I've been commissioned to make a custom Priest's Stole

Cool, eh? So y'all get to come with me on my journey from fabric and threads to finished piece. This is for the priest at the church I attend, and she totes adores the stole I made and gave to the church, and gave me the impetus to set my hands to doing this--actually, what she said was, "You could make a lot of money doing these, people are always looking for custom and One of a Kind stoles for friends and family members who are ordained." I'd say money wasn't a consideration, but I looked at the prices for stoles, and the polyester machine embroidered ones go for $150 and up. I mean, like, ChaChing! Uh...and the custom jobs out of silk and hand embroidered etc...CHA-CHING!!! One of the few areas in embroidery where you get paid a decent amount for the labor etc...

Day 1: I typed in and printed out the wording I am stitching on the stole. It is a piece for the Feast of St. Francis, and the Blessing of the Animals, something our priest does with great aplomb, including the time my Mother-in-law's cat (we took him in after she passed away, because he was a vicious rat bastard of a cat that hated all humans EXCEPT MIL, and no one really wanted him. So...ANYWAY) MIL's cat swatted her chin while she was blessing him. Uh, If you look back over previous entries, I have pics of him on here. Because I love stitching, and I love cats...

The main fabric is a Laurel Burch print of animals, from her Jungle line. It is black with colorful animals, and I love the print quite a lot. Oh, and I'm going to be making two of these, because I'll be attempting to sell some of my creations from my Etsy store...just look for the Deranged Magpie's shop in a couple of months I should have at least two pieces up, maybe even three.

Here is a picture of the print. I actually had this because I love Laurel Burch's quirky take on creatures, and also because when you have cats, you occasionally get clawed holes in your clothing. So I use the animals as little patches. Fun is good, fun and cute patches is very good.

 So that is the base fabric for the stole. Then there is going to be a section with the phrase "All Creatures Great and Small" in bright overdyed embroidery floss, in this case Bravo from Rainbow Gallery, two strands, backstitched. Here is a picture of the front of the patch. I have a sandwich of two layers of cotton fabric, black on ecru. The reason is that I needed to be able to see the pattern of the words...

 And here it is. I plan to embroider the cross with the colorful spirals that LB is so very fond of. And yes, I'm stitching from the back... Hey, sometimes you have to suffer for your art. Okay, not really.

 

I used the Brushscript font on my Mac, but didn't bother doing the thick and thin lines, just a simple outline. 

 

And here is my cat Gandalf doing his impression of a Jack in the box. This is his absolute favorite toy of ALL TIME. He fits through the hole he has his head out of, but prefers trying to wedge his body into the other hole that he can fit his head out of. I do not know why... Probably because CAT.

The Magpie

It has been a long couple of years, filled with a lot of self discovery and tears and angst and too many of my friends and pets dying. But I am starting to come alive again, and I have so, so many projects in mind--creativity is sleeting down like...well...sleet. I lost my beloved Einstein, and a bit over a year later my even more beloved Berkeley--both were due to kidney failure. The daughter is in college now, learning to be a vet assistant, and one of the things she learned is that if it weren't for the thyroid and the kidneys, cats would live forever...and the thyroid is maintainable with medication...

I have two new kitties, both all white, named Galileo and Gandalf. What can I say, I am a total geek, and love the sciency stuff. Here are some pictures of them being totes adorable:

 Galileo, about a month after we got him, and about a year before the next picture...

 Gandalf. Don't you just love those HUGE feet?

 Galileo has claimed the new kid as his personal sleeping buddy...

Gandalf all grown up and exceeding fluffy.

Galileo is a sweetie, and he is also what I call a "caretaker kitty". If you are feeling blue, he will come and try to cheer you up. He has short hair. Gandalf is at least part Turkish Angora--a dead ringer for the pics on the net actually, so...Both have been neutered--there are enough cats still breeding to keep us up to our eyeballs in kittens already. Galileo has amber colored eyes, and Gandalf has bicolored eyes, one gold, one green. They started out much closer in color, but as he has aged, the green and gold have become more distinct. He is also completely deaf--we have learned to stomp on the floor when we want his attention, and he has learned to compensate also--meaning, he tends to hang around the cupboard where we keep the food if it is getting close to feeding time. He is also scary smart--most of my cats are, just lucky I guess, if you want to call it that, The only thing that saves us is the not having opposable thumbs. He figured out how to turn the electric can opener on...

The plan is to get some pictures of my projects up soon. Until then, keep stitching...or whatever your hobby may be.

THE Magpie