Rigid Heddle Cats

Day 155: Between the linen cupboard and the door into the bathroom, there is a six-inch wide bit of wall which hosts an assortment of changeable bell-pull style fiberarts acknowledging the changing of the seasons. Aside from Christmas, it's the only seasonal decorating I do. Not all the pieces match to a specific holiday, but examples of those which do would include krokbragd sheep for spring, tvistsöm or woven birds for summer, satin stitch/hardanger acorns for autumn, and hardanger poinsettias for winter. Having developed a rigid-heddle pattern for cats, I thought it might be nice to acknowledge Merry's birthday with a cat panel. That said, the grey cats in this little design have tails. Merry only has a stub. Working at 15 epi using 8/2 cotton, the piece was woven with a pickup stick on alternate rows to provide the cat pattern. In between, I wove white tabby (over and under), using floating selvedge threads. The pattern threads must also be taken out to the edges, passing over or under the floating selvedges as appropriate. I had to place dividers between the cats to keep floats on the reverse from being too long. I found that taking both floating selvedge threads either "up" or "down" on each pick worked best for this design. Given the nature of the weave, sometimes a grey thread would get trapped under the tabby pass as they occasionally do in any overshot, but these were easily brought to the surface with a yarn needle and should not be problematic once the fibers have been fulled by washing (not yet done in the image). 

Dorset Buttons On Hardanger

Day 12: Murphy got a real workout as far as the hardanger was concerned on this piece. I wanted something fairly simple on which to display a variety of Dorset buttons. It should have been a piece of cake, but I think I made every mistake in the book as I developed the design. I cut the fabric too short. I didn't like the colour of the perle cotton (twice). I turned a corner of the stitchery incorrectly. I miscounted multiple times (I mean, any idiot ought to be able to count to five, right?). When I finally put the last stitches in place, I was ready for a break before doing any sewing, but a few days later, I backed the hardanger with stiff interfacing, sewed the buttons in place and added a broadcloth lining to the reverse side. The hanger and tassel were easy, and the work was ready to display on the narrow strip of wall between my linen cupboard and bathroom door. That's the only concession I make to decorating for the different seasons of the year, changing out a series of mini bell-pulls themed for spring, summer, autumn and winter.

Abhorrence

Day 1: Nature abhors a vacuum. Crow abhors a mistake. Having finished the birds cross-stitch, I decided to work on making a small hardanger wall ornament on which to display Dorset buttons, and it has become a serial nightmare. It started badly. I wasn't happy with the colour, wasn't happy with the weight of thread I'd chosen. I cut the stitching off at least half a dozen times in the process of working out how I wanted it to look. Once I finally settled the issues of colour and weight, I made no end of miscounting errors in the buttonhole stitching outlining the piece. After sorting that out, I realized I'd set the design too high on the scrap of cloth I wanted to use up, and didn't have enough to turn for a rod pocket, but I was so far into it that I decided to keep going and turn it into something else. I thought everything was coming along nicely until I turned the final corner and discovered that if I continued, I'd have 21 threads on one side of "middle" and 22 on the other. I counted. I counted again. I counted several different ways. I couldn't see where I'd made the mistake. Thinking I might have messed up in the planning phase I'd only done mentally, I charted it. No, I should have had 21 stitches on either side. I counted again. And again. Somewhere in there, there's a mistake, and I can't find it. Now I have two choices: cut the stitchery off the cloth, or throw the whole bloody thing in the bin. I'm 'bout ready to opt for the latter choice.

Footnote: Found and fixed!