Two Down, One to Go

It’s amazing watching these lovely Magi come alive with just a needle and a bit of thread. Here is Magi #2 in all his glory.

My favorite part of this one is a technique that’s used in all three Magis. Strangely enough, it’s one of the least showy parts of this Magi’s garments: the underskirt (if that’s what it’s called).

The very front section of his robes, below his sleeve, is stitched simply with long stitches of #4 Kreinik braid, couched every four threads with a very thin matching metallic. The result is that it looks like the skirt is made of a sheer, glittery fabric, though that unfortunately does not come across in the photographs.

About threadholders…

A couple of weeks ago, Carolyn responded to a post with a wonderful question:

Can you tell me how and why flosses or threads are attached to mother-of-pearl rings or floss cards or wooden thread holders like a hornbook or heart with holes around the outside edge to keep the colors separate? I mean, are the threads wound around a stick, i.e., 18 inches long and then cut into appropriate lengths for stitching before being looped onto or into the rings and floss minders? Or are the flosses and threads purchased in such lengths from the shops? I see all of the lovely little threads and needle cases and accessories all over the net and it looks like the lengths are about 18 inches or so. I hope this is not a silly question and that your answer will benefit many others.

Before answering the question, let me elaborate on what Carolyn’s asking about. Instructions for any needlework “smalls”, such as When I am Sewing from The Drawn Thread, often include the attachment of rings for managing flosses. Similarly, threads can be managed with cards or wooden items with holes punched in them, like these thread pallettes or this hornbook.

There are only two reasons I’m aware of for using such items.

• The first reason is purely for decoration. These are pretty! You don’t actually have to use them!
• The second is, of course, for function. I suspect if your threadholder only has a few rings or holes, this might not be realistic, unless you’re working a project that requires only a few thread colors. On the other hand, I’ve received class kits that have included the threads attached to cardstock with holes punched in it, like the one shown here. This is much preferable to kits with loose threads that require sorting!

As for the length of threads to attach to your threadholder, it’s a combination of personal preference and ease of cutting.

• Some threads, such as ThreadworX flosses, come pre-cut in 1 yard (?) lengths. To get to an appropriate stitching length, just cut this length in half.
• Pearl cotton skeins (and some other threads) can be opened up into a single loop that can be cut in two places to get stitching lengths.
• In my classes with Carolyn Mitchell, she calls the distance from the inside of your elbow to the tip of your middle finger (with your hand out flat) your “personal stitching length.” In my case, this is approximately 17 inches, so I’m usually fine with using the 18” lengths from the previous suggestions.
• If you have a different length preference, yes, you can wrap the thread around something appropriately sized such that a single cut would result in the desired length, or find some other way to cut repeatable lengths.
• Of course, if you’re just using the threadholder for decorative or temporary purposes, you can just attach a full skein (as seen in one of the links above).

Physically attaching the thread is fairly straightforward. Simply use a half-hitch knot. Fold the thread length in half, insert the folded end through the ring, put the cut ends through the loop formed by the folded end, and pull tight.

Carolyn, I hope this answers your question. If anyone has anything to add, please do so!

An Easy Way to Control Color With Multi-Color Threads

Overdyed. Variegated. Hand-dyed. Whatever you call them, these lovely threads sometimes intimidate stitchers, especially when they’re used in geometric designs when the balance of color may be important.

There are two schools of thought on using multi-color threads in designs such as these. I call them the “Don’t Cares” and the “Cares.” If you’re a “Don’t Care,” you’ll let the colors fall where they may. But if you do care, this can be a challenge.

I usually fall somewhere in the middle. On My Way, just a hint of overdyed thread was used. For this, I let the colors fall where they would, but I made sure just a hint of the yellow portion of my Watercolours thread showed up in each block. This color wasn’t used anywhere else in the piece, so it added a bit of interest, but it wasn’t glaring enough to completely distract the viewer.

On some projects, though, I work more in the “Cares” camp. I’ve found that when working a symmetric geometric design, controlling the color is easiest if you can find four lengths of the multi-color threads. Then you simply stitch each of the four sides starting with the same end of the thread.

As an example, I pulled a card of Rainbow Gallery’s Encore from my stash. To get a good run of color, I cut a fairly long length.

 

 

After separating the strands, I prepared each with a waste knot, trying to keep the tails roughly the same length on each strand.

 

 

Since my stitch of choice covered the back well, I decided to start the thread “in line” with my stitching, so I could just stitch over the tail, then cut off the knot when I reached it.

By repeating this on each side, trying to keep the waste knot the same distance from the start point, you can get consistent runs of color in your stitching.

You can see that I decided to try this on Mystique. Check out the overdyed silk (in this case, Caron Waterlilies) on this block.

This can be done with any multi-color thread, but sometimes you have to hunt to find four equivalent lengths of thread. I find that’s often too much work. Why bother, when some threads are perfect for doing this because they divide easily by four:

• Bravo!, from Rainbow Gallery – 4 strands, pearl 5 weight
• Encore!, from Rainbow Gallery – 4 strands, pearl 8 weight
• Overture, from Rainbow Gallery – 4 strands, pearl 12 weight 
• Waterlilies, from Caron – 12 strands, silk floss
• Silk ’N Colors, from The Thread Gatherer – 12 strands, silk floss

Can you think of others? Please share!

Playing with J.L.Walsh Silk Perle

Whenever I travel, I seek out needlework shops (and what stitching addict wouldn't?). In visiting these shops, I keep an eye out for new (to me) threads. I'll buy some in colors I like so I can play with them and use them (eventually) in some future project.

A few skeins of J.L.Walsh Silk Perle made their way into my stash in a similar fashion. According to a previous blog post, my MIL picked them up from Beehive NeedleArts in Pittsburgh last fall.

Recently, a couple of these skeins were added to my pile of threads for Potpourri. These two colors seem to work with my palette.

During the class, I started stitching with this thread as it came off the skein, but it was a bit too thick for diagonal satin stitches. I quickly decided that I needed to play with it a bit more before using it too much.

Let's take a closer look.

Looking at the thread up close, it's a bit different than the typical perle thread. As it comes off the skein, it's a tiny bit thinner than a perle 5 weight. It also has a much looser twist, as a close-up picture shows.

Unlike typical silk or cotton perle threads, this is easily divisible in half, and each of those halves is made up of four strands the size of floss. (For lack of a better name, I'm using the term "full bundle" when referring to the thread as it comes off the skein, and "half bundle" for the thread when it's divided into two.)

Here's a look at each of these divisions side by side. I chose to run the smallest division (the floss strand size) over a damp sponge to straighten it before stitching. Without this step, it still has the waviness shown in the half-bundle.

Once it's straightened, this single strand is almost indistinguishable from cotton floss, except, of course, for silk's fantastic sheen. Here is one strand from the bundle of silk perle (top) alongside one strand of DMC cotton floss (bottom).

I did find that the color was not consistent throughout the thread. This cannot be seen easily with the full bundle, but once the thread is divided in half or more, it becomes more evident. I would expect this variation in depth of color to be even more obvious with darker colors, but it can be seen even in my pale lavender. The arrow in this photo shows one of lighter spots, but there are others in this photo, too.

I found that the slight variations of color actually add a bit of texture and interest to the thread. Again, this might be more objectionable with a darker thread, but I like it for this color, at least.

So what does it look like when it's stitched?

When stitching with the full (i.e. as it comes off the skein) or half bundles, I found I needed to keep adding twist to the thread to keep the bundle together. This is especially true of the half-bundle. Without consciously adding a twist to this thread, it just looks like poorly laid thread.

• The full bundle covers very well on 18ct mono canvas for horizontal or vertical stitches, but is a bit too thick for diagonal stitches. 
• Half of this bundle is perfect for diagonal stitches, but it too skimpy for vertical or horizontal stitches. 
• By stripping the thread down to its individual strands, straightening them, and recombining to use four together in the needle, you'll get really nice coverage for any stitch direction, especially when carefully laying each stitch.

I notice that the thread doesn't look as dark once it has been divided. That's likely due to the variations in the color distribution.

The short story:

• Regardless of whether you decide to use the thread as it comes off the skein, or divide it in half, or strip it down to its component strands, you'll get great sheen from this thread. 
• You do need to keep an eye on the twist when stitching with the full bundle or half bundle. If you don't keep a fairly tight overtwist on the thread, it does start to get a rougher texture. But then again, that may be what you want!
• I can't find the full color palette online, but this site shows several of the 118 colors. 
• This thread is really nice if you want matching colors in various sizes of thread, since you can use it all three ways, though the full bundle does seem slightly darker.

 I hope this helps somebody stitching with J.L.Walsh Silk Perle. Does anybody have any other tips for using this thread?

Issues with thread color conversions

If you're like most stitchers, when you've started a project, you've used a color conversion chart to change to a different brand of floss from the one called for in a project's instructions. There are plenty of these conversion charts online, allowing stitchers to change from DMC to Anchor floss, or from Soie d'Alger to Needlepoint Inc silk, or even to switch from cotton floss to silk or vice versa.

These conversion tables work well, at least most of the time. The simple fact is, though, that each brand of floss has its own range of colors. It's rare (perhaps impossible) to find exact matches to the original threads for any project within another brands range. Fortunately, it's not typically necessary to find exact matches. It's more important to find colors that work well together and have the right amount of contrast to each other as needed in the project.

It's this last point where I ran into a problem when trying to finish my How Great the Blessing sampler. In the original sampler, Catherine Theron used Soie d'Alger from Au ver a Soie. The class kit only included the linen, and each stitcher had to supply her own threads. For convenience, Catherine did provide conversions to several other brands of floss, including DMC.

Of course, I wanted to convert to a brand not on Catherine's list. For linens 36ct and higher, I really like using Hand-Dyed Fibers from Vikki Clayton. The nice thing about this is that Vikki redesigned her colors a few years ago to specifically correspond to the entire DMC line. She also has color conversion tables right on her site, so I could type in the Soie d'Alger or the DMC color numbers, and know what color to order from her.

Here's what I ended up with for the reds in my project:

• Original colors: AVAS 2911, 2912, 2913, 2914, 2915, and 2916.
• DMC conversion: 3713, 761, 760, 3712, 3328, and 347.
• HDF conversion: The "Gandy Dancer" series: 1101, 1103, 1105, 1107, 1109, 1111.

Catherine called these colors very very light red, very light red, light red, red, dark red, and very dark red, respectively. (Actually, I think they're more coral than red, but it's easier to refer to them as red.)

This conversion had been a success, until I reached the lighter flowers in the border of my sampler. The flowers call for a border of very light red, with petals of red and very very light red. In HDF, this means I should used 1103 for the border, and 1101 and 1107 for the petals. As seen at right, when I added the 1101 to the 1103 border, though, it didn't have any contrast. (Part of this might be due to the slight variations within the hand-dyed threads, but it wasn't working for me!)

I tried darkening up the border to 1105 (light red), but then I found that I needed to go to 1109 (dark red) on the other petals to get enough contrast between the border and the darker petals! See the picture at left.

Then it seemed that these flowers weren't light enough. To the stash! I found a very pale pink Splendor silk. It's just slightly more pale than the 1101, though that's hard to see in the photograph with only one stitch. Here's how it turned out with all of the light petals complete.

Now, I've just got to make a decision: which of these flowers do I go with? That's a topic for another post!

How about you? What have your experiences been with color conversions? Have they all been successful, or have you needed to play with things? Feel free to answer here or on your own blog!

Needlework Nibbles: Silk Purl

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know that I enjoy trying out new threads and new (to me) needlework techniques.  However, I fully admit that I often will buy a new thread and never actually do anything with it.  Because of this, I was thrilled when Tricia Wilson-Nguyen of Thistle Threads started designing her "Needlework Nibbles."

In Tricia's words:

Needlework Nibbles are small projects designed to let you try a new material that is hard to find or new technique. The new materials are usually one that I have imported or had made to my specifications to allow us to do a type of needlework not practiced very much anymore. Often, these materials may be in short supply or packaged such that they are expensive. The 'Nibble' allows the stitcher to try the material/technique out before committing to a larger investment.

I purchased both kits for the July Nibbles, which made use of silk-wrapped purl, a thread that originally was used in the 17th century, but has only recently been recreated.  If you're familiar with the purl threads used in goldwork, you know that they're coils of wire that are typically couched down or added like beads.  (Actually, I featured purls in one of my very first blog posts.)  The silk-wrapped purl is exactly what it sounds like:  metal purl "threads" wrapped with silk.  I'm not going to go into detail about it, since Mary of Needle 'N Thread already has a fantastic post about the thread.  (Thanks, Mary!)

I can, however, report a bit about stitching with this thread, and about the Needlework Nibbles kits.

The kits contained everything needed to complete the stitching of the project, including needles, and also contained backing fabric to finish the piece as a scissors fob or ornament.  At right is the kit for the Pink Silk Purl Bug, and the kit for the Rainbow Silk Purl Bug is shown below.

Each kit included plenty of the silk purl to complete the design.


I found that the silk purl was slightly tricker to use than regular pearl purl. I used my serrated-edge scissors designed for metallic threads, and while these cut through the metal, the silk sometimes wasn't cut all the way through. I had to keep a close eye on the thread when cutting to ensure both metal and silk were cut before letting the two pieces separate, or the silk would start to unwind from the metal.

Actually, the unwinding of the silk is the biggest downfall of using this thread. In some spots on my finished bugs, the ends of the threads have plain metal showing, and in other cases, the silk is slightly frizzy. In the closeup of the pink bug, you can see both of these: frizzy light pink silk at the point of the right wing, and a tiny bit of exposed metal at the second row in at the bottom of the body.

I'm glad I worked the pink bug, where all of the purl was couched, before trying the rainbow bug. The rainbow bug used couched purl for the head, but all of the rest was cut and threaded like beads.

A very big thank you to Tricia Wilson-Nguyen for making these kits available.  I don't know when I'll use silk purl again, but I'm sure I'll find that it's the perfect thread for something.  By trying it, I now know its properties.  I think it might be interesting to try to use this on canvas, perhaps on a painted canvas, for just the right effect.

Oh - one additional note:  I did not use the linen that came in the kits, choosing instead to use linen twill left over from a stumpwork project.  I've got some ideas about using several of these Nibbles (if they're of similar sizes) in a project together.  Speaking of size, the pictures above are a bit misleading.  These bugs are pretty small.  I worked both of these on one piece of linen in a 5" hoop.  Below is a better picture with a standard US quarter for reference.

Has anybody else tried the silk purl? Can you come up with interesting ways to use this thread? Please share your ideas!