A Bluestocking Knits

Page 7

Page seven of the nine-page chart for the "Quaker Virtues" sampler.  I had been feeling for a while that the border would look more finished with two lines of stitches instead of one, so I went back to the other side and have begun adding in another line.  I'm quite content with my rather agonized choice of three shades of Antique Blue -- blue and white china being always pleasing to my eye -- which makes the eternity that this thing is taking into a journey, not an arrival-to-be (!).  Laura -- who to my astonishment and delight has decided after working a set of small cross-stitch pictures that she actually likes this hobby -- frequently asks me, "How far along are you now?" and I sigh and say, "Not halfway yet," but I think I've passed that mark without even noticing, since page 4, the one above what I've just finished, is in fact the only remaining full-page of the chart, and the rest are all partial pages.

Books and Threads

There is a new-to-me meme hosted by Kate of Books are My Favourite and Best, called "6 Degrees of Separation", one of two that I came across unexpectedly the other day -- this one has you take the book chosen by Kate, and link it in succession to five more books, and see where it takes you.  (You don't have to read, review, or even have read them, just link them together by whatever occurs to you!)  The given book for October is The Turn of the Screw, which I confess I've never read, but I think you cannot get a degree in English lit without knowing all about it, so I lighted on the governess theme and went to Jane Eyre, which I have read, multiple times in fact.  It was happily part of a class I took in Victorian lit, in which we also read North and South, which was new to me but I liked very much.  (Also the series, which I thought was very well done.)  Gaskell reminded me in turn of Cranford, which I had started reading some years earlier but didn't get very far into before giving up, and then just a few months ago, after watching the series for the umpteenth time, I gave the book another chance -- though I was aware that there are quite a lot of differences between the two -- and really enjoyed it.  For nos.5 and 6, I made quite a jump -- I was looking at the cover illustration for Cranford, and I still don't know which came first, but I thought of bonnets and Laura Ingalls' perpetually-slipping bonnet ("Laura! Ma says you'll be as brown as an Indian!"), hence Little House on the Prairie, and of that fellow peering over the top of the fence, who reminded me immediately of Mr. Collins, hence Pride and Prejudice!  (To be honest, I'm more bothered now, looking at the Cranford cover, about that chair leg! I'm sure it will give way under that poor girl at any moment!)

I have also chosen these particular covers because I find them both appealing and appropriate to the book!  (Except for that wretched chair leg, of course -- do let me fetch you another chair, my dear! ...)

Steady progress on the "Quaker Virtues" sampler.  I like the "Driftwood" taupe-y brown, but I'm not entirely convinced yet, so I've put the one letter in so that I can think about it for a while.  A dark coffee-brown would be handsome, too.

But, oh, what is this?

I had ordered a piece of linen and the "Anna Ohman" sampler nearly a month ago, and shipment of the linen kept getting delayed -- one of the reasons I decided to go ahead and start "Quaker Virtues" -- but the linen arrived at last a few days ago, and looking at it and the chart, well, can you blame me?  I braved the 25 minutes' drive to the nearest needlework shop, which I was doubly happy to find open, in these uncertain times, and spent a happy hour browsing the racks and chatting with the owner on the other side of the shop.  The thread I was interested in trying, Classic Colorworks, didn't have enough in very many of the reds I liked, and so the owner recommended ThreadworX, which is not only a local company but comes in twenty-yard skeins, compared to Classic Colorworks' five.  I was hoping for a Falu red, that deep red so often seen on Swedish country houses --

so was delighted to find one that comes very close, and goes beautifully with the café au lait supplémentaire of the linen.

This is just the first piece of floss! worked with one strand, as the linen is 40-count.  Very small stitches --

-- but, oh, isn't it pretty?!

The other bookish meme I came across, when I was replying to a comment on my "Swallows and Amazons" post last week, is the weekly "Bookshelf Traveling for Insane Times" -- it was started by Judith of Reader in the Wilderness, and is now being run by Katrina of Pining for the West.  The idea is to share a bookshelf or stack of books in your house, and write a bit about them (read Judith's two original posts here and here) -- simply to share discussions about books literally and figuratively "un-hemmed in by spatial constraints or parameters".  I suspect that we are not the only bookish household to find ourselves short of shelf space, and one day I was looking without quite seeing it at the fireplace we'd been so disappointed to realize, after the excitement and confusion of buying our first house, was only a dummy with a gas hook-up and no chimney, and I thought now, "well, nothing's burning in there, might as well put books in it!"  It is clearly not ideal, having to stack books vertically, and it's even harder to dust than a proper shelf, but needs must ....

Most of our bookshelves have general themes -- the travel books are all in one place (along with foreign languages), the science fiction, mysteries, knitting, and so on -- but the fireplace, being a catch-all, didn't have any sort of plan, though as it turned out most of the books in it are history-related in some way, except for the D.E. Stevensons, the hardcover copies of which somehow found their way here from other places in the house.  I guess we've been on a history kick lately, though I do spy a few novels in there, and the Shakespeare books that wouldn't fit on the Shakespeare shelves.  Seeing this photo reminds me that I must finish The Wake -- it was very atmospheric and dense, I remember from the first chapter or so, but required considerably more of me than I quite had at the time, not unlike W.G. Sebald.

Done! ... ish

Here is my version of the "Peace to My Friend" Quaker-style sampler by Jacob de Graaf of Modern Folk Embroidery, on 32-count linen in Natural by MCG Textiles using custom-dyed floss.  I made some modifications, perhaps most notably to me the alphabetization of the ligatures (!), and in the dedication and initials plaques, and some tweaks here and there with spacing but which I think don't detract from the charm of the original.

It's "done-ish" because the frame is at the moment only a virtual one -- though excellent, and perfect for this piece in both color and elegant simplicity -- but I decided to enter it in the virtual County Fair we're having this year, the deadline for which is next Monday.  Even the mascot is getting into the spirit of things! --

It's Beginning to Sound a Lot Like Christmas Concert Season!

It's well into Christmas concert season, actually, but how could I pass up a title like that?!

I had a chamber choir concert at the end of November, a Christmas concert with the big choir a week later, went to Julia's instrumental-music concert at school, then yesterday helped to swell out the alto section when our director's church did "Messiah," which was fun -- it's done a lot, yes, but it is one of my favorite masterworks to sing, and I actually can't decide whether the soprano or the alto part is my favorite!  (Yes, I'm still wistful about not being in the alto section any more.  This is my seventh season as a first soprano, and that's still hard to believe.)  The church where we rehearse had asked for some singers for Christmas Eve, but then they decided to just carol on with the congregation as usual, and so while Christmas Eve services are always a pleasure, I'm a bit relieved to be able to just relax.

Here is a progress photo of the "Froth and Bubble" sampler --

at which I've obviously been slightly obsessive, as it's much further along than I expected.  I'm enjoying it tremendously, clearly! and am spending most of my free time, and I confess some of my not-technically-free time, on it.  At the moment, I'm pondering a color switch on those acorns in the bottom panel -- I can't seem to wrap my head around yellow acorns, so I've tried one in a golden-brown, which is not as realistic as the real thing, but more in between brown and the chart's comparatively bright yellow.  (Not that yellow is bad per se, mind you, but for acorns it's just not ... quite right!)

I was watching the Christmas 2017 episode of "The Repair Shop" yesterday evening, as one does, and was delighted to see that one of the craftsmen decided to knit a scarf as his Secret-Santa gift. 

It was a bonus that Will was quietly touched by the gift, perhaps in some disbelief that Dominic could knit at all, but also that he had gone to the effort to do so.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, and you knitters, may all of your knitted gifts be as happily received as this scarf!

Gifts of Needlework

Julia and I had a gift exchange last week that I wanted to make something for instead of buying, and so for one of them I chose a free biscornu chart from the Cross Stitch Guild.  I used the same colors as on the chart, except for the little back-stitched embellishments (for which I used the dark-brown 3371 already at hand in my box because of the "Froth and Bubble" sampler, but in hindsight looks a little too dark).  I also omitted the beads, as I hope this pincushion will be used and, personally, it sounds a bit risky to me to have a pincushion covered with beads, which would either get in the way or over time dull the points of the pins.  (Anyone with biscornu experience, please speak up!)  I left a bit more room around the design as well, which ended up adding an extra row of color by way of the whip-stitched seam.  Instead of a button, I "tufted" the cushion with cross-stitches that go all of the way through to the other side.  I used the tips for assembly from The Floss Box and Carolyn Mazzeo, which were helpful as it was a bit mind-bending without first having seen how the thing gets put together!  I stuffed mine with cut-up bits of Paton's Classic wool, as full as I could, as I've heard that the lanolin in wool helps keep the pins from tarnishing.  The chart was fun to work and I think it makes a pretty pincushion, so I'm pleased on the whole!

The other was a miniature coverlet, from the Diamond in a Square tutorial at Purl Soho that I had such good results with on my 1:12 version a few years ago.  This time I used the pattern exactly as written, so the layout is a little different from the 1:12 one.  Still Kona Cotton, though -- one of my favorite fabrics, I think.  I was tempted to hand-quilt this one, but I was a bit short on time, but I thought it did need some battening-down, as it were, so I stitched-in-the-ditch by machine.  This feels to me a bit second-choice, but there it is -- and I did really enjoy choosing the colors, and the process, as the tutorial is excellent.  The color balance in the photo is really off, I'm afraid, but I didn't have time to fiddle with it or wait for better light.

These were actually worked much earlier than the first, but of course I couldn't show them here just-in-case!  I decided to work a sampler for the friend who has joined the local miniatures group with me, so I chose a free chart from Kreinik called "Love Makes a House a Home".  I converted the threads from Silk Mori to DMC, which was a fairly simple matter.  I started with the main motto and worked down the chart, tweaking the house panel a little, to make the couple look more like our friends, and I shifted the tree a little and reshaped the cloud too, just for balance.  I enjoyed that part so much that when I went back to the motto and started working upwards, I ignored the little voice in my head that was telling me that the line of hearts and the alphabet weren't quite centered.  While I was blocking the finished sampler, David looked over my shoulder and said, "Um, is that part off-centered?" upon which a small howl escaped me and I admitted that it was.  I can't give it to J like that, I thought, so instead of working the whole thing all over again, as I was running out of both time and silk gauze, I looked around the internet for another free chart, and found a modern-looking one among the free charts at La-D-Da, the "Tiny Sampler".  My friend has a huge dollhouse under construction, which is to be a Victorian house "lived" in by a modern family, so can have things of any style, including contemporary.  The "Tiny Sampler" has a definitely modern air, especially the alphabet with its irregular-sized letters, and so while my heart seems to be with the "old" stuff generally, it was fun to do something quite modern for a change.  I used the floss colors as on the chart, though looking at it later I probably should have used a slightly darker blue for the details in the bottom panel, as they are a bit pale against the natural-colored linen I used.  This is actually cross-stitch, not tent, leaving the fabric background bare, both a nice effect and a time-saver!

In the end, I thought, "Well, if she hangs the 'House' sampler on the side wall of a room, the off-centeredness would hardly be noticeable ...!" and so I ended up giving her both!

There are a number of different ways of framing miniature needlepoint, two of which I found online, Janet Granger's and a more-complicated method at Face From the Past which I might try when I have no deadline -- I ended up using spray fabric adhesive (which I had left over from sewing my shoulder bag a few years ago) to attach the stitching to a piece of watercolor paper (because it's acid-free and stiff), making a frame with picture-frame moulding, the kind with the rebate under the inside edge since the needlework is relatively thick, and then instead of masking tape à la Granger (because I'm a librarian ... !), I secured the needlework in the frame with a glued strip of paper.

"Kindness In"

A progress photo for the "Froth and Bubble" sampler.  The original is surprisingly garish for my usual tastes, but I love it, though I admit to having toned down the colors a bit for my own version.  I think Long Dog's style might best be described as "neo-traditional" -- this one looks Elizabethan in its motifs, yet the colors are quite modern (even though, yes, the Elizabethans loved bright colors!), and the verse is from a much-longer poem by the early-Victorian Australian poet, horseman, and sometime politician Adam Lindsay Gordon.

The stitching frame I'm using is a bit ungainly and a pain to shift, so I am working a page of the chart at a time -- it is six full-sized pages!  I was a bit alarmed to see how very hot-pink that one flower stem (!) is, so I've left it either until I resign myself to it or can find a somewhat milder pair of pinks and pick this one out.  The dark-brown outline would tame it a bit, but it's awfully vivid ...

In other news, I got a dirty big stack of books for my birthday, pictured here with a ringer.  We went to go and hear Isabella Tree speak at the Theodore Payne Foundation recently, on a subject that interested both Julia and me, that of native-plant gardening and our relationship with our local environments -- the book was included in the ticket, but I would have bought it anyway, as it was fascinating to learn the effects of simply not doing anything, as it were, to the land, albeit on a much-larger scale and a very different climate than our own arid little suburban lot, and to begin to think about how we might work with nature instead of against it.  I very much enjoyed reading the two volumes of memoir in the Lucy Boston book, the first of which was new to me -- it reminded me in many ways of Gwen Raverat's Period Piece, though Boston is more fierce in her independence and tart in her manner, even as a child.  I will probably never get tired of leafing dreamily through Ben Pentreath's book, which seems to me to illustrate pretty much exactly what a comfortable home best looks like.  The small lives of women throughout history interests me, and so now I've just started The Jamestown Brides, about the literal shipment of fifty-six young women who volunteered their futures -- they were to be bartered off as brides -- in exchange for passage to the New World in 1621. More to come!

She Still Knits!

(I am regularly amazed and delighted at the generosity of miniaturists, in sharing both their knowledge and their stuff.  The lady who gave me the big Golden Lion Inn a few years back phoned me last month and said she is retiring -- from making miniatures, not admiring or owning them, as I'm pretty sure you don't retire from that! -- and would I like to have her stuff?  Of course I said yes.  Among the little treasures were these three House of Miniatures kits and this figure -- even though I don't "do" dolls generally, I got a big kick out of this one, since she looks a lot like me! even the slightly tired smile.)

But yes, despite the volume of not-knitting stuff on this soi-disant knitting blog, which may be excused lately because of the summer heat, I do have a bit of knitting on the go at last, though I confess that it is not only a pair of very plain socks but is in some wool I've had in a drawer for at least a decade, and was orphaned even then, from a stash that came from a yarn shop that was closing and made the rounds of multiple knitters at David's work but nobody wanted this so he brought it home to me.  (Like Maria's homely dress at the beginning of "The Sound of Music" -- "The poor didn't want this one.")

It has been a very long time since I worked a full-sized piece of cross-stitch, but for my birthday I got two sampler charts --

one of the band sampler designs from Long Dog Samplers, whose catalog is filled with wonderful, and wonderfully quirky, things, and a Quaker-style sampler from ByGone Stitches --

also with sentiments very meaningful to me.  I am starting with the "Froth and Bubble" but I was only able to decide between the two by remembering that I have been mooning over that since the spring, I think, and only recently saw the Quaker one.

These are gigantic compared to my usual petitpoint, and since they will have to be worked on a table frame will not only take quite some time but will not be portable -- unlike knitting on a pair of socks!  A bit of handwork for every situation, as they say.  (Don't they?!)

Some Fibery Goodness from the County Fair

Here is an eclectic selection of things from the Fiber Arts division at the County Fair this year -- things that caught my eye, mostly, out of quite a lot of interesting items, from all classes and of every type of fiber.  The above was, obviously, a bit of a show-stopper!

The first-place winner in the socks class.  Nice design, and beautifully worked -- I might hesitate to suggest to the fair staff, though, that the charming little elephant belongs on the outside of one's ankle.

I had thought that these would appeal to the judges and I was not far wrong, though in view of the competition, I can see why they chose the ones they did for first place!

I thought this was really stunning -- not only beautiful woodworking, but with a wild and gorgeous needlepoint back! and here is a closer view of that --

This is really charming!  I'm not sure what it's for -- billets-doux, perhaps! -- but charming.  I really like the silver-grey on cream color choice.

Of course this caught my eye very quickly!

I have always loved the William Morris acanthus designs, with their subtle shading.

And this I have mentioned before, but here it is again full-sized, so that you can see some of the detail.  Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of the whole thing -- it is probably twice this size.  It is a sampler in cross-stitch of past OC Fair logos, and quite incredible to behold! --

The Fair runs through August 12th, so if you're in town, stop by!

10th Update

(Not the tenth one, on the 10th ...!)

I finished the knitting on the second Mora mitten late last night -- now only have the weavings-in and they're done!

This is less successful -- my nth attempt at a sontag, which every single time so far has either been far too big or far too small, curled mercilessly, shrivelled ditto (twin rib stitch), or just generally disappointed.  I keep varying the stitch pattern or the sizing, without yet finding the right balance.  This one is too small -- again.

These, however, turned out exactly as I'd planned.  I have been continually dismayed at the ease with which the girls manage to dent and scratch the metal water-bottles they take to school daily for lunch and various after-school activities.  Most of our older ones don't stand up straight any more, from being dropped or knocked over, etc. etc. etc.  When I found these new ones at Costco recently -- the mouth is large enough to easily get ice cubes or a bottle-brush into, and the lid has no moving or difficult-to-clean parts! -- I decided that I should take some protective measures, and so of course being me I thought, "well, what about a crochet sling-type cover?"  These are a mash-up of two free patterns, Kat McCab's "Water Bottle Cozy" and Kelly Spenhoff's holder with a strap -- I used the stitch and the shaping of the former, and the latter as inspiration for the carrying loop.  So far, so good!

I am also slowly doing some handy-man work on the dollhouse -- regluing loose pieces of trim, mostly.  Am dreading sanding that dark-green paint from the upstairs room, which I am sure is going to be a challenge to cover up, but it is just not attractive -- I should just get started, I'm sure it will give me great satisfaction once it's done!

A few weeks ago I joined Postcrossing, an international postcard exchange group.  Ireland is the latest country to issue a postage stamp in honor of the group.  I used to collect stamps, a very long time ago, found it interesting at the time but only from a distance once I stopped, but it is appealing to think of the occasional first-day cover like this one, to keep in a box or perhaps an album now.  I've just sent my second postcard, so am looking forward to my first arrival!

(I joined because I was feeling rather wistful about not really having anyone to exchange letters with any more, my oldest friend being hors de combat, as it were, and limited to e-mail as a result.  It's just not the same.  What a loss to the younger generation.)

I was delighted to see the Google Doodle for today -- it's Nansen's birthday.

As for my current petitpoint project, the Turkoman is slowly coming into shape.  I like the design a lot, mind, and the "faded" colors I decided on -- but it's tedious, I must say.  I've watched rather a lot of television, filling in all of that red background.

Goodness, I think I forgot to say that I started a separate blog over at Blogger (because it's free, to be honest) for the photos from our canal-boat journey.  We enjoyed it so much that David and I certainly plan to do another trip as soon as possible (Julia says wearily, "just not so many locks") -- maybe another stretch, or the rest! of the Stratford Ring, maybe Oxford ...?  I decided on making a separate blog so that I could play around with subject labels as well as focus exclusively on narrow-boating -- plus of course it's more of a family thing than just my own natterings here chez Bluestocking.

Some Church Kneelers and Cushions

Being me, I could hardly help noticing the needlepoint kneelers and cushions in most of the churches we visited last month in England.  Most were extraordinarily handsome, and each church's selection had a character of its own, to add to the character of the building itself.

I couldn't find out much about the history of needlepoint kneelers as such, except that it seemed to really take off in the UK in the 1930s.  Of course there is a centuries-old tradition of embroidered vestments and altar linens, but kneelers seems to be a (relatively?) new form.  If anyone closer than I knows more, please pipe up!  Perhaps I'll send off a question to the National Needlework Archives ...

(Goodness, here's a needlework tour of London!)

This one might be crewelwork, now that I look at it.  All four of the above are in Holy Trinity at Stratford-upon-Avon.

I thought these especially pretty.  Each pew has a different selection of botanical designs.  They are at St. Peter's in Wootton Wawen, Warwickshire.

St. Mary de Castro, Dover Castle.  This is the only church I noticed as having cross-stitched cushions, with perhaps three strands of wool.

This and the two below are all from St. Clement Danes in the Strand, London.  They show exceptional care and skill in the complexity of the designs as well as in the unusual shape, fitted to match the corners of the seats.  Most, perhaps unsurprisingly, have a military theme, presumably all RAF.

It was difficult not to stay there taking photos of each cushion, but this one is of course, charmingly, "oranges and lemons"! --