Annies Crazy World

A couple of weeks ago Here and Here and Here I showed the designs and miniature knitting I did in preparation for this seam.

The knitting needles are made from a 2 inch lengths of stiff wire which I sharpened at one end and glued a bead onto the other end, To hold them in place I put glue along the back of the stitches on the needles and uses a silver maetalic thread to put stitches over the knitting needles where they cross, at the end of the knitting and on the ends, I also glued 2 stitches around the beads on the end, the stitches I glued on will not only prevent the needles from being pulled out but improved the look of the knitting needles because before I added those stitches the knitting needles looked more like nails.

I had made balls of wool for each colour in the knitting but they made the seam look clutttered so I went with just the 2 colours that I had on the knitting needles.

I now have 25 blocks made which leaves 5 to go.

No prizes for guessing that this seam idea came from the pattern in the fabric…

The dangling beads are done by threading beads to desired length of dangle, select the end bead and go through it only once before putting the needle back through the rest of the beads in the dangle and through to the back of the fabric…leave thread a bit loose when securing thread on the back, if thread is to tight the dangle will stick up instead of dangling

More often than not when a repeat a seam treatment it will look quite different the second time…This one surprised me at just how much the same as the first one, that this one looks…I just love how delicate this seam looks.

I refined it a little more the second time by doing the second twisted chain on each butterfly over all 6 of the foundation stitches, by doint this I was able to get the body of the butterfly looking much tighter and neater…and then I couldn’t resist adding straingt stitch antenna.

This morning I realized that it was Monday and that I hadn’t yet done any Butterfly Chain, this weeks TAST Stitch.

Some times I can imagine how a new stitch will work on a seam other times I need to experiment which I do on a sample block…

I wanted to emphasize the butterfly in the stitch and I worked groupings of 3 short and 3 long foundation stitches hoping that when they were drawn together with the twisted chain it would look like front and back wings of a butterfly….It sort of worked but I left to big a gap between the foundation groupings leaving me with long floaty, catchy threads on the front which I need needed to couch down, I used a green thread wrapped around the flouty thread and detached chain stitches half way along to anchor the stitch, this made the connecting threads look vine like and made the butterflys stand out and look better.

I also got Block 25 peiced…The little Darling on the block is myself, age 5.

Ballina is a man made Island, A creek and a river connected by a canal, surrounded by water with wharfs and bridges, boats and beaches to fish from, fishing was a common occupation and fresh fish a big part of our diet…I didn’t do much of the fishing but did help to cook them and they were always crumbed and fried.

I reduced the visual journal thoughts to the basic ingredients…

To cook fresh fish dust fillets with flour, dip in beaten egg and milk, coat with crumbs, fry in oil untill golden brown, season with salt pepper and lemon or Malt Vinegar…

I hope that I will be able to find a Lemon shaped button or charm which I will put at the bottom of the vinegar bottle…I made the packets and bottles by photographing the items, printing them on T shirt transfer and then cutting oround the edges of the items before ironing to the fabric so that when I appliqued them I only had fabric to turn to the back…The applique was a bit fiddley but not to bad because the T shirt transfer meant that I didn’t have to worry about the fabric fraying…I padded the eggs for extra effect.

And Below is the finished Block 24.

The Big news today is that I am an Aunty again, I had the phone call from my brother earlier today and was delighted when he told me it’s a girl.

I found tonights stitch Chained Feather Stitchon Page 22 of The Anchor 100 Embroidery Stitches Book,
Sharon has a similar sititch in her Stitch Dictionary.

When I started this Block I said that it was for a friends birthday, that was a little white lie to keep the secret in case M happened to read my blog.

The truth is that it was for a friends farewell quilt…a gorgous American girl who has been liveing in Canberra for the last few years and now has to move and we have made a crazy quilt for her so she can take something from all of us with her.

At our meeting tonight M had little presents for each of us and We presented her with her special crazy quilt…and yes she loved her new quilt and was down on the floor examining it while we all told her about the blocks we had made.

We all took a plate of Aussie food, including a Pavlova, Lamingtons, Anzac Biscuits, Tim Tams and Vegemite Sandwichs…and had a lovely night.

And Below is the secret project that I have been working on…Tuesday 4 of us got together and got most of the tying done onto the false back (and false back continued)…Wednesday 2 of us got together finished the tying, added the real back and Buttons…and I put the bindings on last night and this afternoon…The centre block is for us all to sign which we did with a green pen.

The middle block in the 4th row is Sharon’s Block which you can see here

In a comment re detail 260 I was asked
‘how do you hold down the rickrack while you sew the herringbone stitches?’

I start by attaching one end of the ric rac (These also work for braids and laces)…There are several ways to attach the end of the ric rac to the seam: I mostly slit a few stitches in a seam, slip the end of the ric rac under it and then restitch the seam, If I don’t have access to the seam I turn the end under, with ric rac you can twist it back on itself so that the end finishes tucked in or the end can be covered with a lace motif or a button cluster or on of Sharon’s ric rac roses would cover the end nicely.

The actual answer to the question is that I don’t hold the braid down while doing the stitches…I lay it along the seam, if it moves I adjust it before taking the next stitch…If you are still learning the stitch or just knot comfortable without the ric rac being held in place then you can run a tacking thread down the middle of the ri rac braid, work the stitch and then remove the tacking.

Work the Herringbone Stitch into the spaces on the ric rac.

To hold the ric rac (this also works well with ribbons) on with Colonial Knots come up close to the edge of the ric rac braid or ribbon, make the knot and go down just beside the braid.

or use any other stitch that you can fit into the spaces or a combination of several stitches.

When Sharon loaned me the size 14 knitting needles she also showed me some old needles that were bicycle spokes that had been sharpened to a point, I wondered if the emery board would be sharpe enough to file metal…I found some wire that doesn’t bend easy and the emery board did the job, they are not as nice to knit with as the commercial needles but they did work…

…So what can I knit with them…Ummm I will want cloths to hang on the cloths line…It took me a few attempts to get the sizes and patterns but I am delighted with just how well they worked, particularly the 3rd singlet which I did with crochet cotton and…

…the third dress which I did with a fine embroidery wool. I started with twice the number of stitches as I wanted for the finished bodies and knitted knitted 2 stitches together for the row between skirt and bodice…I knitted the back and front at the same time so that I didn’t have to count rows, did the skirt in garter stitch because it is easier to do and has added a nice contrast and crocheted, using a tiny hook that I inherited from my Nanna, the sleeves after joining the back to the front at the shoulders (the image shows it with 1 sleeve done), I also ran a thread around the neck line to tighten it up…I have found knitting these quite addictive and do hope that I have it out of my system now.

I thought that the block needed a quite, simple seam to balance Yesturdays seam and chose a seam of
wheat stitch positioned end to end.