Picture of beaded bead and Granny Weatherwax

Here is a picture of the beaded bead I am working on.

 I thought at first that it looked kind of like a frog's eyes, but later started thinking it looked a bit like a corset, at this point. Um. A friend of mine calls me terminally naive, and she may be right, but I'm getting better. Anyway, the little bumps are going to go all the way round, and then a row of slightly bigger bumps round the middle, and a second row of the small bumps for the last row. Then I add crystals between the bumps, and work some rows to tighten the ends, and I'll be finished. Appearances to the contrary, the yellowish beads are actually ceylon white pearl.

 Here is the little pot of beads I am using to stitch the bead up with. Pretty, no? Ceylon white pearl, Delica 24 kt Rose Gold, iris blue Charlottes, Capri blue 4mm Swarovski bicones, capri blue luster size 11 seed beads and three cut size 12 capri blue AB seed beads.

Here are two pictures of my avocado tree. I started her in August, and in November noticed that she had sent up a shoot, but that something had happened to it. So I brought her out from under the table, where I had placed her so that she could grow undisturbed, and added some water in hopes that she was still alive, She responded by sending up a second shoot, which got to six inches tall, and which one of the cats promptly bit off. I figured the tree had possibly gone to that big forest in the sky, but on the off chance she hadn't I put a glass chimney over her, to protect her from voracious herbivorous felines. Well, about a week later, I noticed leaflets poking out from the chopped off stems, and so she acquired a name, Granny Weatherwax, who had a sign she would hold when she was out borrowing animal minds, "I Aten't Dead Yet", so that no one would bury her by mistake. Well, the avocado tree "Aten't Dead Yet".

THE Magpie

Beading and Embroidering

Here is the picture of the framed Wizard hat.  It was inspired by the description of the Archchancellor of Unseen University's ceremonial hat, written down by Terry Pratchett in his book Sourcery. I stitched in the footnote he had explaining things, and it is where I get my nickname. I am very pleased with the frame, and, for now, the rumpled look works for me.

On to beading. This is a design out of Bead and Button Magazine, the October 2010, Issue 99. It is their cover project, and I liked it because of the textures created by the different beads and the angles they were set in. I had to modify it a bit, as I am using the 4mm cubes, not the 3mm cubes called for, but everything else is the same. I think it looks like a circuit board because of the colors of beads I chose.

Meanwhile, I have purchased Stumpwork and Goldwork Embroidery Inspired by Turkish, Syrian and Persian Tiles by Jane Nicholas (Hardcover - Sep 7, 2010) and the pictures in the book are scrumptious. I mentioned before that I got to take a stumpwork class from her, and she is an awesome teacher, and she had pieces from this book with her, so I got to see the actual  pieces, not just photos. They are even more scrumptious IRL. I am currently waiting on an order from Benton and Johnson of various goldwork supplies, then I am going to order the wires and beads from Jane Nicholas' site, I have embroidery floss (even silks!) and ivory silk dupione, and you know I'll be busy. Speaking of Benton and Johnson, I'd like to post a sincere thank you to one Neil Halford, the ever so nice gentleman who answered a zillion questions for me, promptly and completely. And, I had my answers back the day after I sent the questions. He works for/at Benton and Johnson, and I really appreciated the awesome customer service.

My shoulder is continuing to twinge a bit, but nothing like even a week ago, and the neck seems to be pretty much all better. Hi ho, physical therapy is next.

THE Magpie

Oh to be by the Ocean, now that Fall is here

I belong to a group called the Tangle, stitchers of all sorts and ages who get together once a month to stitch and also to show off our stitching. We discussed the twelve steps stitchers might use, but we got to the first one, "We admit we have a problem regarding acquisition of stash", and decided there was no problem there, except for the problem of where to store it all.

Anyway, the Tangle met at Ocean City, and oh did we have fun. I finished two projects, the Jane Nicholas piece and also my Arch-Chancellor's Hat piece. Here is the photo of the Jane Nicholas piece. I think it turned out very well indeed.

This is the first piece of stumpwork where I have done the detached petals and leaves, and I really leapt in at the deep end with this one, as I had five flower petals, four dragonfly wings, three raspberries and two leaves to stitch and cut out. Oh, yeah, there was no partridge and no pear tree, but that might make a cute piece to do in stumpwork, along with the other eleven days of christmas.  I was a bit nervous about cutting out the petals and leaves, but I figured I had done the dragonfly wings, so I went ahead and snipped, but I did take them up to the room and did them in total silence. I think it turned out very well indeed. I am thinking of making an etui (that is a little sewing box that has a lid that you remove and the box kind of falls open like a flower) and putting this piece on the lid.

I also put the last ornamentation on the Arch-Chancellor's Hat, and also wrote in and backstitched the quote from Terry Pratchett's book "Sourcery", "When it comes to Glittering Objects, Wizards have all the Taste and Self-Control of a Deranged Magpie". I also did my initials in a signature that I came up with years ago, which I thought was very cool also. I sign a lot of my pieces this way.

So the only thing left is to get it framed and choose just the right place to hang it. I had a lot of fun with this piece, and if anyone finds this and wants to make their own version, just ask in the comment section and I'll give some pointers--although, really, I just cut out a hat shaped piece of red velvet that I had stored all balled up so that it would get lots of wrinkles in, and started adding shiny and sparkly stuff to it. Actually, I am thinking of doing another hat, this time from black velvet, and making it a flapper's cloche or something of the sort. But first, I have a plumeria flower to design and stitch. Although, maybe the plumeria would look nice on a black velvet cloche... hmmm...

Along with stitching at Ocean City, we also did treks to a shop a couple blocks down the boardwalk that is called Salty Yarns, where I got some new fabric for cross stitching, a couple of kits to stitch up, and the turtle bead on the hat, If you look closely at the picture, you may also notice a small shell just under the blue tassel, it is a shell I picked up on the beach and added as a memento of the trip. I got a couple of chances to sit on the beach and watch the waves as well, which is amazingly calming to the nerves.

THE Magpie

More on the Arch Chancellor's hat

So, I drive two ladies to a bible study at the church we currently attend, and go to the bible study so that they won't feel like I am inconveniencing myself, as neither of them drive, and so I started driving them. This is the church that I was making the altar frontal for, all those flowers. Remember them? Well, the rector asked how they were coming along at the meeting, and I mumbled something non committal which apparently reassured her that they were coming along fine, when what I really should have said, was, "I'm not working on them. I am angry at you, and as a result, any time I work on them my threads knot and break, my imagination goes on vacation, and what started as a joy has become a chore that I avoid, just as I avoid thinking about you. The altar guild should make a set of hangings however they want, waiting on me is silly." It seems that the altar guild has been putting off getting fabric to make a white set of hangings because they didn't know what kind of fabric I would like to sew the flowers onto, as the jacquard that is usually used for hangings and such is very slippery. Anyway, I'll see what happens.

I have reached the point where I can pity her, for her non freedom concerning a lot of things. For me, that is the first step toward being able to feel forgiveness.

On to more cheerful thoughts. The Arch Chancellor's Hat! I have been working on this for a while, and put it aside to give it some thought in the back reaches of the old brain, and then started working on it again. Also got a lot of beads and threads organized, and found (okay, I'll come clean, the reason I was organizing things was because I was looking for them) a quartet of beads that I wanted to put on the hat. They are pressed glass beads, pink, and they are elephants. I have to put them on, as Discworld is a flat planet that rests on the shoulders of four elephants, who are standing on the shell of a giant turtle. Yes, I am going to add a turtle as well. So I was pretty excited about finally finding the elephant beads, I've been looking for them for over a week.

Here is a picture of the hat just before I started adding the elephant beads. I have added two star shaped beads with some purple bugle beads and silver lined gold seed beads trailing off them. I also added some red sequins around the central stones.

THE Magpie

Wizard's Hat embroidery piece

I have been doing some clearing out of the house, which it desperately needs, and unearthed my wizard hat project from my pile of unfinished objects. So here it is, from where I started to where it is now.

 This is a hat shaped piece of velvet I cut out of an old dress that I picked up at a yard sale. I was looking for crushed velvet to do things with, and I love the color red. The floss is actually red also, I blacked it out.

 Here is where I stopped last time I worked on it. I have applied a tassel and a large crystal drop to the tip of the hat, and a large flower crystal surrounded by eight octagonal bermuda blue crystals.

Now I've added some pearl and gold colored braid and also a metallic gold fancy braid to the brim of the hat, and also some fresh water pearls around the octagonal crystals. I still have some way to go before this is as fancy as the hat described in the book, but I am well on my way. The book is Sourcery, by Terry Pratchett, and the hat is described on page 10, if I recall correctly. Readers of Terry Pratchett's Discworld books will understand this next bit best, but gold lace is involved, and ankhstones, which are like rhinestones but a different river. Having been unable to acquire any octarines here, I used octagonal crystals in Bermuda blue in their place. I still need to add sequins, and totally over do the decoration, as the hat is described. Overdoing is necessary, as, "When it comes to glittering objects, wizards have all the taste and self-control of a deranged magpie." Um. Well, now you know where my screen name came from.

Here are the leaves from the Jane Nicholas piece. I decided to do long and short stitch to fill. I have finished filling one of the leaves, and the other is partially filled. Once I finish that, I just have to add the veining, cut them out and apply them.  The masking tape is covering the stems of wire, so that they don't catch on the thread as I stitch, one of the tips that Jane gave us in class.

THE Magpie