Crewel Embroidered Flowers

I would like to introduce this crewel embroidery cushion cover I made many years ago for the front cover of a Japanese lifestyle magazine.

According to Wiki, "Crewel Embroidery, or Crewelwork, is a decorative form of surface embroidery using wool and a variety of different embroidery stitches to follow a design outline applied to the fabric." Usually wool yarns are used for Crewel work, but I used general cotton floss instead. Because the issue of the magazine was for Spring and Summer, so I wanted to give fresh and cool feeling to the pillow.

I used many kinds of stitches and techniques on this piece for expressing delicate detail of flowers. The colors of the embroidery design were inspired by the silk plaid fabric which I used for the frame. I used many colors and they are all from kinda same tone group. I like smokey pastel colors a lot.

This cushion cover is now listed on my Etsy shop. And there are more detail pictures in my Flickr pool. Thank you for reading and I hope you all have a happy new year.

Silk Scarf and Kimono Obi Shoulder Bag

I added two new items on my booth at Circa Arts Gallery where I am selling my work on consignment since last month. They have sold this purse last week and my table got a bit desolate so I needed to restock it with some newly made items in a hurry.

I made two new things. One of them is a shoulder bag which featured a beads-embroidered piece of silk from a vintage Kimono Obi (sash). I embellished a flower motif on the Obi with a lot of fine beads and cut the pattern off from Obi, then appliqued it on a wool fabric which I used for the body of the bag.

The mauve wool fabric I used for the body has a little bit of gold glitter in it. And the gusset is made of a upholstery weight fabric. There is a zipper pocket on the back. You can not to see them in the picture below, but I made the handles long enough for being hung from a shoulder.

The lining is again (I have a lot of them) one of Good Folks cotton prints in pink. There is one simple pocket inside. I added a couple of magnet snaps as a closure. And there is a fleece in between an exterior fabric and a lining.

Another thing I made is a scarf. The material is a silk from a vintage Kimono for front and a black Silk Dupioni for back. I used some fine glass beads, sequins and feather stitches for embellishment. The fine stripes pattern of Kimono makes the scarf look very chic and sophisticated.

I sewed in a thin soft fleece which is 100% cotton, so the scarf feels nice and warm. Silk is a very gentle material for sensitive skins (which I have). It won't irritate your neck like some other wool scarves.

I have lots of old beautiful Kimono fabrics sleeping in my drawers. I always think I should use them up someday. I want to make more scarves like this for my Etsy shop. But I think I have to wait till this crazy busy holidays gets over.

I wish you all have a merry merry Christmas and happy new year with your family and friends.

The Winner is ......

Katie ! Congratulations!

I sent email to you Katie! Please give me your mailing information via email to hibilabo{at}gmail{dot}com.

 

Katie said...

I have yet to purchase patterns online but would love some quilting ones. PDF format is ideal. Thanks for the chance!

And thank you all of you who left a comment and answered my questions. It was very interesting and will help me to make a plan of how I should share my crafting ideas with other craft lovers.

 

I hope everyone will have merry Christmas and happy crafty new year !

Modern Embroidery Messenger / Shoulder bag

Thank you all for answering my questions on the last Giveaway post. The entry is still going on until Dec 17th so please leave your comment on the last post to win the giveaway!

* * * * * * * * * * * *

 I finished making a bag which features this colorful leaves embroidery.

This bag is messenger style, but it can be used as a shoulder bag because I made the strap adjustable. The exterior fabrics are cotton canvas and cotton corduroy. I put same embroidery design on both sides of the bag body. When you see it from the top the embroidery pattern is continuous over the zip opening.

The top zipper opens pretty wide so you can easily find your stuff in the bag and get them out. Also I made the strap wide to ease your shoulder off the weight of a lot of things you need to carry.

  

The lining is a cotton print from Denyse Schumidt's "County Fair" collection. There is one simple pocket and one zipper pocket inside.

This is how it looks like when it is used as a shoulder bag.

This bag is now listed in my Etsy shop. There are some more pictures of this bag in my Flickr pool as well.

We had much snow last night and it seems we are going to have White Christmas this year. My daughter had her first ballet performances "the Nut cracker" last weekend, and she had a Christmas concert at her school last night. There are many holiday activities going on here just like you do. I hope I can write about those sometime soon........ I have so many things on my to do list though.

I hope you all have Happy Holidays!

December Giveaway Day!

Do you remember that giveaway I participated in May? I cannot believe it has been seven months since then. I am going to give my handmade things away again for this Sew, Mama, Sew blog Giveaway Day.

So as you will notice on Sew, Mama, Sew blog , the competition will close on the December 17th . To enter please leave a comment on this post to answer these three questions about purchasing patterns online. Entries will be taken from today until December 17th and I will draw the winner randomly on December 18th. The items will be sent from USA, and I will ship internationally.

The questions are ....
1) What kind of patterns do you want to buy online? Embroidery? Sewing clothes? Quilts? Making purses? Or something else?
2) Have you ever purchased any kinds of patterns online?
3) Do you prefer PDF type (you download the file and print it out to use) or Paper type (you receive the pattern already printed on papers)?

If you have any particular patterns you really like, I would love to hear about it too!

There are the items I will give away this time. They all go to one person who wins this giveaway. A set of a little box and two sachets which are embellished with silk ribbon embroidery.

I am not going to put any scent in the sachets. So you could use them to store your jewelry in it or put your favorite fragrance inside. I hope many people will enter this giveaway and would love to hear from you! Happy Giveaway Day!

Modern Zip Pouches !

This has been a crazy busy week! Nina's first stage the Nutcracker of Southold Dance Theater just opened this morning. So we had three days of dress rehearsals at Morris Performing Arts Center, then there are three more stages Nina will be on this weekend. I will wright about that later this week, or maybe next Monday.

But I tried to update my Etsy shop by this weekend so I would like to tell you about it Today.

I finished two stylish modern pouches this morning and one messenger bag is on the way yet. These pouches have a geometrical pattern which is felt appliqued and embellished with sequins and some stitches. I partially used my sewing machine for making sharp embroidered line.

On the back, they both have simplified applique pattern as well. I added felt charms for the zipper pulls. Those pulls are fun to make and make the product merrier. I like to make them.

The sequins added some sharpness on the design. I am glad I came up with the idea of using machine stitches. I think it looks more sophisticated. What do you think?

As usual, thinking of what fabric I should choose for lining was so much fun. I used multicolored stripes print (Japanese cotton) for the light blue one, and one of "Good Folks" by Anna Maria Honer for the green one.

These pouches are now listed on my Etsy shop. There are more pictures will be on my Flickr pool soon. If you are interested.

I am waiting for some zippers I ordered coming in my mail box. Then I will finish up one more big project for my shop. I think I will keep myself being super busy by after Christmas. I hope you all have super happy busy Holidays too!

Embroidered Leaves / Snow Cat

I am working on the new project. It is embroidery. Many many leaves are coming into being.

 I love these colors of leaves.

Inside house we have colorful leaves in my hand but outside is pretty much filled with gray and white. We had another couple of snow days and built a snowman.......No, a snow cat this morning.

Adding ears on his head was Nina's idea. His eyes are made of buttons, nose is a carrot, and mouth is a stick we found in our yard. We are so proud that we made him very cute and unique. I bet the snow cat impressed all the neighbors who drove by our house this afternoon.

It is expected that we will have much snow tonight. I hope all of you stay warm and have a good weekend!

Ready to go!

I set up my purses in the store of Circa Arts Gallery this morning. They gave me the best spot in their store so people will see my stuff as soon as they went in the store. My Etsy shop will be on vacation mode while all items are gone to this event. If you are close to South Bend Indiana, please come to see my work and have fun at DTSB First Fridays and Holiday Art Walk. I will be there sometime Friday evening and Saturday Afternoon.

This is the store front of Circa Arts Gallery. The next door is my favorite shop Junk Evolution.

Happy Artistic Holidays!