I cannot count my day complete
'Til needle, thread and fabric meet.
~Author Unknown

Sharing a common thread with those who love the art of hand embroidery

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

This week, with all of the spring flowers blooming across the prairie as my inspiration,

I have started embroidering a small cluster of sweet peas.
When I had just started my journey into surface embroidery many years ago, these tiny designs would have made me feel very intimidated. However, through practice and perseverance, I have managed to accomplish even the smallest of designs. Above the bud is worked by using the satin stitch......with 1 strand of floss. The leaves are also worked in satin stitch, with a darker green used to work a "Whipped Backstitch" down the center for the vein of the leaf.

If you are not familiar with the Whipped Backstitch, there are two wonderful video tutorials to show you how by clicking onto this link.
I often rely on the Whipped Backstitch to give me the detail I want, especially when embroidering small twirling vines as featured in the photo above.

As you can see, I am still not quite finished with this design. I am still filling in the areas with stitches to bring it to life. But if you click onto the photo, you can see the vine and the leaf veins worked in the
whipped backstitch.
How about you?
What interesting stitch have you learned and now work with to get your projects done?
I would love to hear.

7 comments:

janice15 said...

I love your work, thank you for stopping in with me and thank you for the cheer...It means a lot coming from you...I want to learn how to do that cut out business...have a great day...with love Janice

MeganH said...

oh! Sweetpeas! They are on my needlepainting list-to-do.

deb said...

So pretty! Your work in marvekous!
*hugs*deb

Anonymous said...

Kathleen, I always say that there are not enough years in a life to accomplish all the things I'm interested in. You so inspire me to embroider again. I'm not at the level you are, but I certainly would love to do some things.

Your sweetpeas are so pretty, and I love the stitching you manage quite eloquently in the stem work.

Thank you for your visit. I always love to see you.

Marinane xo

Jocelyn said...

That's gorgeous!

I love the whipped backstitch, though I knew it as the wrapped backstitch. Potato, potahto, right? It always makes the lines so smooth and beautiful, and they pop just a little bit more.

Karen said...

Kathleen, I love your pink sweetpeas! I haven't yet tried the whipped backstitch, but I'm going to now, I really like the way it looks on your embroidery. Thanks again for your visits to my blog!

A Colorful World said...

These are just gorgeous! I know I have a lot to learn Kathleen...those whipped backstitch tendrils, for one thing! Thanks for including the url to the tutorial.

Thanks for your well-wishes about my eye. Go to the Dr. tomorrow!