Category Archives: Embroidery

Beautiful embroidery, inspiration, stitches and works in progress.

Ash Wednesday

This post is at least a day too late.

Ash Wednesday was yesterday, but as I have said several times before, this tiny corner of the wwworld is my party and here I do what I like. So I’m going to post anyway.

My mother, my younger daughter, my granddaughter and I, all went to a charity sewing afternoon in a café in downtown Reykjavík last Sunday. We were sewing traditional “öskupokar” (lit. ash bags), for “Sun in Togo”, an Icelandic charity that supports vulnerable children in Togo.

My mother made a beautiful one, with two embroidery covered rocks. I was too slow to photograph it, (it sold immediately) but you can glimpse it in progress here:

I made one in advance at home (the embroidered one on the right). My daughter made the beaded one.

She also made a lovely one with hearts, that I forgot to photograph. The butterflies on my second ash bag (see below) were rather time consuming. so I had to hurry a bit.

This one would have needed a little ironing, but you can’t have everything, I guess.

The little one made a silver bag with lot’s of beads.

Here is my mothers second one:

 

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Embroidered Picture – Update

There has been some embroidery progress.
The coral column has been raised considerably and there are three new pastel coloured fishes above it now. They are sleek and self assured and fancy themselves a bit above their neighbours

On the left side a huge blue fish shows his head:

He looks curiously at the jellyfish, but he proceeds cautiously, knowing that they are slightly venomous. He is dangerously close to the poisonous and electric school of tiny crabs, swimming right below him.

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New Felted Embroidered Beads

The necklace with felted embroidered beads is almost ready.
There are two more “big” beads, about 2 cm in diameter

and two smaller ones.

That makes six in all, and I think that is just enough for the kind of necklace I have mind. The beads are so decorative, that I feel too many of them would be a bit much to wear.

I have not quite decided how to finish the necklace. A silver wire, a clear cord, a white leather band, a satin ribbon – these are all possibilities I am considering.

What do you think would be best?

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Felted Embroidered Beads

I have been embroidering.
Quite a bit on my picture, and then some of this:

The felted beads are pretty small, about 2cm/0.8in in diameter.
I’m going to make a necklace so I need at least a few. I haven’t decided how many yet.

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A Progress Photo, Embroidered Picture

This is how far I have got with the embroidered picture.
I recommend clicking on the picture and viewing it larger.

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2012 Project Calender of Knitting and Embroidery

When I look back on the year 2012, I feel like I didn’t get very much done at all.

But when I look at the archives, I see that my feeling is not entirely correct. True, I didn’t embroider nearly as much as I planned, but I did get some pretty good things done. I did some sewing and dabbled in other crafts, with varied results.

This year is going to be the year of the embroidery. The knitting is going to be less important, but I want to do a little more sewing too, preferably for me…

2012 Project Calender:

January:
My Grey Heart

February:

March:

April:

My Heart

My daughters confirmation was one of the highlights of the year.

May:

In may I was honored with a project grant by the Cultural Council of South Iceland. It was in connection with my embroidery exhibitions in Vík and Selfoss, but is was also, and perhaps mainly a recognition of my embroidery work.

June:

July:


This is a vintage dress I repaired.

A this is a lovely Ralph Lauren jacked I reworked a bit.

August:

September:

October:

November:

This is a wall. It counts.

December:


This is perhaps not quite everything. I did some more sewing, a lot of repairs and I’m sure I have forgotten something. But nothing important.

Looking at these project photos, 2012 looks like really bad year embroidery wise.

But things are not quite as they look. I started working on my first embroidery picture last spring and although I have not embroidered a lot this fall, I did a fair bit of work on it in the spring and summer.

I have picked it up again now and I will show you a progress photo very soon.

Happy New Year!

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Embroidery Progress

My embroidered picture now has a school of benevolent but ever so slightly venomous jellyfish.

The swarm of ill tempered tiny crabs is not finished:

There are going to be some seahorses. I don’t know how many yet, but more that one. Three or four perhaps.

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Embroidered Fish

The embroidered picture has three new fish.

They are very sleek and self-assured. They live in shallower water, closer to the sunlight, where their shiny colours really sparkle. But they venture further down on occasion, tempted by the rich feeding grounds.

This school of swimming crabs needs not worry about sea monsters, giant snakes or other dangers. They are both venomous and electric but they are very peaceful and gentle creatures.

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Monsters

I have picked up my embroidery again. Perhaps you can’t see much difference, but I have added a lot to the sea bed, and there are three new fish, swimming timidly towards the feeding ground.


The small but frightful sea-monster waits with open jaws to catch anything that comes too close.

On the other side there is a huge sea snake.


Fortunately is not very clever, but it has poisonous teeth and a very big appetite.

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Advanced Stain Removal

Accidents do happen.
Sometime the stains left by them are easy to remove in the washing machine.
Some require a little effort, but some just won’t budge, not matter what. Like these permanent marker stains on my little darlings favorite every day dress.

I guess the key word here is permanent.

Advanced Stain Removal

So there we take a different route.
Embroidery over stains or holes is one of my favorite clothes rescue methods. When dealing with holes, the hole needs to be closed first and then I just embroider something over it to cover it up, butterflies are a reoccurring theme.


This time I kept things simple. I used just two stitches. The Whipped spiders wheel and French knots . In the description it stated that the spider wheels should have five spokes (arms). Most of mine have six, sometimes four, even three or seven. Anything goes it’s just a matter of what kind of effect you want.

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