 I love Up and Down Buttonhole Stitch, it is hard to draw but easy to stitch and I really like how the thread sort of curves between the stitches.
The variation on the right is not unlike Feather Stitch and indeed when I went to the Contents Page of Sharon’s Stitch Dictionary to get the link I found that it is there as Up and Down Buttonhole Feathered.
The seam on the right is 2 rows of zig zagged Up and Down Buttonhole Stitch…I was going to put beads into the little V’s along the edges but decided that it looks good as it is and didn’t need any more beads.
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It was the big and small squares that I liked in the sketch I attempeted yesturday so today I took that part of the idea and executed it in Fly Stitch which I sealed with Colonial knot…The other thing that I did was to work the small squares first with 2 strands of a silk thread and then went back along with 4 strands of the thread for the big squares…Beads completed the seam treatment.
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 Well this stitch did not go quite as I planned. I had planned to do the chevron variation sketch from the page in my visual journal for Chevron Stitch from TAST week 5 But when I pulled my first choice of thread through the red fabric it resisted and pulled threads in the fabric, I was doing it at a friends house and had only taken a limited number of threads and the only one fine enough to go through the eye of a smaller needle turned out to be a hard to manage rayon thread…I persisted to the end of the seam but the stitching ended up a bit wonky and if I had tried to mirror the stitch on the other side of the seam the wonks would have been exagerated so I decided that I would be best off finishing the seam simply with beads, I did give it a little interest by adding extra beads in the spaces.
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This seam is a wavy line of chain stitch with addition detached chain stitches for leaves and Pistol stitch done in a cotton floss thread.
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  This seam treatment is one of the ideas for feather stitch in my visual journal forTAST week 7…
When I looked at it again it had me confused as to how I had overlapped the stitches and I had to draw it again in 2 colours to figure it out.
For best results choose a stranded thread so that where the second row overlapes the first row the threads will blend softly together and not be obviously double…I used pearl twist thread for my sample so you can see how the threads sit side by side so the overlaps sections are more visible.
Start by working a row of Double Feather Stitch then turn the work around so that the second row is worked in the opposite direction over the top of the first row…orientating the first stitch of the second row was a bit tricky and hopfully my samples illustrate clearly how to get that second row started…once the first stitch is in place the rest of the row is easy.
I like this seam treatment so much that I have also done it on my Box top.
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These stars are an extension of the stars on the fabric…The stars are formed from 5 Straight Stitches which I have demonstrated below, I have stitched mine free form because I like the different shapes formed by the randomly spaced points but when you are learning or if you want a regular shaped star you can make yourself a template by tracing a star with permanent ink pen on a piece of plastic and poke a whole through each point…Tip for a neat finish when doing the last stitch weave it over the first thread and under the second thread that it crosses.
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As you can see I have gone with my idea from yesturday and created a stitched picture along this seam…The sand, waves and water are couched threads and straight stitches done with rough textured, varigated threads, I did a google image search for fishing trawler to get the basic shape for the boat and stitched it with straight stitches and the Sun is a circle of Barred Chain Stitch.
I Can’t remember why I originally planned this project to have embroidered seams but no embellishments but thinking about it I have realized that by embellishments I meant baskets, flower clusters, ribbon fans, lace butterflies, embellishments that are pretty but have not particular meaning and I may have felt that they would overwhelm the images that I wanted to be the focus…In the 12 years since then I have done a lot of themed and biograhical crazy pieces which has expanded the meaning of ’embellishments’ for me and whilst I still feel that embellishments that are just pretty would overwhelm and distract from the images I am thinking that embellishments that are relevant to family history/stories/memories would compliment the images, add a lot of interest and actually enhance the finished project…I discussed the pros and cons with my sister and decided that for now I would include ‘some’ embroidered embellishments as I have done in this seam where the fishing Trawler will remind my mum and family of the 12 months that my dad spent working on the trawlers and that he remained friends with the fishermen who would often drop by with a bucket of fresh seafood, we were poor but as we sat under the mango tree eating prawns, crabs and my favourite morten bay bugs we would wonder what the rich people were eating, amused that it couldn’t be better than what we were dining on.
I have a feeling that with the decision to do this seam I may have opened the floodgates because my mind is already thinking of a few charms and how could I fit them into a seam treatment…
Below is the finished 12th block
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I have done twisted chain stitch before but never done Barred Chain Stitch, this weeks TAST stitch…After playing with it in my visual Journal I picke the above variation because I thought that it looked like waves and I was going to put it on the block with the shells and seaweed but when I looked at the block I thought the barred chain done in a circle would look like the sun above the beach, when I started drawing the sun a little picture developed along the seam, I am still not sure wether I am going to go with that idea or not because it takes the embroidery in a different direction to what I had planned for this project but I do like it so while I think about it I stitched the seam above on another of the blocks and was glad that I had done it on a different block because the spaces between the bars is wider than I thought it would be and it doesn’t look like waves at all…
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 After I posted yesturday I realized that I may have made the stitch look a little confusing because by not thinking ahead I had started the herringbone on the right hand end which meant that to have the scollops at the bottom of the seam (and still be able to stitch the underneath thread of the crossover first) I had to work the bottonhole from right to left and although doing buttonhole in the reverse direction direction is not difficult it does make the illustration look a bit cackhanded so I decided to give it another go (I like stitching this seam treatment, it is not quick but its repetitive nature makes it a good seam to do while I am watching TV).
To make this seam distinctive from the ones last night I stitched the scollops in alternating colours which also has the advantage of making the illustrations clearer…
 I have also added an extra image image to show how when the end of the underlapping scollop is finished the thread is sitting on top of it ready for the next scollop ….Last night I also forgot to mention that using a tapestry needle for the buttonhole stitch makes it easier to slip the needle under the herringbone thread without catching the fabric beneath.
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Above is one of the seams on my box top below I have repeated it on mums memory quilt…It is Buttonhole stitch worked over the threads of Herringbone Stitch.
The cotton pearl thread I used for the seam above stitched up more evenly and neater than the softer silk thread I used for todays seam…I do like the way varigated thread works in this seam treatment.
when working this seam treatment you will find that the buttonhole stitch wants to twist around the herringbone stitch thread but this is not a problem as the thread is stabalized at the bottom of the curve and again at the top with the seal off stitch at the end of the loop…At the bottom of the curve work a couple of stitches going under both threads of the herringbone, this will stop the twist at this point.
At the top work up to the cross of the herringbone threads then pass your needle under the top thread before doing the last couple of buttonhole stitches.
 See next post for more information…
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