second one changing thread for the middle of the circle…I then moved onto a wall with towers at the corners…The little green spot is a bush not very exciting in itself but I started with just a few stitches and increased a little before decreasing and as I was increasing it was forming a funnel shape and I realized that Trellis stitch wil make great Fungi shapes.

Next I did a pyramid, a wonky pyramid because I decreased to quickly.

while I was stitching the pyramid I was looking at my bush and thought, a little bit bigger with a brown trunk and it would be tree…

To make the tree I started with 4 stitches set in a square and worked spiral trellis stitch till it was about 1/2 inch high and then added a branch to the side.

Trellis stitch tree trunk

To make the top of the tree I worked 4 rows of Trellis stitch increasing each row at which point I joined the branch.

Trellis stitch tree top

I then worked 1 row without increasing and then decreased to the top of the tree.

Trellis stitch Tree

My Band Sampler 139 – Stitch Explorer o4 – Detail 846 – Chicken Scratch January 21st, 2009

Miniature Apron with Chicken Scratch EmbroideryMiniature Apron with Chicken Scratch Embroidery Actual size

Before I started doing samples of chicken scratch the only way that I could think that I would use chicken scratch would be if I wanted to make a miniature apron and before I knew it I was making a miniature apron using 1/16th inch gingham and simplifying the pattern to single cross stitches…The only model that I could find that was the right scale (5.5 inch high Doll) was dressed as some sort of super women, an outfit that doesn’t quite go with and pink apron but you get the idea.

Chicken Scratch on my Band samplerThat is all the chicken scratch that I am going to do so I have taken a photo of the whole chicken scratch section.

My Band Sampler 138 – Stitch Explorer o3 – Details 842 and 845 January 20th, 2009

Chicken Scratch variations

I think that I have mixed feelings about Chicken Scratch, it is not a stitch that I would have chosen for crazy quilting (and crazy quilting is my main focus of stitch chose on my sampler) and I do find it a bit tedious to work but now that I am playing with it the patterns that can be formed are sucking me in…Umm with waste canvas I could add them to crazy quilting…

My Band Sampler 137 – Stitch Explorer – Details 840 and 841 January 19th, 2009

Reverse Chicken Scratch

What a difference a change of colour makesThe next obvious variation of chicken scratch for me to sample was reverse chicken scratch, the image on the right shows the chicken scratch and reverse chicken scratch together, I love how the change of thread colour has the appearance of changing the colour of the ground fabric.

I then did chicken scratch as a counted thread, next to that done on the gingham background I thought this line looked almost to perfect…If you look closely the left side is slightly different to the right side because some directions laced the thread around twice and other directions only laced the thread around once, so I just had to try both….for the first 4 laced stitches I wrapped the thread around twice and for the last 4 I only wrapped it around once, I prefer the double wrap.

My Band Sampler 136 – Stitch Explorer – Detail 839 Pink it Is January 18th, 2009

Stitch Explorer Chicken Scratch a

Sharon’s 2009 stitch challenge is Stitch Explorer.

The January embroidery style is Chicken Scratch, a technique traditionally done on gingham…I went looking through my fabric stash and could find 1/2 inch, 1/8th inch and 1/16th inch gingham but not a scape of 1/4 inch could I find. I thought about making do with one of them but before I explore any stitch I like to do a sample of the traditional/basic stitch so when visiting a friend on Saturday night we searched through her fabric stash for some and had just about given up when we found a small scrape of 1/4 inch pink gingham, so Pink it is.

I stitched the gingham onto my sampler and worked this first sample with a white silk thread, thank you Primrose Designs for the Chicken scratch instructions.

I have added a Stitch Explorer Category for those that would like to follow just the stitch explorer posts.