White Threads

New distributor in New Zealand

The latest Vetty Creations news is that I have recently signed a distribution contract for New Zealand. This means that Vetty Creations wonderful step-by-step embroidery books will soon start to be available in more bookshops and needlework shops in New Zealand.

The Vetty Creations books that you may have seen in needlework shops and bookshops in New Zealand previously were imported by those shops. This new distribution arrangement will mean that Vetty Creations books are more readily available and therefore much easier for shops to obtain.

Its all part of slowly growing Vetty Creations. I sometimes get magazines ringing me, wanting me to advertise. Unless I have a very good reason, I usually decline, however wonderful they tell me that the current offer is. You see, I don’t actually want Vetty Creations to grow too big, too soon. (And I also feel that there are better ways of advertising Vetty Creations wares, rather than paid advertising.) I’m happy with growing slowly, because I’m also a stay-at-home mum to two kids. And that’s a very important job!

So to all you lovely people in New Zealand, particularly the guild groups, I hope that this means your favourite Vetty Creations books are soon much easier to obtain.

Christmas ornament swap – more

To follow up on the needlework Christmas ornament swap I proposed a little while back, we have already had a good number of people indicate that they want to join in, which is great. But I want to allow the opportunity for anyone else to also join in. I will set the deadline for signing up as October 15th. From that date onwards, I’ll close the list to any more people joining.

If you’d like to join in, we’re starting early because so far the people who are partaking come from all over the world. This means that we need to take international postage times into account, if we want the ornaments to arrive at their destination in time to be hung on the Christmas tree! It would be good for all decorations to get to their new owners either near the beginning of December, or by halfway through December, so that they have time to be enjoyed before Christmas.

If you’re wanting to join, keep in mind not only the posting time, but also postability of your ornament – will it get squashed?, posting prices, and the fact that some countries have very strict customs and quarantine requirements.

Who you are getting yours from will remain a secret until it arrives, though you will of course know who you are sending to – but you should also keep this a secret. Because of the secrecy, its fine for you to blog about making your ornament if you wish, because no-one will know (apart from you and me) who its going to.

If you sign up for this challenge, it is a true commitment. You need to understand that you will be allocated a “recipient”, who will be expecting a needlework Christmas ornament, made with much love. If you run out of time, and don’t make one or don’t send it, there will be someone who is disappointed. If you don’t think you’ll have time, then please don’t sign up. We want this to be a fun and happy swap!

After October 15th, I will contact all who have signed up to obtain your address so that it can be sent to your “giver”. Your address will be treated with kindness and respect, and will not be placed on any mailing list! I will draw names out of a hat to allocate “givers” and “recipients”.

If you have any questions, please just ask.

If you’d like to sign up, please add your name in the comments section. It’d be great to have you join us. If you have already signed up on the previous post about the needlework Christmas ornament swap, there’s no need to do so again.

38 count linen

For my new book, I’ll be working with 38 count linen. This means that the linen has 38 threads per inch, in both directions of the fabric – warp (down the length of the fabric) and weft (across the width of the fabric). 38 count linen is also known as Linen 20 or 20L linen sometimes in Europe. (I don’t know what that notation means though.)

I already have tried two types, Graziano Nuovo Ricamo linen from Italy, and some Sampedro linen (I think) from Portugal. In order to know about other linens though, I am wanting to try out other 38 count linens.

I have ordered some Sotema 20L linen from Italy, and hopefully it will arrive any day now. (Can you tell that I’m waiting very excitedly for it?!)

Does anyone know of any other 38 count linens that I could try? Brands and places to get them?

The reason why I want to try them out is because sometimes linens are known as evenweave – meaning they have the same number of thread, over the same distance, in both directions – but then end up being not quite evenweave, as they may have slightly more threads in one direction than the other. If you’re not counting threads, and just using the lovely linen for surface embroidery, then its not going to matter.

However, this can cause problems with counted work as a square (based on thread count) will not end up looking square. For a small square, when there is only a slight discrepancy in thread count for each direction, it won’t make too much of a difference. But over a large distance – say on a tablecloth – it could be quite obvious.

So that’s why I want to try them out, and besides, I just like special linen!

Vicarious Valentino

I mentioned previously that I’d love to go and see the Valentino exhibition that is currently on in Brisbane. I was hoping to see it when up there teaching. The teaching has been put off until next year, and the exhibition will be long gone by then. 🙁

However, my husband has been in Brisbane this week for a conference. He is staying very close to the gallery where the exhibition is being held. So he went along for me. I asked him to press “record” on his eyes when he got there. I hope he remembered!

Apparently it was wonderful. Exactly the same exhibition we saw in Paris a couple of years ago, but with some added dresses from this year’s collection. Also there was no glass in front of the gowns in Brisbane, unlike in Paris. And importantly, there were visible signs saying “no photography” unlike in Paris, where we missed them and got a little rap over the knuckles. Honestly, we didn’t know we weren’t allowed!

A catalogue has been purchased on my behalf. My husband said that its the size of a brick, so he was pleased to learn that they have sold out, and by ordering one for me, it will be posted and he won’t have to carry it home in his luggage. As he’s also getting one for my sister, he’s even more pleased not to have to lug two home!

So l look forward to drooling over the catalogue in good time. My guess is that it will be put aside until Christmas, which is a longer wait, but its nicer than not seeing it at all!

If you do get the chance to see the exhibition, get there early because the queues are quite long!

holiday felting

If you visited the Vetty Creations Facebook page yesterday, you will know that I was planning to stitch some butterflies. Did it happen?

No. Unfortunately I ran out of time. With it being holidays, my focus at the moment is more on my kids than it normally is when they are at school. They have been going to a holiday club at a local church in the morning (and having a great time), and in the afternoon, we are at home together.

Yesterday was a lovely sunny day, with beautiful warm weather. It was the perfect day for some felting in the backyard. And so we did.

As none of us had ever done it before, I did one first, with my eldest reading the instructions to me, and them helping with counting the minutes of agitation. After I had done mine and we understood the process, they did theirs, with me helping with the rolling agitation (it gets a bit tiring for little arms!)

We all enjoyed it very much. I can now say that we understand the process of how to wet felt very well. I can’t say that we came away with the most attractive creations that you have ever seen though! The girls were very happy with theirs (of course, and so they should be!) but as an attractive surface for embroidering on, I’ll need a bit more practice in learning how to “design” with unfelted wool fluff.

I’ll certainly be giving it a go again, as it was great fun, and I can see definite possibilities for embroidering on handmade felt.

There’s also a great tutorial on felting a picture for kids, on the same blog that I got my instructions from, and some beautiful inspiration on the blog itself.

Stitching butterflies today…

Hardanger to drool over

A few days ago, a regular reader of this blog and long-time correspondent of mine, Shay, sent me some Hardanger blog links. (Thanks Shay!) There was one that I just have to share with you.

Its the blog of a lady in Spain, Mamen. Unfortunately I don’t read Spanish, but you don’t need another language to see gorgeous Hardanger!

The Hardanger shown was made as a gift for a friend. What a special friend! I particularly love the box and the pincushion design. They are particularly exquisite! But the basket and bookmark are also lovely.

I am not sure whether these were all Mamen’s designs. It seems that the basket border is, but as I am not sure of the translation of the site that Google gave me, I am unsure whether the others are her designs also.

Beautiful work, Mamen. Congratulations on your exquisite stitching!

a different type of stitching

A few years ago, we visited friends for a week. The husband is a gynaecologist and sometimes videos himself operating, for later reference. He wanted to show us some of his videos. Not surprisingly, we declined that opportunity! We did joke about comparing stitching techniques though.

Yesterday afternoon we were relaxing at home. I was doing some gardening (anyone who knows me personally can faint now!), my husband was doing some stuff inside, and my children were playing in the yard and on the driveway.

Suddenly the Sunday afternoon peace was rent with a blood-curdling scream from my youngest daughter. I raced down the driveway to her, to find a bloody mess underneath her chin. She had fallen over while skipping with a skipping rope on the concrete. It was a hospital job, being deep and jagged. My thoughts were, “this will be stitches, not glue”. She’s already had her chin glued up once before, some years ago, after doing the same thing.

So off to the hospital we went. 4.5 hours later, she was newly stitched up. I stayed outside the procedure room with our other child, while my husband was in with her. When they stitched her up, apparently they covered her head with something so that she couldn’t see what was happening. She squeezed my husband’s finger to help express the pain, and though she was brave, she did (quite understandably) cry too.

My husband said he had a morbid fascination with seeing what the nurse was doing, as he’d never seen anything like it before. I’m sure I too would have found the stitching interesting, had I been in the room. However, as I was already feeling quite queasy, I’m not sure that I would have not been violently ill!

Thanks Nurse James, for taking good care of her and your skill in stitching her up.

more on copyright

There’s a new blog that’s been set up about needlework and copyright. Go and have a read, it is interesting and worthwhile.

My only issue with the site is that it does not identify who is behind it. I think if we had some idea of who, that would make me feel like it had more credibility. My guess is that it could be either one concerned individual or a group of needlework designers who are fed up with copyright theft. Either way, it would be nice to know.

Regardless of that, I hope their campaign has a positive effect.

hardanger with an overlay

To follow on from my post the other day about my Hardanger ornament with the organza overlay, I thought that you might like to see some of my other projects that feature this technique. If you’d like to join our Christmas ornament swap, all the details can be found here.

First we have a needlecase, which has an overlay of chiffon. This is worked over natural coloured linen, so you can imagine the effect would be rather different without the overlay. One of the things that I really like about this technique is that you can add lots of beads and crystals to the designs!

And secondly we have an evening bag which also has an overlay of chiffon. This too is worked over natural coloured linen. This project featured on the cover of Embroidery and Cross Stitch Magazine a few years ago.

Learning merezhka

I was reading a needlework forum recently where some time ago a lady wanted to learn merezhka to put some on a sampler she was making. Many people directed her to websites where she could get the information. She used one of those websites for her sampler.

However, Mary Corbet and others also directed her to my book Ukrainian Drawn Thread Embroidery. Some time later she came back to the forum and said that she had purchased my book to work some merezhka, and found that using my instructions created a neater and straighter result than the websites.

Smiles all round.

You get what you pay for. 🙂

If you’re wanting to learn merezhka, Ukrainian Drawn Thread Embroidery comes highly recommended by people who have used it and and found it very beneficial.