I got the silver disk or nue done, and here you see it on the original fabric
and cut out and sitting in place ready to be appliqued there, with rays of silver probably shining out from it before I'm done.
This was difficult because with the cold weather and despite major hand care, my fingertips and thumbs are rough and dry and they snag the silk thread sumfink awful, which snags my temper, too. But we survived.
Then since I needed to be making something, I created a little notebook from the giveaway postcard I picked up at the Morven sampler show I blogged about a while back.
Simple saddle stitching, and my corner punch rounds off the corners nicely. I still like little notebooks, have made and given away a ton of them, despite keeping a lot of notes on my Ipod.
By the way, this is a great way to spiff up a greeting card -- just insert pages you've cut to match, stitch in place, and you have a nice little notebook with a great cover.
I've done this to send to people who warranted more than just a card but who aren't big on gifts, figuring this was half way between.
Incidentally, there are several good books on book making, but for me the most appealing and useful is this one:
Great step by step and photos, and you see the pages containing some of the steps I used in the stitching
A lot depends on how the light falls on this kind of silverwork, where the shadows move. It looks different from different directions. I'm hoping to get the disk finished at this evening's stitch-in.
I'll decide which way up is best to applique it to the night time wilderness piece once it's ready. My couching skills are improving, the edges of this disk better than the gold one. The silver is a bit easier to pinch and redirect from the side, too.
After this is done and appliqued, I'll finish up the glasswing insect whose wings are done, and whose body will be beads stitched directly onto the wilderness piece, probably the night one.
The wilderness pieces continue, with the hope of finishing the three in the next few days, well, we'll see.
Here you see the or nue gold disk in place as a "sun" figure in the daytime wilderness piece.
Still to come is one more critter to complete the piece.
And there's a "moon" in silver and blue upcoming to go into the night
time piece.
At this point it's felt pieces stitched in place, waiting for the or
nue, which I supposed, since it's silver, would be argent nue, but I
don't think that's what they say.
And again, that piece needs another critter to complete it. I think both might benefit from a couple of random butterfly wing shapes, too, but we'll see how they work with the last critters in place.
I have attached the freeform and painted crochet to the dyed silk background for my wilderness piece, at least one of them. The other is the black sateen one with this crochet design monotyped onto it with copper metallic paint, so it will echo this one.
Next will come some strategic beading, using silver,copper and gold beads as you see in the little dish, attached with the gold silk thread which you see there, too. After that will come the denizens and probably more yet to be thought up.
I photographed this from two orientations, and this is where I would like some input from blogistas -- do you have a preference as to which way will be up? before I attach animals and butterflies, I need to decide this.
The black lines you see, which in rl are a perfect square, but I couldn't get that faithfully, are the outline showing me the edges of the box frame this piece will go into. Incidentally, that's a good tip for any artwork if you already have a frame in mind -- show yourself where the edges will come as a guide.
So if you have a thought, please share it.
People have been asking to see the critters created to date, and what I'm up to. So here's the current state of play. The parts of the butterflies are still separate, until they are stitched onto the final surface, but I've tried to post them in their little bags so as to show you the general idea. The molded paper pieces will be stitched in somewhere, don't know where quite yet.
I've done most of the dragonfly body, but still need to bead the head and stitch some interesting features into the tail. Meanwhile, thanks to Florence, I have a piece of organza to work the dragonfly wings. And I've drawn them, and I'm stitching on the wiring for the shapes.
The pic shows the body on one hoop, the wings on another, and the working drawing cut out because I had to use it as a template for the felt padding of the body.
I drew in the wings on the body hoop, too, so as to remind myself of the placement. But when I came to draw them individually on the organza on the other hoop, you see that there are four parts to them, all to be wired and able to pose off the surface of the work. I love the stitching of the wiring. I'm using a purple silk thread for this.
Since I have two possible backgrounds, one a white silk with dyed colors, one a black sateen with a copper monotype on it, this might be shaping up to be a diptych, one daytime scene, one night time scene. We'll see.
I'm done for the moment with butterfly wings, and they are safely stowed till the rest of the piece is ready for them. So now I'm working on a little lizard, or salamander.
I drew and cut it out in yellow felt, stitched the shape down, forgot to take a pic of it, sorry, and now you see my original drawing next to the current state of play: the lizard is being given a coat of the same sparkly ribbon I used on the luna moth's wings.
I'll stitch this down all around then proceed to make it nice looking. The left hind foot will be stitched entirely. This is a different form of stumpwork, where padding is used, and the outer edge will be stitched closely same as the butterfly wings, so as to cut it off its background ready to install on the final work.
This afternoon is all about rain, so this will be a good stitching time.
