Another Cyber Class

I never promised you a rose garden...

but here's the other cyber class I promised you this month and I'm calling it my GARDEN GATE:


I just LOVE stitching gardens, and this one is an especially sweet little 6" x 8" project worked on 24 ct. green Congress Cloth. I really enjoyed working with a handful of subtly variegated flosses from ThreadworX that helped create a more realistic garden. If you look closely, you'll see that the lawn, bushes, and flowers are all done with those variegated threads.

In order to make the climbing roses a bit larger in scale than the rest of the french knot flowers, I chose to use Ribbon Floss for the french and bullion knots, and they really look like big fat roses! Also, the opalescent Ribbon Floss also give the roses a soft sparkle of dewdrops - a very magical and pleasing effect.

Here's a peek at the piece up-close:


And after I finished stitching all my pink roses, I realized the piece would also look terrific with pale yellow roses too -- so stitchers can choose which color they prefer to go along with their delphiniums: pink or yellow. And, I've also included a "WELCOME" script that can be added to the bottom of the design, since I thought this would make a lovely welcome sampler in any home.

I consider GARDEN GATE to be a more intermediate-level project. The stitcher needs to be comfortable working embellishment stitches (french knots, bullions, lazy daisy stitches) on top of stitched areas, as well as having the confidence to add lots of those stitches in random patterns.

Random stitching often creates anxiety in stitchers... but this is one project that DOESN'T need all the surface stitches to be precise and perfectly aligned - au contraire, mon amie! In this case, the sloppier and more irregular the better. I know it can be scary to start (there's always that fear of making terrible mistakes) but once you get started working all those knots, you start to loosen up and actually have fun with it.... (you know, it can be very freeing plopping all those bullions and french knots hither and yon, without worrying about how neat they all are!)

So, if this GARDEN GATE cyber class (which starts at the end of July) gets your garden green thumb itching to start stitching, please visit my website for more information and the class registration form.

A Few Distractions

I must confess that during these past few weeks I haven't been in my usual "All Stitching All The Time" mode. But I have a really great excuse: I've been in the midst of a backyard renovation.

These past few weeks have seen a flurry of workers transform my boring, bark-filled backyard from this:


to this:


WOO HOO! Which means that now, with a new flagstone patio AND a lovely lawn, Katie and I can actually walk out into the yard....and we're BOTH extremely pleased about that! As you can see, Katie is already relaxed and ready to play ball in her new space:


This week I plan to go shopping for a few trees and a bunch of shrubs to screen that boring ol' fenceline. And I can't wait to get to the really fun part: planting flowering bushes and lots of bulbs for springtime....

Oh, To Be in California When the Irises are in Bloom...

The irises are blooming now in Northern California.
It's so fun to walk around the neighborhood and see all the colorful irises in bloom. I never can decide which colors I like best - they're all so luscious. And they all seem so fragile, you have to enjoy them while they appear, for they are gone from the garden so soon...

Here's an iris that's blooming in my neighbor's yard. She has drifts of purples, yellows and even some coppery bronze ones that are very different.

And look what I did after playing around with the iris photo in Photoshop... I used one of the artsy effects to create this painterly version of the iris. I just love the effect! It reminds me of a pastel drawing, or maybe a bold watercolor painting...

I can visualize this translated into a quilt, using batik fabric. But I'll have to think about how you could translate this image into a stitchery piece. The blurred edges are so soft and very Monet-like....I'm not sure how you could stitch that effect, but it's worth considering using blobs of color, outlined with light, to create that halo effect...hmmmm.

And as long as I'm mentioning iris, here's one of the first flower collages I stitched: the Bearded Iris Collage. I used a soft variegated thread (Watercolours' Harvest) that had soft apricots and lavenders. Although I stitched it to hightlight the apricot iris, you could certainly use lavender colors to create a lavender iris in the center instead.!
I wish I could stitch it up BOTH ways, to see both versions....(and then of course you could also try a pale cream iris too)...sigh...there's just too many yummy possibilities sometimes, and it's hard to pick just one to stitch...

And because there are so many different types of irises, I'm planning to stitch another iris collage sometime - I'm thinking I'll do a Japanese Iris or my favorite, the Pacific Iris (both flatter flowers that you view from above)....

No Gnomes In My Garden

Some gardens have gnomes hiding in them.

They peek out from the flower beds, or even hang in little swings from the trees.

But my garden has a very small bunny I affectionately call "Bun Bun", after a rabbit my cousins used to have when we were growing up.

My Bun Bun pops up in lots of my garden shots because... well, he's just so darn cute!

Here he is in a patch of sweet wild violets that are scattered around my yard.

And he's joined by a rather large ceramic tortoise I just call Mr. Turtle. He's a very special turtle, because he was handmade by a very special artist at The Neighborhood Center of the Arts, in Grass Valley, CA. When I lived up in the Gold Country, I worked as the office manager for that art school for developmentally disabled adults. When I left NCA, they gave me Mr. Turtle as a parting gift....and he's had a special place in my garden ever since.

(He's got a goofy grin on his face because I guess he's been sniffing all the spring flowers!)

Anyway, I wanted to introduce these garden characters to you, because you'll surely see them again in whatever flower or garden shots I include here from time to time.

And always remember Bun Bun and Mr. Turtle's advice: DON'T FORGET TO TAKE TIME TO STOP AND SMELL THOSE FLOWERS....

Primrose Lane

One of the hardest things about being a stitchery designer is trying to focus on creating new projects while AT THE SAME TIME juggling a bunch of other important stuff. (i.e.: printing and mailing out patterns, preparing tax documents, arranging trunk shows, answering emails about pattern questions, walking the dog, doing laundry.) And now that spring is creeping around the corner, I have to add WORKING IN THE GARDEN.

At least when it's winter and it's pouring rain, cold and yucky outside, there's not much incentive to go outside and plant flowers. But here in northern California, winter hasn't made much of a showing this year, and all the trees and flowers have decided to move on into spring already. The reason I know this is happening is because last night, when I went outside with my dog for her last trip around the yard, I smelled a definite sweetness in the air. I sniffed and realized that the sweet smell was the early arrival of spring. The apricot and flowering cherry trees all around the neighborhood are in bloom right now and their perfume fills the air. The rosemary bushes and all the clumps of daffodils and primoses are blooming too, adding their soft scents into the air.

So, yesterday, despite the pile up of important things I should have been doing in my office, I gave in to this early spring's siren call and spent the day outside in the garden. I brought my dog, Katie, outside with me so she could lay on the lawn "guarding" me while I pulled weeds, neatened the rows of rocks that line the flower beds, planted six-packs of pansies, separated clumps of primroses and transplanted them in other areas.

All in all, I'm glad I spent the day outside, working in the garden. Because now when I look outside , I can enjoy the flowers and not feel guilty about neglecting the garden. And now I'm ready to focus on the piles of work INSIDE, because I know my garden has been cleaned up a bit and is ready for the flowering of spring. WELCOME, SPRINGTIME!!