Shaking my Tail Feathers

Once I had finished making all of the tail feathers, I wanted to see how they would look assembled but, in order to do that, I had to make another piece of needle lace for his back. This was a much simpler task than the feathers, not least because it was made on a piece of fabric with a cordonet outline. The detached buttonhole is worked over the same silver passing thread as the body and feathers. I wish that I had taken time to create a template and pad for the feathers, it would have made life much easier!

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

I sometimes struggle to follow written instructions and that the case with the placement of the feathers on the back. In the end, I gave up on the instructions and arranged them in a way that I found pleasing.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Now that I had completed most of the components, and I still had not made the finger loop braids for the Casket Keepsakes, I thought I would continue with the Bird Thimble Holder. The next step was to make the pouch that sits under his tail feathers. Here I made a couple of changes to the instructions. The first was to the braids that close the pouch. The directions said to make two plaited cords but I thought that finger loop braids might be nicer. Yes, I know that the Casket Keepsakes are on hold because I didn’t have time to make the finger loop braids but the ones I wanted to make for the pouch are a little simpler, so I thought they would be quicker … and they were … except before I could make them I needed to find a video to remind myself how to do the braid I had in mind and when I found a video I fell into a finger loop braid rabbit hole! Anyway, many hours of watching videos later, I was ready to make my basic braid, which I now know is called a 5 loop square braid. The braid is made in a similar way to a plait but instead of passing the outer loop over other loops, it passes through the other loops. Starting with two loops of one colour on the one hand and three loops of another colour on the other hand, you get a chevron effect that looks very much like a plaited cord.

In one of the videos, the cord maker suggested that you can make your cord anywhere provided you have a suitable anchor for one end of the cord, even in bed using your foot as the anchor. This liberated me from having to make my cord in the office where I have a wooden clamp attached to the desk for this purpose. Instead, I could make the cord in the living room and as I was making a "simple" cord, I could do it while watching TV!

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

The first one went well except I had to hold my leg in the air and it soon got tired. DH placed a small stool and a couple of cushions under my heel so that I could rest it for the rest of the operation. For the second cord, I put both legs up on the sofa and found it even more comfortable to work this way.

The second change I made was a minor detail on the pouch. The instructions suggested threading the cords into a large chenille needle and taking several long running stitches around the opening. I decided to make eight eyelets around the opening and threaded the cords through these.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

I had a few more pieces of needle lace to make; six pieces to make the decorative tabs on the ends of the cord and two pieces for his beak. I also needed to make two legs then it was a relatively simple process to assemble all of the pieces to finally finish my showy peacock.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

After his long incubation period, I am very happy to have completed this project and add him to my Cabinet of Curiosities.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

A Very Long Tail

Generally, I have two WIPs (Work in Progress) on the go at a time. I have one on my stand in the sewing room. This is usually a larger piece that will take several months, if not years, to reach completion. Such a piece was most likely started in a class. Following the class it may have gone into hibernation either immediately or when I next attended a class and started something else. I mostly work on this piece at the weekend or on days off. During the summer months, I may work on it for a while before or after work.

During the evenings I like to have what I refer to as a sofa project. These tend to be smaller projects, both in size and the time I expect them to take, and something I can manage while watching television at the same time. Once started, I usually stick with a sofa project until it is completed but there have been a few that I did not for one reason or another. Recently, I have been working on the fourth in the series of Casket Keepsakes (and loving it). It is nearly complete but I need to make some finger loop braids before I can finally finish it. Each braid takes me over an hour to make and, once started, I have to keep going until it is finished and concentrate fully. I have not been able to find the time to make them yet. So, I needed something else to do in the evenings but was reluctant to start a new project until the Keepsakes are done.

Looking for a "little" something to do, I came across one of the sofa projects that I had stalled. I started the Bird Thimble ten years ago and it had taken me about two months to make its body. I was very pleased with it but that was only the first of four online lessons. I then moved onto the second lesson which was to make the tail feathers.

I mentioned in Dressing the Bird that starting the cover for the body was a little bit fiddly … to say the least! Starting each of the feathers was also a little fiddly and I did not seem to get any easier no matter how many feathers I made … and I made a lot of them (eventually). Like the body, the feathers are detached buttonhole stitch on a silver wire. The wire travels back and forth to form a series of concentric ‘U’ shapes.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

The feathers are either five or seven rows wide and either one, two, or three centimeters long, although mine are not very consistent in length. There is a total of 66 feathers stitched in nine different colours, just under half of them in the same yellow green as the body.

I don’t know exactly why this project stalled but I remember that I was struggling with these little feathers. In my progress report of February, 2013, I wrote,

"The bird thimble holder, which I forgot to mention last month, has not progress very much. His body is complete and I have begun to make the many, many tail feathers but because I usually work on these during the evening they have fallen victim of my S.A.D.ness. I will probably resume work on this when the lighter evenings return."

S.A.D.ness referring to seasonal affective disorder brought on by the dull, grey weather. I did not resume work when the lighter evenings returned and the project languished for ten years.

When I resumed making the feathers, I still found the process fiddly. Fiddly but not quite the struggle that I remember them being before and I can only attribute that to the hours I spent doing buttonhole stitch on the carnation and cornflower petals for the Spring Casket Keepsakes. At first, it took me an entire evening to make one feather but quite quickly I was able to make three or four in an evening, depending on the size. Initially, I thought it might take me several weeks to complete them but, in fact, it took little over two weeks.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Toing and Froing

Most of the bird’s body is worked around and around in one continuous spiral. Where the neck meets the body, some shaping is required. This is done by stitching to and fro for several rows to get around the bend. Then you continue round and round gradually reducing the number of stitches until you reach the tail end of the body.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

My first attempt seemed to be falling short of the bend so I had to unpick and try again..

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

The silver wire is one continuous thread from the top of his head to the tip of his tail. If you could stitch with a sufficiently long thread, the green silk could also be one continuous thread but of course it would not be practical to work buttonhole stitch with a thread several meters long. Instead, when one length runs out you simply join in another and continue as if it were the same thread. The loose ends get covered by the needle lace body as it grows.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Progress Report - December

I am definitely not getting as much stitching time as I would like, especially at the weekends, but I am managing to fit in a little time most mornings to work on my Pouchette. I am making slow but steady progress. It is a good thing that I enjoy couching because my design involves a lot of couching and it is taking a very long time to do all the outlines. I think that it will be worth it because it does emphasis the swirly gold lines in the way I imagined. The Pouchette had a day out at The Big Stitch last Saturday and I received some very nice comments about it.

© JEC/Carol-Anne Conway

In the evenings I have been working on the bird thimble holder. Another slow project! All of those tiny buttonhole stitches round and round and round! Actually, it is not all round and round, there was a little toing and froing for a while. I finally covered the entire body. It has taken me two months just to do that and that was only lesson one of four so I may be working on this little bird for some time yet.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Slow Going

The past couple of weeks have been very busy with very little time for stitching. I have worked on the bird thimble holder when I have had a little time but I am making very slow progress.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Dressing the Bird

The body form is covered entirely in detached buttonhole stitch on a silver wire. The instructions mentioned that starting is a little bit fiddly. I found it much more than a little bit fiddly. I took 3 attempts to get going! One of the reasons that I did not work on this while on holiday is that the stitches are tiny and I need really good light and magnification to see what I am doing. The whole project is really quite small.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

I was concerned that my stitching was too dense and therefore covering the silver wire entirely. There seemed little point using an expensive and beautiful thread if it did not show.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Given the difficulties I had starting in the first place, I was loathe to start over but I was even more loathe to stitch the entire body and not be happy with it. It took me another two attempts to start the second time, this time keeping my stitches a little looser and more spaced out.

© The Essemplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching

Bird Thimble Holder

I’m not doing so much stitching in the evenings at the moment but I do have a small project that I have been working on. When I say small, I am referring to its dimensions. In terms of work and hours I don’t think it counts as a 'small' project!

I really must stop surfing the web because I keep finding irresistible online classes like this Bird Thimble Holder by The Essamplaire. The kit arrived several weeks ago but the first lesson was not published until mid-September, just two days before I left for a week’s holiday in Portugal. Although I took it with me, I did nothing while I was away. When I returned home I was very keen to get started.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

The first step was to make the body form. This is made from two pieces of linen stitched together and stuffed with wadding. The instructions said to make the body a firm as possible.

© The Essamplaire/Carol-Anne Conway

Happy Stitching