A(nother) baby gift

What's been happenin' needle-wise around these parts?

Had promised a new mother-to-be friend a keepsake for her first baby.

Promising's the easy and quick part....More......

Deciding what to do, making a gazillion sketches, being enamored of the latest when done, but somehow dissatisfied the day after, going through the cycle again and again, finding the perfect frame, having to reduce the design even more because the aperture is quite small, and so it went for months.

Thank goodness a baby is in gestation for 9 months because, I swear, that's almost as long as it took me to do this project, as little as it is (the diameter is no more than about 3 inches across).

I started out with something much more elaborate and flowery, though shied away from designs too baby-ish in nature...I wanted this to be a keepsake she could keep out and enjoy forever (nothing pretentious about me, nope! nope!). Settled on a monogram: GM.

The small space available for the stitching helped me focus on making the design ever more clean, especially since I wanted a good balance between the more elaborate frame and it. (Keep the frame/final form in mind when designing your projects!)

The mom and baby (Hi! I. and G.!) are coming into the office, tomorrow, to say "hello," so I finally can spill the beans.

That's what I've been up to, amidst this whirlwind of work.

How about you?

Is there life after cushions? (03)

As long as we're talking about pincushions, here's the one...More......I made with my initials for myself. It is filled with the sand intended for creating sand pictures in decorative vases (I have to get very creative about coming up with product substitutes, as craft stores don't exist here; needle work stores concentrate on cross stitch and, for needlepoint, DMC, which has threads either too big, or too small, for 18-pt; and postage costs are prohibitive).

Lining it and adding a zipper would make it just the right size in 18-pt for a change purse, too. (Because of its small size, it might be too hard to sew with right sides together, then turn...with the wrong sides together, fold a ribbon around the circumferance; sewing it down--being sure to catch both edges of the ribbon, front and back--will close up the little purse.)

My approach to designing my needlepoints (Part 2)

So, I tend to adopt consciously at least a degree of stylization in my designs,...More......as you can see in this Christmas decoration executed in honor of the birth of the first child of a friend. Now, I think you can see that "a degree of stylization" doesn't have to mean "abstract," for those of you preferring what are called the "figurative" arts. It really just means something important in all the visual arts: being aware of the possibilities and limitations of the medium, and keeping them in mind during the design process.