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| A Face and A Shirt |
Last night I had a little more time to stitch than has been normal recently, so I finished the Dotted Swiss stitch on the kitten's shirt by doing tent stitches with Shimmer Vineyard Silk in a darker brown shade than the Classic Vineyard Silk. If your shop doesn't carry the Vineyard Silk line, let me just say you can buy four types of this silk tapestry style thread:
Classic is a solid color thread that looks like a soft silk/wool tapestry thread although it is 100% silk. It's soft and stitches on either 13 or 18 count beautifully.
Shimmer is Classic with a metallic thread woven in so it is slightly stiffer.
Tone on Tone is Classic dyed in various shades of the same color and
Merino Wool s a wool thread I haven't seen personally yet. Here is more about the brand.
http://www.vineyardsilk.com/products.htm
Anyway, using Shimmer Vineyard Silks for my tent stitches added just a hint of sparkle. I was hoping that it would make the shirt look like heavy brocade. In person it is a nice effect, although I doubt you can tell in the photo above.
After my success with the shirt, I decided to finish the cat's face. I'd already stitched the eyes and pink nose/mouth in tent stitches using perle type threads. I wanted to use brick stitch for the rest of the face, just like I'd used it for the paw. I think it turned out quite nicely.
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| Close up: Would you trust that face? |
One of the things you have to consider when using more than one stitch on a painted canvas is what will happen in the area where two different stitches meet. Will you have to compensate? Will that look good? Tent stitches slant /// and brick stitches are upright lines ||| so you can see there might be gaps. In a few places I squeezed in another tent stitch if a straight stitch didn't look like it would cover but mostly the brick stitches laid up against the tent stitches nicely. Mixing tent and brick stitches probably worked well here because I was using size 8 perle cotton and Trebizond silk which is the same diameter and will spread out a bit on 18 count to cover well.
With the pirate hat, shirt and face stitched, I can now work on the bandanas around the kitten's head and neck. I wanted all those areas finished before I laid in long padded stitches for the kerchief areas.
Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow
2 comments:
Jane, do you ever have a problem with Vineyard Shimmer laying smoothly on the canvas? VY Classic is currently one of my favorite threads. The Shimmer sometimes (though not every skein) gives me fits. I'm just wondering if it's just me . . .
Nancy, I haven't had trouble with Vineyard Shimmer lying smoothly but this is only the second time I've used it and both times were in limited areas. So I'm not the best person to ask. It certainly is stiff, especially compared to regular Classic Shimmer.
When I have trouble with a thread, I automatically go to shorter lengths. I hope that cure-all tip helps you. Otherwise I am not much help, I'm afraid.
Anyone else had this happen? Any tips to help Nancy tame Shimmer?
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