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Mary Corbet

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I learned to embroider when I was a kid, when everyone was really into cross stitch (remember the '80s?). Eventually, I migrated to surface embroidery, teaching myself with whatever I could get my hands on...read more

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Appliquéd Letters on Altar Cover – Finished

 

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Welcome to Tuesday! And to a Very Quiet Week at Needle ‘n Thread.

Anna, you see, is gone for the week.

And while neither of us may be the Most Talkative People in the World while we are working, it’s strange to be working alone again, in silence. It’s funny, though – I’m making it through my daily to-do lists in record time, for some reason. I feel so accomplished!

Today, I thought I’d share the results of the appliquéd lettering project that I told you about a couple months back, and that I updated you on here. My deadline for that was the end of May, and I was able to deliver it on May 30th.

Appliqué letters on an altar cover

If you’ve been around Needle ‘n Thread for the past few years, you might recall that Anna and I already embroidered an altar cover for this church. You can see the original goldwork embroidery cover here.

This appliquéd cover that I just finished is not nearly as “fancy.” Because of the wear and tear on the goldwork embroidery, we wanted a not-quite-so-fancy-but-sturdier option for the altar cover. We’ll have to do some repair work on the original goldwork embroidery, due to folding problems that the cloth encountered during use. So this new appliquéd cloth will stand up to the rigors of daily use much better in the meantime.

The space, as you can see in the photo above, is quite large. That photo was taken about halfway down the length of the nave of the church, so the altar is pretty far away from the back of the church. Still, the letters can be read from a distance – they just don’t show up so great in the photo.

Appliqué letters on an altar cover

As you move up the center aisle, of course, the lettering is even clearer.

I’ve never loved the spacing on this, as far as the lettering goes. The D, O, and M in “domus” are such large letters, that the word seems much more compact that “aurea” on the right side of the center, which seems much more spread out. The space both words occupy is the same, but the letters fill the space differently.

That’s always bugged me, but I can’t really see how it could be done differently, keeping the size of the letters proportionately the same.

No one else seems to notice it – or they haven’t said so – so maybe it’s just me.

But now that I’ve mentioned it, it’s probably going to bother you, too! LOL!

I wish I had thought to take a camera when we delivered and installed the cover, but unfortunately, I had to rely on phone photos again. Sorry about that! That’s what happens when I’m hitting so close on a deadline – I forget the peripheral stuff!

Appliqué letters on an altar cover

I managed to snap a few photos in the studio before leaving to deliver the cloth.

The effect is somehow not quite the same, is it?

Appliqué letters on an altar cover

I think the method of preparing the letters worked out well. They are definitely sturdy. They were relatively easy to apply. The trickiest part was taking the trim over sharp angles (which I only had to do on a few letters) and, of course, securing the ends of the trim. You can see where the ends meet up on this closer photo above, but it’s not noticeable at all from a distance.

It worked out. It was a relief to get it done and delivered.

Having a project like this out of the way is delightfully invigorating. Now we have more space now to do our normal daily work in the studio, and, better yet, I don’t have the pressure of that particular deadline looming over me!

Coming Up!

Coming up, I’ll share a blooper with you. Have you ever picked the Absolute Wrong Stitch for a project? Gosh, I have. Too many times to count. But I picked an exceptionally bad one last week, so I’ll share it with you.

That, and more to come!

Hope your week is off to a great start!

Rainbow Thread Cutters

 
 

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