Inspiration!

Thankyou Frances~

 Earlier this past week I received a wonderful email from a reader that touched my heart so much, I asked and received permission from Frances to share it with you all here~ 

"Happy New Year and a big thank you from the UK. I became aware of your website last year and as the months have gone by have found myself drawn to it again and again.  I'm sure you hear this all the time, but your work is truly exquisite and you have inspired me to pick up a needle after many fallow years. I dipped my toe in and worked a little stumpwork lion and having finished that have embarked on a much larger project that I am working on every spare minute I get. So, thank you Rachael for sharing & inspiring"

 
  I am so blessed, truly, to get to share my love of early things and embroidery with you all here on my blog. It makes me so happy when I get emails like this, to know that I have inspired someone to pick up a needle again after some while off, or for the very first time. And just look at her lion(click on to enlarge)~ he is super super wonderful! My favorite are the wrapped parchment strips in the surround. Each parchment strip must be cut, then wrapped individually with silk floss... a process that takes forever.  I am super proud of Frances!

 We have emailed a few times and she has shared her newest project she is working on now, as well as some earlier ones, and this sampler above is one of my favorites, I just love it.  

The glorious circle of sharing and inspiration~ Frances was inspired by me, and shared with me some of what she has done, and in turn, she has inspired me so very much, and I hope, you all too!  It's never too late in the day, or the week, or your life, to pick up a needle my friends! 

Just do it!

Happy new Year

A Wish for World Peace, & Happiness in 2019

 I'm not being hokey, I really do wish Peace & Happiness for any and everything that walks or swims or flies the earth in 2019. Wouldn't it be great. I am going to try to do my part, to be more patient,  and more accommodating and understanding to anyone I should encounter. Perhaps I should print out this picture of Moxie...this is how she smiles at me....and show it to anyone having a bad day...I mean, who can not smile back at that little face.....

I hope everyone had a Happy &  Safe start to their New Year. I finished the front panel to my casket before Christmas. Here is a short couple second video of how my mermaid, Taormina's tail came out using the beetle wings....sooo pretty

I did change the design a little as I went along~ I had originally planned to have a full side view of a fish in the grotto with her, but as I was working the water, he just started looking more and  more like a beached whale....so he is forever swimming beneath the surface of the water. Instead, I decided to  put just a tail there, sticking up out of the water

  I worked the first one in green, same beads actually that I used for Taormina's tail....I liked how it looked in my hand....so stitched it on the panel. Didn't like it. It just got lost in the water~ looking from afar, one couldn't really tell it was there at all.  So...I took it off, and decided to make the fishies carp, an ode to my youngest daughter's goldfish that we just lost, Mr. Timms.  

Mr Timms was a pretty awesome goldfish...daughter was fishing one day at the lake in the park in town, and caught him...as in, on a hook, instead of a trout.  We brought him home and put him in our outside pond, where he was very happy and survived a winter and many snake attacks that killed off his fellow fishies. Years, as in, YEARS, later, husband decided he no longer wanted a pond outside for all the snakes it was attracting, so Mr Timms got to come live inside. This fish. I mean. Oh My golly. he got HUGE, and lived for years and years and years! We were all sad when he finally passed away this last summer...so, Mr. Timms is forever on my front panel now

  The contrast is much better, as you can see here.  Don't ever be afraid to take something off of your embroidery if you don't like it.... even if you have spent days and hours and hours  on it.....

  Mr Timms is on the left, talking to Taormina. She is hand sculpted by me in mache, with glass eyes, holding a wooden mirror and comb.

Perhaps 2019 will be the year I finish this casket~ I hope so. I have just the two side panels left, but cannot start them for a while yet, probably not until I get back from teaching at Colonial Williamsburg in Feb/March.

Happy Stitching!

Merry Chrsitmas

Thankyou!

2018 Ltd Edition Ornament Kit Peaceful Kingdom

SOLD OUT

Thankyou so much for your patronage~ I am excited to share next years ornament kit with you soon~

AutoPilot

Have you ever been driving along, and realize you are in a different spot than you expected? I do it all the time on a long drive home, say from the dr office...which is 89 miles from us. All of the sudden I realize we are on the other side of Walsenberg....and I dont remember going past it....Auto Pilot. 

Lately I feel like I am stuck in autopilot....or maybe its the Twilight Zone...that could be it. I have a list a mile long to get done every day, if I dont write whatever it is on the list, it doesnt even get remembered.  I am an emotional wreck...in less than a week will be 1 year since I lost my Biskie....cant quite thinking about that, missing my parents and wishing I was home with them....my last Christmas at home was 1988....its just never worked out to be home again~ not for lack of want, not at all. Thats just life and I suck it up, but every now and then I get overwhelmed. I have had my Christmas tree up in the gallery here since Thanksgiving weekend....boxes of ornaments all around it on the floor...but there it sits, I have no want to get them out. WHAT is the deal??

  I know I should be spending my spare time decorating the tree....but this is what I find myself doing instead....is this my auto pilot? I dont know, but it is very engrossing.....all consuming......making fish scales from beetle wings. My dear friend Stacy gifted me them one year, and I have had them in mind for a mermaid tail ever since. Have no idea how many I will need, probably a zillion or so.

 I first cut the wings into strips, then cut the strips into smaller bits, and then trim one edge of each 'bit' to round it out, like a fish scale. Takes forever and I seriously need to go get my glasses redone, as I am really having a hard time focusing on ANYTHING lately....as in...the seeing kind of focus.....oh my eyes are wide open, Im walking around, but big blurry blobs, thats all Im seeing. Hannah has been telling me, while at the store, 'geeze mom, you didnt even say hi'.....and I honestly say~ what are you talking about? And she will say I came within arm reach and total eye contact of a neighbor....and I literally have no idea they were there.... even more reason to get it in gear and get this casket finished, before I really do go blind.

 After I get the little buggers shaped, then I have to go back and drill a hole in each one. Takes forEVER. This is two wings worth of little beetle wing fish/mermaid scales.

Happy Stitching y'all~

Oh and just a little reminder~ I have only 2 of this years Ltd Edition Peaceful Kingdom Ornament Kits left, and as well, the Padded Mirror Case Class will be closing December 31!

Has it REALLY been 2 Weeks?

since I last made a blog post? Really? It doesnt seem like it~ time is going by so fast! I have been working on my front casket panel a little when I can steal some time. I have the clouds done, and the base foliage, thats about it. Working on a zillion little rose petals for the roses, I am up to 66 made to far,  and that is only for the back layer of petals on the attached flowers...I will have just as many or more for the interior petals....I havent decided yet if I will make fully detached roses yet...will have to see how it looks first. 

Thanksgiving came and went in a flash, I have managed to get the rest of the floor in the house finished, so I am super happy to have that done. Only 18 years of living here it has taken me to get the floor in...(.now you see the significance of the snails on my casket.)

Working madly on Christmas orders, if you order a slate frame now tho, I cannot guarantee delivery before Christmas. Working on next years classes and kits....I am hoping sometime in all that I will feel the urge to put up the Christmas tree in the gallery. At this point, a little voice in my head says 

'whats the point....it takes so long to put up, it will be up just a few weeks and  you will have to take it down again'

I recall this time of year passing alot slower when I was younger....

Another Snow Day

 And its STILL Snowing here in Southern Colorado!

 Go figure...the season I am not elk hunting...it snows....and snows.... About 10" maybe this time??? Its still snowing and blowing and being utterly disagreeable outside...the children are home, no school today....

I have a pot of tea on and trying to suppress my urge to blast my favorite 1940's Christmas Album.

Despite what it looks like outside, in 'my world', inside nice and cozy(actually the tip of my nose is quite cold because I keep it around 50 in my part of the house...), the sun is out on my front casket panel, and a precious little dove has come flitting by to land on my finger.