Teapot Background in Tent

The weather over the long holiday weekend has been lousy (hot, humid, overcast, thunderstorms) so between washing windows and other household chores that need doing I worked on the body of the teapot and started the background. Note that the empty area between the wisteria vine handle and the body of the teapot has been totally stitched. I decided to fill that area rather than trying to cut it out when this is made up. That is much easier!

I have started doing three rows of basketweave around the perimeter of the design. That's because I've been reading Judy Harper's blog where she talks about surrounding ornaments with tent stitches for easy finishing. You can read her comments here, in date order.
http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/basketweave-background-for-shaped.html

http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/more-shaped-basketweave-background.html

http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/amoeba-with-background-needlepoint.html

How did I decide to use white for the background area? That color is part of the design but not part of the outside edge so it will set off the design. I did consider pale yellow as I thought that would make the purple wisteria flowers and the blue teapot itself pop out visually, but in the end I went for simplicity as my mother collects blue and white china. She would prefer the colors be blue and white with purple touches instead of blue, white, purple and yellow.

I found three Melissa Shirley teapots for sale on at this eBay shop. You can see why I think my wisteria teapot came from her. The black one with pink flowers and leaves has a very similar spout, although all three teapots are smaller than mine.
http://stores.shop.ebay.com/dogwoodfan__W0QQ_armrsZ1

By the way, I worked with these threads in this order:

First, the white band around the middle of the pot (Gloriana Winter White 190 edged with Crescent Colours' Belle Soie silk in Violet Water).

Secondly, the blue diamond shapes inside the latticework (mostly in Crescent Colours' Babbling Brook, cutting out the right shade of blue for the area, with some solid blue Splendor silk in S860 for the very lightest blue diamonds).

The purple shading around the white band (Belle Soie silk Violet Water again).

The blue body of the teapot, working from left to right in the lightest blue, then the medium blue and finally the dark blue. (light blue is Splendor S860, medium blue Splendor S914 and dark blue is Kreinik's Silk Mori #5013).

I've started testing packed stem stitch for the brown wisteria vine on the handle. I plan to use Mandarin Floss (a six ply floss made of bamboo) in dark brown M830 and medium light brown M886. The stitching you see is three plies but I think two might work better. I will pull this out and restitch next. I want the wisteria vine stem finished before I do the white latticework.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

My Wisteria Teapot

What you see on the right is my next project, a teapot with a wisteria and white latticework pattern. This is a really cheap eBay find which I got for something like $5 including shipping because the canvas itself is flawed. I think the designer is Melissa Shirley and so did the eBay seller, but the canvas doesn't have MS on it like most of hers do. It is marked 290 C with another line of letters that are illegible. It resembles other Melissa Shirley small teapots so I think she is the designer.

This piece is about 3 inches high and about 4 inches wide at the widest point. It is on 18 count canvas. Look carefully at the right side of the teapot between the handle and the wisteria stems on the body of the teapot. See the flaw? There's another gray line at the base of the wisteria stem near the bottom of the teapot. I got this at a very good price because of the flaws. When you think about buying damaged canvases like this, consider how bad the damage is and whether it will hinder your stitching first. Because the line of gray is a vertical or horizontal line, it is easy to tell what is supposed to be there. I'll stitch right over it without any problem.

When buying a painted canvas, the first thing to do is analyze exactly what you've got and make a color copy of it. I have my color copy made, so let's list what we have here:

First, this canvas is ornament-sized, which is perfect as I intend it as a birthday present for my mother who loves teapots and flowers. It will be a quick stitch and fairly easy for me to make up myself in time for her birthday celebration.

Secondly, the motifs are the wisteria flowers and vine, the latticework, the leaves and the teapot shape itself with the rounded corners and the fat little spout. I need to emphasize those things and de-emphasize the body of the teapot itself. Since I intend to use silk ribbon embroidery for the wisteria flowers, they will be last. Everything else will be stitched first and I'll test the right size and colors of ribbon and the stitches I might use for the wisteria blooms while I work on other parts of the canvas. Since I want the blue teapot body to recede, I will tent stitch it. So that's my first step, more endless basketweave, after I choose threads, of course!

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Fake Bullions for the Faint-of-Heart UPDATED

E-Rose wrote bullions scared her but not to worry! David McCaskill taught us on the ANG list how to make fake bullions and kindly gave me permission to teach anyone and everyone the technique. He discovered how to do it by accident when he messed up stitching something with perle thread and because he is a thread genius, he immediately saw the possibilities and perfected the technique.

To do it, you must have a perle-type thread. This doesn't work with any other kind of thread. I recommend you use a 3-4 inch length of thread and a needle with a larger eye than you'd normally use with this thread (although you shouldn't use a needle with an eye too fat for your NP canvas or other ground fabric). If you look at the loose thread with the knot below the example of a fake bullion, you'll see that I choose Trebizond, a silk perle. The end without a knot is already begining to untwist a little as that's how perle threads are made--they are twisted single threads. This characteristic is what David exploited in making fake bullions.

Secure your thread, then come up as usual. Slide your needle off the end of the thread and put it away safely temporarily--you'll need it again in a second. Grab the loose end of your thread and untwist the perle a bit so that you see all the component parts. (The loose length of thread on the canvas below the bullion shows you what perles look like.) Grab one of the pieces in one hand and all the rest in the other. Hold the single twist steady with one hand and slide all the other twists down toward the ground fabric or NP canvas. Let go. You'll have a bullion with a very messy top as you see above. Gently thread up all the loose ends again being careful to not disturb the bullion and secure the bullion on the back side.

There are drawbacks to fake bullions--you can only do one at a time and I personally find they are less controlled than the regular wrapped bullions. If I have only one bullion to do, and I'm not trying to carefully place it to mimic a finger or something else that needs to go one way and one way only, then I use fake bullions. Holi the colorful Tudor Dog had a fake bullion flower in her halo, for example, but I used the normal bullion knots to make the paw ridges in the Golden Rabbit as they had to be precise sizes and had to bend a certain way. You have to wrap a bullion to get that exactness.

Many, many thanks to David McCaskill for generously sharing this technique! David knows much more and you can see the terrific designs he works out on his website. Clicking on the waving flag on his home page takes you to a free flag design. Most of David's work is on line drawn canvas. Head to the Design section and choose Christmas, then look at his Millennium Ornaments bowl. He made the bowl transparent and used the ugliest thread in existance (in my opinion) to make those red sparkling ornaments. This is just one example of how fine a designer David is and how much he knows about threads.
https://www.needlepointdavid.com

By the way, I found another great tutorial on how to make traditional bullions here. You might enjoy looking and comparing how bullions and fake bullions work.
http://www.heritageshoppe.com/heritage/stitches/bullion.html

UPDATE: Belle found us a link to Mary Corbet's videos of how to make stitches. Bullion Knots are under the Detatched Stitches & Knots section. Thanks, Belle!
http://www.needlenthread.com/2006/10/video-library-of-hand-embroidery.html

Feel better, e-Rose?

UPDATE #2:  I redid the above tutorial with better pictures.

https://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com/2016/04/faux-bullions-david-way.html

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Gone But Not Forgotten--Ray Dockstader UPDATED

On Memorial Day I learned that the stitchers in the D.C. area have lost one of their most famous and interesting stitchers--Raymond Dockstader. That's Ray above in a photo taken from the Washington Post, with a piece of his needlepoint and one of his many ribbons. He specialized in small 3x3 inch squares of needlepoint, with many motifs done in tent stitches, which were later assembled in groups and framed. I've seen a lot of his work exhibited at Woodlawn over the years, all of it wonderful, but I didn't mention all of it in my reports to you. Ray's work was hard to describe as it was original and personal. Sometimes I think you had to be present to study the pieces to grasp their artistic impulse. Ray had two small framed groups on display last March that I didn't describe. I wish I'd taken better notes so I could do that now. You'll have to be content with a quotation from the 2006 Woodlawn Plantation exhibit about Ray's work and my very favorite piece of his stitching, the parrot in a window. This is what I wrote then.

There were also many male stitchers who sent in cross stitch and needlepoint, plus a gentleman was demonstrating Hardanger when I was there. I am glad needlework is being done by both sexes these days. In fact, the winner of my annual "I'd Take This Home If I Could" award was stitched by a man. My favorite was one of four original pieces Ray Dockstader submitted (he showed several original pieces last year, too). This particular piece was the size of a piece of typing paper. It showed a yellow stucco wall with a few bricks peaking through crumbling stucco. There was a window cut in the wall with a black wrought iron balcony. Inside the window the walls were bright red and there was a parrot sitting on the wrought iron framed against the red wall. His pink head was cocked and he had an orange and yellow body, green wings and a blue tail. The whole piece was saturated in color, with touches of green elephant ear-type leaves and other lush green plants outside against the yellow stucco wall. Very nice piece, very different. The bright yellows and reds aren't my usual favorite colors but I thought it a very charming piece full of personality. He did three other pieces, all original, all probably in tent stitches (although I wasn't able to study two of his pieces closely). The largest was sort of a fabric collage in deep burgundy red with various fabric motifs scattered around. Another, also with a deep reddish brown as the main color, was a sort of abstract quilt pattern based on diamond shapes. It had other colors (navy, brown, yellow) but red was the main color. The last piece was another fabric-type collage and it won 1st place in its group. It was his version of a sampler with a marching line of terrier silhouettes on the bottom, a Bird of Paradise, flowers, strawberries, daisies, pears and a nude all scattered here and there. [I think this is the piece in the photo above, by the way.] It reminded me of a crazy quilt but without the fancy embroidery around the pieces making up the crazy quilt. Interesting work and nicely stitched but none of the pieces had the charm or design magic of the parrot in the window. Somehow there is always a piece that has personal appeal beyond its technical merit.

I hope the above brings some of Raymond Dockstader alive for you. I never met the man but I will miss him.  I loved that parrot!

Here is his obit in the Washington Post. If the Post asks you to sign up to read it, please do. You simply give them your email address and create a password. I've never gotten spam from the Post and you will want to read about Ray's amazing life and what he did when he wasn't stitching
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/23/AR2009052301737.html?sub=AR

More about his other interests.
http://www.umt.edu/urelations/MainHall/0104/cookbooks.htm

His online memory book.
http://www.legacy.com/gb2/thankyou.aspx?bookid=2577107365744

UPDATE:  A memorial written by a friend.
http://maggiebsmocks.typepad.com/smocking/2009/10/sharing-the-needlepoint-of-raymond-dockstader.html

UPDATE #2:  Maggie Bunch, who wrote the memorial above, owns several of Ray's pieces and is allowing me to post photographs of them here.  First, here are several 3 1/2 inch square paperweights.  Ray worked these as doodles, creating whatever was on his mind through his hands.  Maggie was fortunate enough to be invited to his estate sale where she purchased these.

She says she doesn't know what they are filled with (walnut shells?) but it is larger and heavier than rice.

Maggie says to notice the subtle color changes in the purple edge at the corners and in the middle.  Each piece has touches like this.

Maggie had this doodle sampler which shows off his through processes framed by Total Framing in Fairfax, VA with one of Ray's needles still parked.

His estate donated a few pieces to Woodlawn Plantation and they part of Woodlawn's 50th Silent Auction.  Maggie was lucky enough to be one of the winners.

These two photos  (above and below) are images of a Navajo style rug.  It is 15 1/2 by 23 1/2 and was blocked and framed by Total Framing.

Maggie says she knows the orb is from her camera flash but she likes to think that it is actually Mr. D. smiling down at us.

Thank you for the wonderful needle art you shared, Ray.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Bullions

When I posted about the Golden Rabbit's bullion stitch paw, Mickstitch wrote this comment on Blogspot, "I love your bullions! Any tips on how to get them to lay flat? I've been practicing them for one of my current projects, but I always get an extra strand underneath that twists the bullion. Any suggestions?"

I thought perhaps Mickstitch wasn't pulling the tail of the loose end of thread tightly enough, or perhaps wasn't holding the wraps tightly enough to keep one from unraveling into that extra strand underneath. It's not possible to diagnose a problem without seeing the problem stitch but here are two websites with good instructions for making bullions.

The first is SharonB's site. She has a whole series of stitches here, all with clear instructions. Note that she is making a small bullion. When you are learning, just do a few wraps. A 20 wrap bullion is a lot harder to do than a 5 wrap. Wait until you understand the stitch before running wild, ok?
http://inaminuteago.com/stitchdict/stitch/Bullion.html

This site is by Carol of Stitchin Time. I think she is a counted thread and XS designer, although I'm not certain. Look carefully at the needle she uses to explain how to make a bullion. It is longer and thinner than the one SharonB used for a reason. Bullions are made by wrapping thread around a needle, then sliding the needle through the wraps. Using a needle with a narrower eye than tapestry needles means you don't have so much trouble sliding the needle through the middle of the stitches. A lot of folks use millinery or crewel needles for bullions since they have narrower eyes. That's my first tip--use a needle with a skinny eye! They will have sharp tips, though, so be careful. By the way, MickStitch, perhaps your bullions are curving because you did too many wraps for the area you want to cover? Carol is curving her bullions because she is making roses from them.
http://www.needlework-tips-and-techniques.com/bullion-stitch.html

Another tip I've heard--as you pull the needle through the wraps you've made, think of this little rhyme. "Pull his tail, tickle his tummy." Pull the needle through the wraps, and continue to pull on the thread to snug the bullion down on the ground fabric. Don't rush this and use the tip of the needle to gently stroke the underside of the bullion so it lies smoothly. Bullions actually are about practicing until you get the tension right. You have to wrap the thread around your needle tightly but not too tightly, then hold the wraps steady with one hand as you pull the needle through the wraps with the other. This takes practice.

Gay Ann Rogers is called the Queen of Bullions by her students. Want to know why? Check this out!
http://www.gayannrogers.com/site_2/Bullion_Knots.html

Gay Ann says if you practice bullions ten minutes a day for ten days, you will own this stitch. I recommend you try it! You won't "get" this stitch immediately but you will eventually and it will become second nature.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow