Avoiding Injuries While Stitching

No, I haven't hurt myself. Not yet, anyway. I write the blog for my EGA chapter, Baldy View in Ontario, California. Our May meeting included a presentation by a physical therapist about how to avoid repetitive movement injuries while stitching. Some of you may find it useful.

http://baldyviewega.blogspot.com/

Stitching on a Plane

I realized that I was a serious stitcher when I started spending more time planning what I'd stitch on my trip than what I'd wear. I'm on a trip now and here's what I chose to stitch on the plane.
It's the Halloween Mantle from Bent Creek. It's on 18-count linen and stitched with pearl cotton so it's easy to see even in the inferior plane lightning. I need to finish up the witch portion and I'll be done. I'm thinking it will make a nice pillow.

Cleopatra's Cat

I have finally gotten back to working on my cat. If you looked at my stitching plans for 2013, you'd see that, in this fourth month of the year, I am about four months late.

Most stitchers would probably consider me right on schedule!

Here she is now. Cleopatra's Cat is a group correspondence course from the Embroiderers' Guild of America. She is charted for blue tones but I changed her over to red because I like red better and have a lot of it in my stash. I changed her eyes from gold to green.

The technique is called or'nue. It's a, get this, "laid filling stitch." Wha-a-a-t?

It works like this: you put down ("lay") metallic thread, then stitch over it to form the design. The original model was stitched on white-with-gold-metallic canvas. I used that same canvas, though it doesn't show up in the photos very well. And her face looks weird in this photo because I've only got part of the stitching done. She uses threads of wool, silk, cotton floss, pearl cotton, solid colors and over-dyes. She also uses just a little red metallic in addition to the gold thread.





 Here is the original photo from the EGA website.

You can see how different the design looks in a color change.

 Here are a few close-up photos of the various sections. If you click on them, they should get bigger and show more detail. See the gold flecks on the canvas? It looks really pretty in real life.

Soft little kitty feet.

This is over-dyed floss and gold thread.

The eyes will have a metallic gold iris.

Several of my EGA friends are doing this project also. We all made different choices. One stitched her on 24-count congress cloth instead of the 18-canvas, one stitched her on black canvas, etc. If I can, I'll get a photo of as many of the cats together as possible. Stitching with friends is just one of the many good things about being an EGA member.

I've been working on other projects as well. I still have to post my photos of Santa's Village from Cottage House Needleworks. I've also completed a cross-stitched quilt square for World of Charity Stitching. I'll get more photos up soon.

Christmas in March

I seem to have Christmas in my needlework right now. I signed up for the Santa's Village series from Country Cottage and am doing a SAL with a local group. I'll post pictures soon. I also just finished up four ornaments. The first three are a set of perforated paper gingerbread houses from the book "A Cross-Stitch Christmas: Handmade Holiday," and they have lots of beads.

Here is the first one. I added the Santa buttons for fun. I had three red bird buttons so each ornament got a bird.

Then there is this next little house. I opted for snowflakes on the roof. The bird is tucked on the back by the snowman.

This last one has a snowman button in the doorway on the front and it's little bird perched on the doorway. I have two different trees on the back. These little guys were more work than I'd anticipated but they were fun to make!

Then this ornament is actually a pattern from by EGA magazine of December 2011. My local EGA chapter, Baldy View, gave us all the materials for this as a gift. The kit even included precut cardstock, padding, and backing material. They even twisted up floss for the cording! Thanks, guys! It turned out really cute!

Cirque des Cercles

Here it is, all washed and pressed. This Ink Circles design was stitched on 25-count mushroom lugana over 1 thread. I really like how it turned out.

Santa's Village

Here is the first house in the collection, Santa's House. I'm picking up the Crescent Colors floss for the house tomorrow. This was two days of stitching.

Santa's Village from Country Cottage

I found out about this SAL for this adorable project, and then discovered that it was on sale at Beach Cottage Stitchers. I ordered the lambswool linen to stitch it all on one big piece.

Here are the first two houses. More information is at Country Cottage Needleworks. I'll be getting a chart each month. I've got a little bit started, but I don't my camera handy so I'll post photos when I get a chance. Unfortunately I discovered the SAL too late and it was already full.

I made my stitching plans for 2013 and can now report that I have done a big nothing on them. Cleopatra's Cat, which could not be finished by the middle of January anyway due to waiting for my thread, had not been touched. I have been working on my Ink Circles design because I was so close to getting it and it is finished and soaking in Orvus right now.