Although I've been on break from quiltmaking for a while now, I am spending some time with stitchery.
Currently I'm working along on this Color Wheel by Drop Cloth Samplers -- a pleasant little project which is filling time and keeping my mind occupied. It's simple and small, and the hardest part about it is choosing which color of floss to use next in the rainbow gradation. I have a complete lifetime set (400+ skeins) of DMC floss, so lots of choices.
Looking back with nostalgia ... I've been involved with textile/fiber activities all my life. I started sewing my own clothes when I was in 6th grade, and doll clothes before that. Quiltmaking commenced when I was 15. Knitting, crochet, spinning and dyeing, handweaving, basketry, felting, needlepoint, embroidery ... you name it, I've done it. But in my memory, ranging back almost 7 decades, this type of outline 'stitching' was the first. I distinctly recall working on what I would now describe as penny squares, small pre-printed images of happy little animals. I think my mom probably set this activity up to occupy me when she had my brother, so I would have been 5 going on 6 at the time. I can clearly picture a little doll quilt made up of those stitched squares. My mom and I didn't have a good relationship, but she sewed, always, and therefore so did I.
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6 comments:
It's lovely, Jeanne ! There's something soothing about stitching & embroidering...
Good thing your mother induced it in you when you were a little girl. At least something positive and a reason to be grateful :)
xoxo
In stitches,
Nadine
Sweet! My Mom learned to sew from my Grandma, her MIL, but it was Grandma who sewed for my sister and me and inspired me to learn to sew. I taught myself embroidery in my later teens.
I, like you, have had a needle in my hand as far back as I can remember. I have two dish towels that I embroidered when I was about 9 years old. That's the first time I remember really enjoying stitching of one kind or another. Embroidery is always so soothing because you can just sit still and watch the picture unfold. How fun that you have that memory of your doll quilt with your Mom.
That is a neat sampler! Love the color wheel design of it, but each section with different stitches!
Your sampler is the perfect summer-time project I think. Interesting that we've both been doing a colour wheel inspired project. I learned to embroider on my own but I know it was inspired by my maternal grandmother who embroidered blocks for quilts. I inherited her collection of flosses and still have many of them. I use them though, which is what I know she would have wanted me to do.
Your paragraph, "Looking back with nostalgia" mirrors almost exactly my own experience right down to not a good relationship with my mother, except no needlepoint for me and no early quilting. I was the youngest child with more than 6 years separating my sister and me and I'm sure my mom just needed me to focus on something, so embroidery and hand sewing it was.
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