One Stitch At A Thyme

November TUSAL Update

Posted by Jan

Greetings fellow Bloggers and TUSALers. It's hard to believe that a whole month has gone by since we last posted our ort containers and project updates.

I've been a bit adventurous in the last 2 weeks and tried my hand at dying fabric with coffee. I followed the instructions on Martha Beth Lewis's page and here's the out come.

click for bigger picture

On the left is the original cream color and right is the warm brown/coffee color I ended up with.

As a first try at dying fabric I'm rather proud of myself. The only mistake I made was putting too much alum in the final dye bath to set the color. So after the fabric dried for the final time I gave it a quick wash in cold water with orvus to try and get rid of the smell of alum, and it worked.

And for anyone who's interested I used Italian roast dark instant coffee, 8 cups worth.

I've put all my projects away until next year as I have a time sensitive Christmas/birthday present that I need to have done by Jan. 7th. Here's the progress so far with my newly dyed fabric, along with my little beaker.

click for bigger picture

Thanks for stopping by!

Category: Birds of a Feather, TUSAL 2 comments

November Wipocalypse

Posted by Jan

Looks like I'm a little late for this month's Wipocalypse posting. So let's get started.... I put '12 Days of Christmas' by Teresa Wentzler back on the WIP/UFO pile for the foreseeable future. I've had no progress to show since the last time I posted about 'Day Six' back in April 2014. The two projects I have progress on are below.

Musical Bell Pull - Mandolin - by Donna Vermillion Giampa

This is what I've done so far since starting the Mandolin section last month.

Click for larger picture

My Biker's Vest Patch.

Before:

Click for larger picture

After:

Click for larger picture

I tried two different shades of green but the outline just seems to disappear next to the solid lighter green. So I decided to stick with the darker shade of green.

Now for this month's WIPocalypse question.

Topic: What are your favorite and least favorite materials to use in your stitching?

Well I guess I'll start off with favorite floss. I like all types of DMC's cotton floss, linen floss, rayon (aka satin) floss, and pearl cotton floss; Also silk floss and over-dyed floss. I've never used DMC's light effects floss so can't comment on that. I also like Kreinik blending filaments, braid, and Japanese threads. On the other hand, I've never been fond of the DMC metallic thread, the old type that came on spools. It always seemed to fray and unravel too easily.

The only thing I've use as far as accessories is mill hill glass seed beads. I've never stitched anything that required buttons or charms so I can't comment on that either. But I do love the way the glass beads give that little extra sparkle to a stitching project.

As for favorite fabric materials that would be hands down Even-Weave. The thread counts would be 25, 28, and 30. With my eyesight not the best now days 30 count is a little tough to see with out the help of a 3X magnifier. Aida I'm neutral on, I neither like nor dislike it. I started out with Aida learning how to do counted cross stitch, and my favorite fabric counts were - 14, 16, and 18. My least favorite fabric would be linen. For me I just don't like the look and feel of the fabric, it's so wispy and thin, that and the subs in the weave make it look and feel uneven and hard to stitch on.

That's it for this Blog Blurb, Thanks for stopping by.