Embroidery Bliss

I adore having uninterrupted time to sew!  I guess everyone does, and it is amazing how much more you can get done when the phone isn't ringing and there are no appointments to keep.

This picture is of a quilt called "Friends of Baltimore" which is simply beautiful.  Two years ago I started a group of embroidery digitisers who wanted to digitise the quilt so it could be sewn in their Embroidery Machines.  The group of 16 quickly dwindled, and now 2 years later just 4 of us are still on the journey.  All of us are up to the finally phase, of actually stitching out our designs and each one has taken a different direction.  One of the group has made her blocks true to size, and colour of the original version and it is beautiful.  Another shrunk her blocks, but otherwise stuck to similar colours and it too is beautiful.  The third member of our group took a totally different view and has gone to great pains to digitise her version as a white on white, relying on texture to create interest.  The blocks we have seen are truly remarkable.  Which brings me to me.  My quilt is a smaller scale, and is stitched on black homespun.  I've added bling and the blocks are looking very different from the original.

This block was one of the quickest to stitch, and to digitise.

At the last minute I realised I wanted to digitise these large birds using a technique that allows for the use of variegated thread, the resulting movement in the feathers is lovely in real life.

This was one of the first that I digitised and it took forever to stitch out, but has just this moment come off the machine so I will photograph it again.  I love it because I was able to have fun with gradient fills for some of the fruit.

I'm taking a pause in the blocks for a day or so while I test stitch the first block of a different quilt, and will also share these pictures really soon.