New Little Helpers....

  Hand Painted Needle Minders

For those who like to keep track of their needles or pins on their embroidery without having to stab them through the ground fabric, I have a cute selection of needle minders in the ETSY shop today!

They are each handmade and painted by me. 

I wouldn't say these are doodles, as I put a lot of time into them, but I had so much fun! I didn't follow any pattern~just cut out what I felt like and painted what came off my fingers at the time.

In case you are not familiar with a needle minder, it has a magnet on the back and comes with a second. You place the minder on the front of the fabric, and the second magnet behind it on the back of the fabric and this holds the minder in place. The magnets are very strong and hold any pins or needles you put on the front of it in place.

Each one is unique, painted in several layers of transparent watercolours so the beautiful wood grain of the sycamore shines through

They are roughly around an inch and half in diameter...some a little larger, some a little smaller

All are signed and dated on the backs

If you are in need of one, they are available today in my ETSY store, link is to the right in the sidebar.

Happy Stitching!

Special Original 17th c Blackwork Nativity Spool Tray Available

 Humbly Born in a Stable Rude

It's been a very challenging year for me this year, as I am sure it has for many of ya'll as well. Sometimes the stress and just absolute heartbreak just gets to be too much for me so I try and trick myself into not thinking about it by really concentrating on other things. I had been wanting to make something special to offer for Christmas for quite a while, but just wasnt feeling it, if you know what I mean.  Earlier this year a really awesome 17th c redwork panel of Moses in the Rushes was sold at auction, and one day when I was numbly going thru my saved pictures to keep my mind occupied. I landed on that picture. At that moment, I knew what I wanted to make and spent the rest of the day drawing out a 17th c Nativity scene.

I took inspiration from  three 17th c embroideries~ there arent that many with Nativity subject matter. I know of one tent stitch piece at the V&A that is so bright and colourful, it doesnt even look like a Nativity scene until you start really investigating it. A woman is sitting by a stream above a grotto surrounded by shaded green hollocks....and then you notice there is a baby aside her...then you see the sheep and shepherds in the background and realize the man on the other side of her is Joseph, there is a stable with a donkey and cow...there is an angel...its all very subtle.  I didnt want my nativity to be subtle!

The angle is above looking down on Mary who is kneeling aside baby Jesus in his manger. Joseph is standing aside the stable with two shepherds kneeling with their sheep to the other side of Mary.  I tried to fit a donkey into the stable but he just didnt fit without making it look over detailed. Joseph's dove flies overhead and of coarse no 17th c scene would be complete without a huge mulberry tree ;)

  

I love painting blackwork and after sharing this with a friend, got immediate feedback to make it into a black or redwork project to stitch.....so ...perhaps a special for next year 

For now though, this is my one special offering for Christmas 2020. I made it from a beautiful piece of hard maple, and fit it with 21 pegs. Yes~ 21 pegs! My largest spool tray to date. As you can see above both the small and large spools fit on it nicely. It measures 8 & 1/4" x 7 & 3/8". 

Signed and dated on the bottom of coarse

This special tray is available at a cost of 650.00 including shipping~ a direct reflection of how expensive wood has become, and how many hours I have into it. If you love it and would like to purchase it you can email me at rlkinnison@yahoo.com

2020 Early American Life Directory

13 Consecutive Years of DKFA Dollies

   I simply could not be more honored to share with ya'll that my dollies were juried into the 2020 Early American Life Directory of Traditional American Crafts again this year.  I received my August issue of Early American Life Magazine  and was elated to see my boys exploring the Number One House in Historic Zoar Village in Ohio.  Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou so very much to Early American Life Magazine and to all of the judges, for appreciating the work that I put  in to making my dolls, and Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou to each and every person who has given one a home. I appreciate it from the bottom of my soul~

on eBay this week!

New Design Flemish Palette &!

 Happy Monday! I hope your day is a great one and your relaxing with a nice cup of tea...I have mine!  I have finally had some time to breathe after finishing all the end of year school things for the children, and have this gorgeous spool palette up on eBay this week.  I designed this one after the other Flemish pieces I have made, but the design is a little different, based more on the box I embroidered of the same. I love to paint in this style, its really fun and feminine, and I love how the gold looks when its finished. Its something the camera just doesnt pick up in a picture~  if you want to see it on eBay with huge pictures so you can see all the details, or perhaps place a bid, you can find it here

  The gold is very subtle head on, but when the pieces are moved, or you move around them, you get these unexpected little flashes of light~ so pretty!  Just think how pretty a casket would be...I mean....an entire casket, painted this way!

  I have all sorts of things in my head I would like to paint, so many ideas, but the bulk of my painting time is painting what others have always wanted~ its a challenge to be sure. I haven't posted pictures in so long of my slate frames, mainly because I don't post pictures until they get to their intendeds....but by then I get busy and forget~ so thought I would share a couple of my favorites.  Its amazing sometimes what people ask for~ things I would never think to paint on a frame, but in the end, they fit really well.  Sometimes people are very specific about what they want....other times, they can be fairly vague. The above frame was a request for snowmen and snowflakes and silver Christmas balls. 

 Skeletons & pirates are always a popular theme...so this time I combined them.   I know if I was a pirate, my treasure box would be chock full of embroidery threads! 

 Charlotte told me to paint what ever I wanted, but that she likes witches.....so witches it was! I love Halloween and witches and thought this frame would be a breeze, and it turned out to be the most challenging frame I have painted to date, as it is just so blasted difficult to fit mainly vertical objects onto a horizontal plane that is only an inch tall. I love how it came out, its one of my ultimate favorites.

Dollys have been busy to, Ladye Pomme is on her way back home from a visit to Jamestowne & Colonial Williamsburg. I am really thrilled to announce that I was selected again this year for Early American Life Magazine's Directory of Top 200 Traditional American Craftsmen, for the 11th consecutive year in a row.  Its truly an honor and I am so excited for Pomme to get back here so we can have some tea and she can tell me all  about her venture East. I hope she got to go to the glass furnace there...I went this past March and it was fabulous!

on eBay this week!

12 Spool Flemish Spool Palette

   My last offering before Christmas~ if you would like to see more views or perhaps place a bid, you can find it here, or click the sidebar link to my eBay specials. 

Is it really 2017

Already? 

 Happy New Year! Now that its past Christmas I can share one of my favorite slate frames with you all~ nothing brings in a New Year like some gold! I had a special customer that ordered a frame for Christmas~ all she said was to base it on my Flemish Box that I worked a bit ago~

 There is a lot of gold on that box and my following Christmas ornament

 I wanted to make the frame extra special for her for Christmas, so I used real liquid gold for the scrolls and hilites and boy oh boy does it ever sparkle!

 Here I am just starting to add the gold~ in addition to the scrolls, there is gold on the petals and leaves as well~ just like how I embroidered the originals

 One thing I really love about using the liquid gold is how subtle it is....at first you may not even realize there is gold on the piece, but then when you look closer, or move it a certain direction~ the light just dances off in all sorts of directions and makes the surface glow~ soooooo pretty!

 The gold on the top of the trees looks like sunshine

 Scrolling Dutch tulips are perfectly suited for a horizontal slate frame

 I cant wait to paint myself a frame like this~ at the rate I'm going, it may be a few years before I get one~

I couldn't think of a better way to bring in the New Year than working with some 24k gold leaf~ maybe thats how this year will be for everyone~ I hope so! I am gilding casket and mirror case feet this week~ these pictured are mirror case feet that havent been burnished yet. An embroidered casket is special~ if you use the best hardware and the best real gold threads available~ why not give it the best feet available? My casket feet are fr sale in my Diamond K Folk Art blog shop~ link & more info to the right~  cause a girl's just got to have some pretty shoes....

Is That.....

Real Gold on my Palette?????

Well....it sure is! It's actually suspended in liquid as an ink but I am painting with it today....

New dollye on eBay this week!

Queenie

My Love is on eBay this week~ if you would like to meet her, you can visit her 

here

on eBay this week!

One of a Kind Strawberry & Distlefink Thread Palette

  If a stove has four burners on the top... or six or eight..no matter, I got them all going right now!  To say I am currently running in overdrive would be an understatement.  My focus for this past month has been to get my model for my new Flemish ornament kit finished....cant offer a kit with no model!!!! I have it 'just' about finished....along with my slate frame orders.....then there are the 6 dollys currently on the table...some a little more cheeky than the others....and then...well....the elephant. I thought I would have more time to finish my elephant.....what elephant you say????  The elephant! So many of you know I will be teaching a 4 day workshop at the 2017 Bath Textile Summer School~ what will I be teaching...well...that is the elephant! Turns out the pamphlets will be printed in April, so I have to have elephant finished by end of March!  She is coming along nicely, and I am really really really excited to show her to everyone...but not yet! Not till she's finished...and to get her finished by end of march I am definitely burning the candle at both ends....and in the middle! Pray the bead Gods will be kind to me and Ill not spent too many hours hunched up on the floor, with my nose to the ground, picking up spilt beads!!!  Oh ya...I am hooking a rug too....(what am I crazy???)  So all of this and I still have to make my car payment, so if you like the palette above, go check it out on eBay! You can see it here... or click the link to my eBay auctions on the right.
    This palette is really special to me~ youll see why if you read the auction~ Im off to go stab some beads!
                 

Happy 2016!

New Year...New Dollys... New You!

 Happy New Year! I can't believe we are a week into 2016 already!  I want to thank all of my wonderful customers for their much appreciated patronage last year, and say that I hope to continue to grow my business(s) this year~ making dollys, painting, making ya'll beautiful tools and teaching embroidery & beadwork. I have so many wonderful things planned for this year I hope I can get to them all! I have some really new exciting projects planed to make that I have never made before~ exciting but also a bit intimidating...but if I can do it, so can you! I challenge all of my readers to try something new this year they have never done before! 'Just do it!'. 

 I have been hard at work designing some new embroidery projects, some kits, and of coarse sculpting some fresh new faces. The three dollys above are part of my Ladye Grace series of early 19th c dolls, with antique glass eyes and elaborate sculpted coiffures. These are spoken for, but there are several more on the table patiently waiting their turn.  

Cheers to a Happy & Healthy 2016 filled with all in life that makes your inner light shine bright!!!

New Thread Palette Set on eBay this week!

               Custom Made &  Hand Painted Maple Thread Palettes & Thread Winders

 I have bee pretty busy making & painting specifically for filling custom orders, but I have been trying to squeeze in some neat things in between~ I just got this palette set finished and listed on eBay this week~ for those of you who collect my palette sets, I think this one may be the last to go on eBay before Christmas. It is truly a one of a kind set, the ships wheel thread winder was so difficult to cut out that I am 99.9999999% sure that I will never ever make another one! If you love ships as I do, or whales~ you can check it out on eBay here. The ship is of coarse, the USS Constitution, the very first commissioned Naval ship.

  Thought I would also share some of what I have been painting palette wise~ for those of you thinking of designing your own special one of a kind thread palette...or better yet, if your group or guild is having a special get together or function, think about having me design a special thread winder~ they make wonderful and useful take home souvenirs!  You name it, I can paint it....I think :)  I never thought I would paint the Golden Gate Bridge on anything and I think it came out pretty cool~

  This set was made to match a slate frame I painted earlier this year, the palette my version of a 19th c Audubon engraving

 This set was fun, made to commemorate a trip to the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta with a hot air balloon shape palette and thread winders to match the favorite special shape balloons of the recipient...I still cant believe I painted Yoda!

Have a special building in mind?, I can paint those too~ or how about your house? That would be fun!  If interested about having a palette set or special thread winder made, just drop me a line at rlkinnison@yahoo.com 

Bears & Sea Shells

Summer Sea Shells on eBay this week!

  I hope everyone had a Happy & safe Independence Day holiday! I finally finished the above palette set and they are on eBay this week! I say finally because its taken a bit! I designed the clam shell palette for a custom mermaid set I did a bit ago and had shells on the brain~ I have wanted to paint some for a while....they were such a popular motif to paint at the beginning of the 19th c~ I wanted to see what all the hub bub was about. well. Oh My Golly! I love painting seashells!  They are quite involved actually and take extra time to paint, but are so much fun~ so colorful and happy!  I picked some favorite sea creatures to go with~ a star fish, seahorse, and clam for thread winders. So if you are one of the many who have been requesting seashells, you can find them here on eBay this week.   I think perhaps I should paint a bear on the next palette set.....

  We have had a few visitors this summer....I usually get so excited I forget to get my camera...a few weeks ago we had a little 2 yr cub...the blondest bear I have ever seen in my life~ he was the color of a bananna ~ I am not kidding!  This fellow stopped by day before last...well, early in the morning, and was so comfy in our tree he decided to take a nap so had plenty of time to go get the camera...perhaps I need to put him on a skep palette...or maybe a dancing bear!

19th c Schoolgirl Art Reproduction Thread Palette on eBay this week!

Joys of Summer Palette Set

 How fitting that the week Squeek's eggs are hatching,  I have this set available on eBay?!  I love it~ painted with a mamma blue bird feeding her three lil babies in the nest. If you are familiar with schoolgirl painted furniture or art, you may recognize this design from an early 1800-30 painted box.  The three thread winders are an egg, bluebird, and a lil chick's head~ they are always so hungry!  If you would like to see more pictures of it, or are interested in purchasing, you can see it here on eBay this week!

Free Shipping on Padded Mirror Cases

Some News~

   I have had several emails as of late from folks asking if they have missed the newsletter~ the answer is, no~ you have not! I have been so busy I have not sent one out for about 3 months now, and as well, I need to find a newsletter server that can send them out for me, as my mail list is so long, I hit the wrong button a few years ago and sent the list out to everyone all at once and was instantly labeled a spammer! I had to read yahoo's entire policy on spamming in order to get my email turned back on, and one would think, that after 10+ years with the same email, that would be taken off my account, but nope, most of the time, my emails end up there~ so if you are waiting for a reply from me and more than a day or two have passed, look in your junk box, ill be there!  So for now, as Paul Harvey says, Standby for News!

 Free Shipping on Padded Mirror Cases for the month of June
 There is just about two weeks left in June, so if you have been thinking about joining the Padded Mirror Case Class, now is the time! I am offering FREE SHIPPING to destinations within the continental USA, and all others, worldwide get 50% OFF.  For both cases, this equates to a good 65.~70.00 savings!

 Padded Mirror Cases now Available Without Class
 My padded mirror cases are now available at a discounted rate for those in class who would like more than one, and for those who need no instructions.  If interested, you can learn more on the Diamond K Folk Art blog, just click the link at the right in the sidebar, then look for the sorting tabs at the top of that blog.

 I have had several request for slate frames, so am working on some now~ will let you know how they come out! I  am making mine out of ash and poplar~ very nice straight and strong grain~ and I may have schoolgirl painted designs available in the future.

 Speaking of Schoolgirl Art... I have been keeping very busy with my thread palette & winder sets and really really want to thank all of you who have emailed me about how much you like them, I appreciate it so much! I love making special treasures that brighten peoples day~ it makes my heart smile. I do make special custom designed sets, so if you have something in particular in mind, just drop me a line~ you can find my contact info in the sidebar.

 Bath Textile Summer School
  Word has slowly eeked out, and yes, its true! I will be teaching a 4 day workshop at the 2017 Summer school session on 17th Beaded Stumpwork~ its going to be FANTABULOUS!!! So mark your calendars if you want to spend 7 hours a day , for 4 jam packed days with me in a massive beading marathon, I'm not telling what I will be teaching yet, but will hint its gonna be AWESOME!!!!

 Dollys
 Of coarse I have been working on dollys dollys~ and you can see MR Wm Cooper in the current issue of Early American Life Magazine~ I am so so honored to have been chosen again this year for the 2015 Directory of Traditional American Craftsmen~ THANKYOU  so much to all the judges.  I have been quite busy so there has been a lack of new dollys on eBay, but do still stay quite busy with custom orders~ so if you have a particular dolly in mind and are tired of waiting for him/her to appear happenstance, just drop me a line!

Butterflies Everywhere!

Rose & Butterfly Palette on eBay this week!

  My next thread palette is the set above~ I really like how this one came out~ I know I always say that, but I really did enjoy this one! The weather has been so wonderful, I could still paint outside (notice I said, could ~ the mosquitoes have hatched now and I have had to move back inside!)

  Emma sat out with me and worked on her landscape painting with Grandma Dixie....shes getting so old and grey, but still thinks shes the biggest dog in the land!

  On the very outside edge of this palette I inked a few lines from one of my favorite Norfolk samplers done by Mary Southgate, 1806~
 "Pray let the needle claim some little share~ With shades of silkes to copy nature faire"

  There were several butterflies that flittered by while we were painting...along with a zillion little green caterpillars that kept dropping out of the tree above us.....note to self...not good to paint under a box elder tree early in the morning.... anyway~ this fellow was like a B52 bomber compared to the others~ he came somewhat crashing through and landed in the driveway...maybe a bird tried to eat him? He was quite exhausted and let Emma hold him for a bit, and when he had caught his breath, off he zoomed.

I do love butterflies~ and of coarse I could not just paint one on the palette, I had to make three different thread winders to go with! Love love love love them, so much so I could not bring myself to paint one side only, so they are painted on the backs as well! If you would like to see them or are interested in purchasing, you can see them here on eBay this week.

My Needle Box

A little of this, a little of that....

   I have been prepping for starting my flat op casket, and one of the things that really bothers me is my inability to glue a finished piece of embroidery onto 'something' . Anything.  The originals were glued and I find that whenever I try and glue an embroidery to a flat surface, its absolutely riddled with bubbles in the background.  Of coarse the easiest thing would be to cover the background with embroidery and avoid the whole situation, but I want my background to be unworked~ the dutchess silk satin absolutely glows and is so beautiful! So I designed this little project for more practice, and to try out some different techniques...not to mention I wanted something pretty, something more fitting, to keep my needle in, instead of this~

  A hideous plastic zip bag! I have a few needle books, but I like to keep my needles in their original packages~ this way I can keep better track of if I am getting low on a certain one or not, and I know who made it and what size it is....and a zip bag...well how ugly is that!?

  I am planing all sorts of techniques for my flat top casket~ one being silk wrapped parchment strips. If you are familiar with 17th c stumpwork or caskets, you will probably recognize the silk wrapped parchment loupes often used in the borders of cartouches~ but above here, there are silk wrapped parchment elements included in the lace of this 17th c gown~ I love the little flowers!

 First I made my box from a thick board and covered it with hand marbled paper...I love making boxes!

 Next, a simple embroidery was worked, I wanted lots of open background showing. Two little roses inspired by a favorite antique sampler went center of the cushion, and the waves were worked in 4 silver smooth passing. Real silver spangles added some quaint bling!

 I used wheat paste to glue the silk satin to my box, and of coarse~ STILL full of bubbles and not quite flat~ but better. I try so hard to keep the back of my embroidery FLAT, and am thinking, since doing this little experiment, that perhaps backing the silk satin with paper before working the embroidery, would help with the bubble issue. You can see my trinket box in the background~ and may be asking, well, that was flat~ so what is your problem??? Well... I cheated on my trinket box. I guess its not really cheating....but I didn't glue the panels on~ I tacked them on over a light padding, like in upholstery.  When it comes time to mount the embroidery to my casket, I do not want to still be experimenting with techniques.  I like how the cushion turned out, like it aLOT actually~ but see on the side~ there are bubbles. One cannot just add more glue, or it will soak thru the fabric.

  I love my parchment flowers! I am planing many parchment elements on my flat top! Cant wait to start!!!

 There is lots of room for my needles now, so all in all, it was a good learning experience, and tho my background still has bubbles and I'm not happy with that...I have a pretty little needle box I didn't have last week.