My January fabric postcard is a response to living in Canberra the ‘bush capital’ and my first attempt at a fabric postcard. When ever you walk in the Australian bush the ground is covered in twigs leaves, bits and pieces of organic matter that provide homes for a rich insect life. A dear friend once told me that to understand this land you had to walk it barefoot. I don’t walk barefoot but if anyone did the natural debris on the bush floor would definitely lead to an understanding of this place!
How I made the January Fabric Postcard
I used a large variety of threads and stitches on this postcard. I knew I needed a lot of texture for this design. So I dug out rough natural looking beads from my stash and chose a rough linen fabric also from stash. After tracing the outline of a foot on to the fabric I couched down some rough threads that are knitting yarn. I started to sprinkle the area with French Knots and Bullion knots. Wooden beads that I had to hand, were added for further texture. Below is what the January fabric postcard looked like after 5 hours of designing, digging out some fabric, threads and beads from stash and stitching
The threads I used were knitting yarns, cotton perle #5, cotton perle #3, wool and linen thread. I continued stitching as you can see below I added small straight stitches some fly stitches, half and full buttonhole wheel, and Oyster stitches. These links will take you to tutorials on how to do each stitch. Below is what the card looked like after 7 hours hand embroidery.
I continued stitching for 15 hours until the area was full of texture. In order to finish the fabric postcard I backed it with a piece of quilters cotton from my stash. To edge it I used the braiding foot on my sewing machine to stitch 2 rounds of tapestry wool yarn to the edge.
This is a bit of an experiment with the format of using a fabric postcard as a journal. I wanted to see if the format was suitable for a hand embroiderer or anyone wanting to work small due to other time commitments. Since it took 15 hours to stitch it is a bit of a time commitment but I feel the format has loads of possibilities. I plan to treat this format as a journal type project and make another next month. I will see how it goes
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Thread Twisties!
Experimenting with different threads can be expensive. You would normally have to buy a whole skein of each type of thread. My thread twisties are a combination of different threads to use in creative hand embroidery. These enable you to try out stitching with something other than stranded cotton. For the price of a few skeins, you can experiment with a bundle of threads of luscious colours and textures.
These are creative embroiders threads. With them, I hope to encourage you to experiment. Each Twistie is a thread bundle containing silk, cotton, rayon and wool. Threads range from extra fine (the same thickness as 1 strand of embroidery floss) to chunky couchable textured yarns. All threads have a soft and manageable drape. Twisting them around a needle makes experimental hand embroidery an interesting journey rather than a battle. Many are hand dyed by me. All are threads I use. You may find a similar thread twist but no two are identical.
You will find my thread twisties in the Pintangle shop here.
That is truly amazing! All of your projects/pictures are wonderful, but this is just amazing.
Hi All just thought I would leave a comment here to say that the postcard journal project details can be found http://inaminuteago.com/blog/index.php/6-x-4-lives/‘ title=’about’ rel=”nofollow”>here
and there is a sharonb
WOW… Teri was right.. it is a great site!
If you begin a Postcard Journal Project.. I bet others would follow you!
I am in the Art2Mail group, too great folks & wonderful work,too
Sharon—thanks for sharing & keep up the good work!
patsy monk
http://www.monkink.com
Oh my. This is delightful! Yes,,,,,it reminds me of a photo I took in Maine last summer of a little girl’s footprints in the sand. Sharon, this is great!! And I think your idea to use this for a journal project is perfect. I am in Art2Mail and I have not heard of anyone else using the postcard size to journal with.
teri
fiberandthread.blogspot.com
Hi, Sharon! Great work on the postcard. Fifteen hours is pretty good for that amount of close-work detail. I’m a hand-embroiderer. I do use my machine for some work, like mending! I really have to force myself to use it for my fiber work. Texture rhythm fascinates my fingers. Anyway, nice job…!
Wow, this is really BEAUTIFUL. I love it!
This is amazing! So beautiful and inspiring… Thank you for sharing!
I think I last saw that spare five minutes at the back of the kitchen draw or you could try down the back of the sofa with the remote or it could be under the bed with the dust bunnys
yes i think because it is a smaller size it lets hand embroiderers experiment and explore ideas – the larger size is just too big to do so. I could become addicted to this size as the format is also loaded with notions of communication from a distance – as I said I will see how it goes and blog it as I go.
That is really pretty–and i like the intimate size of the “portrait”. Looks like the beach a block from my house! great idea for ajournal project–hm, where *is* that pesky spare five minutes–i want the time for this too!:>
I love this peice! And thanks for posting the large detailed
photo too! I’m not using this size as a journal quilt project…but I’m using a larger 10 x 10 size. I think now that I’ve seen yours, though I’ might just also start a smaller postcard size project as well!
Thanks for posting the finished product. I love the detail (those little toes!) and texture you have been able to achieve 🙂 The colours are yummy too.
Thanks for the compliments – its nice to get feedback and when its positive its even better.
AMAZING!!!! yes, i love this……
🙂
I love your postcardn what a great idea! congratulation!