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Mary Corbet

writer and founder

 

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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Autumn Fire 3: Leaves & Color

 

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Woooohooo! Today’s the fun color day with Autumn Fire! We get to do two things that I just love doing, when it comes to embroidery:

1. We’re going to work with silk thread; and

2. We’re going to manipulate color.

If you’re just joining in, Autumn Fire is part of the Stitch Snippets series here on Needle ‘n Thread. This is a series of a stitch-along projects that develop here on the website and are available as PDF downloads for members on Patreon.

Although the first round of materials kits sold out, I’ll have more available in the near future. We’re just waiting on a couple key supplies.

Last week, we talked about design transfer and embroidering the trunk and branches of the tree. This week, we’re adding the fiery foliage.

Autumn Fire 3: Leaves & Color - cover
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Goldwork Progress: Moving on to the Sparkly Parts!

 

Oh golly. It’s Friday! Hurray!

Here in my small hometown in Kansas, it’s the last weekend of the Flint Hills Shakespeare Festival (Othello this year – spoiler: everyone dies). And that means that it’s going to be another busy weekend!

Next week, with that yearly milestone behind us, we will settle down again to some Big Progress here in the studio. We’ll be focusing on two things this coming week: 1. organizing, reducing, and packing supplies up for the eventually-imminent studio move; and 2. Goldwork. Goldwork. and More Goldwork.

We’ve been making some progress on the goldwork altar cover, I’m happy to say. Anna has been plugging away at the couching – which is finally all finished! – and I’ve started the chip work on the tiny tail of one letter.

Goldwork Altar Cover lettering
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Autumn Fire 2: Transfer & The Trunk

 

Time to launch into the official work on Autumn Fire!

Last week, we covered some preliminaries. Today, we are going to talk about design transfer and how to stitch the trunk and limbs of the tree.

As usual with stitch-alongs on Needle ‘n Thread, I’ll eventually have an index of these articles available so you can easily find them in one place here on the website, under Tips & Techniques in the main menu.

For members on Patreon, you’ll receive the instructions in PDF format, which makes it easier to save and print.

For those looking for the materials kit for Autumn Fire, we will have those in stock for you again. We’re just working on getting supplies in. Thanks for your patience!

Let the fun begin!

Autumn Tree: Transfer & Trunk
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Silk Embroidery Threads: A Recap

 

Good morning, and Happy Monday!

When we started warming up for the Autumn Fire stitch-along (which launched last week with the design and which we start stitching on Wednesday), many questions about silk embroidery threads started rolling in. In most cases, these questions are from our fellow stitchers out there who haven’t had the opportunity to work with silk threads and who feel a little intimidated by the idea.

That’s why today, I want to offer you – especially if you’re new to Needle ‘n Thread – some previous articles on silk threads. If you’ve not embroidered with silk before and it seems like a mysterious and inaccessible thread to you, hopefully this will put your mind at ease and perhaps it may even open up a whole new world of fiber for you!

Silk Threads for Hand Embroidery
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Autumn Fire 1: Preliminaries & Design

 

At long last! Today, we start Autumn Fire, the project I wanted to begin with you at the end of August, and here we are, approaching the end of September.

On the bright side, we’re just getting a taste of autumn here in Kansas. Perhaps my Autumn Mood (which is usually pretty chipper!) will kick in and the project will progress even better because of it. Two days ago, it was still 100 degrees here, after all. It’s hard to be cheerful about autumn when summer won’t release its hot little hands…

So, let’s talk about what to expect, cover some preliminaries, and then I’ll hand off the tree design to you. We’ll also chat a bit about the transfer of the design to your fabric.

Autumn Fire 1: Preliminaries & Design
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Fine Whitework: Techniques, Projects & Pure Inspiration

 

I know what you’re thinking! And I don’t blame you!

After my article on Monday about my book dilemma, here I am, writing another book review.

Oh, ye hypocrite! you may well cry. But this is The Thing: This book is so beautifully thorough that I could pretty much eliminate every other book I own on this type of whitework embroidery, thereby saving quite a bit of shelf space!

Of course, I won’t do that. I have several books on whitework that I very much appreciate and use.

But wow! Jenny Adin-Christie’s new book, Fine Whitework, is a barn burner from cover to cover. I think we are super fortunate to have this book available, written by a master embroiderer who has such a profound artistic sense and such notable teaching skills. It seems to me that only Jenny Adin-Christie could have written this book and pulled off such a masterpiece that makes traditional fine whitework accessible to today’s embroiderer.

That’s just my opinion. But let’s look at the book up close. It’s hard to review, because there’s so much valuable content in it. How do I choose what to highlight?!

Fine Whitework by Jenny Adin-Christie
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The Bookshelf Dilemma: True Confessions

 

There is a slim chance that I have an obsession with needlework books.

I’ve always been a book lover. I like to read. I love holding a real book in my hands and reading it. And when my hands are occupied with work, I like to listen to audio books.

Throughout my reading life, I’ve sunk my teeth into many genres of literature with insatiable enthusiasm until eventually glutted. Then, I moved on to the next genre and became a devotee of it until duly gorged. Right now – and for about the past five years – I’ve been on a non-fiction binge. I’ve found, much to my extreme delight, that non-fiction is possibly the best genre I’ve ever wallowed in, despite my calculated aversion to it when I was younger. You know the kind: well-written, accurate, supported by meticulous research, and related in the best tradition of story-telling? I just can’t get enough non-fiction these days.

Needlework books don’t really fall into any of the categories of regular literature that I’m talking about above. They are the Other Category of book that I tend to over-indulge in. I love needlework books! And I have a great excuse for constantly acquiring them, after all.

This poses a question: can you ever have Too Many needlework books?

Recently, I’ve been evaluating this question. I think the answer could be yes.

Needlework Books on Shelves
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