Those Little Details

When reading a book, I find those little details the author has woven in essential to transporting me to that other world. It's never enough just to have a decent story line or interesting, developed characters.  Good authors thoroughly research their topics and sprinkle in enough authenticity to bring the reader along on their ride.

Many stitchers have run across books by author Monica Ferris, particularly her series of mysteries starting with Crewel World revolving around various forms of needlework in the clues and crimes.  Monica's latest book Theadbare hit the streets just before Christmas:

Turns out that Monica had visited Nordic Needle in Fargo as part of the research for this book. She just happened to spot the chart my Mum designed called Fjord Ponies during her visit.

And somehow, this happened...right there in black and white on page 247.

We didn't know ahead of time.  I think better than any surprise I could have arranged for Mum.  So, of course, I had to get a special copy for my Mum for Christmas.  Monica was so sweet to work with.  She autographed a copy for us. I know my Mum will treasure this forever. (It's her Andy Warhol moment.)

So pick up a copy and enjoy the mystery and all of its little details.

Put it in a box - I'll take it

I was so delighted to see the Ashley in Louisiana chose an Olde Colonial box to finish up her Quiddity piece. She stitched it using Belle Soie Mango and Caron Waterlilies Indigo silks on 36 count Edinburgh linen in Antique Gold.  It's going to be a gift for her Mom, and I know she will just treasure it.

If you've not used one of these boxes before, you should definitely check them out.  They come in all sorts of standard sizes and can be special ordered to a custom size.  Also several different molding options.  The top piece is like an open frame. You mount your stitching on foam core or mat board and insert it from underneath. Use small tacks or a framing staple gun to secure it in the window. Then cover the inside of that top with some pretty paper (from your scrapbooking stash) to give the inside a complete finished look.  The bottom part of the box is already lined with a nice velvety something.

Again, lovely job, Ashley. Your Mom raised you well.

Music to My Ears

I just loved hearing about the projects you stitchers cooked up for holiday gifts.

Letty O. shared these photos of musical clefs that she stitched then mounted to a cigar box. What a neat finishing idea! As you can see, she changed the clef colors on First Bass to match the Treble (you're allowed to do things like that , you know!), then extended the staff line, as would be done on sheet music.  How cool is that.  Wouldn't you love to see that under your tree?  Letty, thanks for sharing this great idea and your lovely work.

Here's another shot of some Ink Circles Christmas love- this time with the happy recipient in the pic.  This is Max and his 99 sampler. Max likes beer and even brews his own. (I've seen the hop plants he has growing!) Have a Merry Christmas, Max! This special moment was brought to you courtesy of stitcher Sue in Pendleton, Max's mom.

Thanks everybody for the wonderful support and fun in 2011. I wish you all the most spectacular fantabulous 2012!

Cheers,
Tracy

Geeky Tools for Geeky Socks

If you subscribe to Knitty.com, you already know they have a wide variety of fun knitting patterns for free.  You have to learn to knit, after all, you can't really cross stitch it near total darkness or when your eyes are wonky.

May I direct your attention to these fun filled socks by Heatherly Walker (aka Yarn Yenta).  Now, aside from acknowledging they are very cool socks and wondering whether a sock designer's real name is "Walker," you may also be wondering why I'm  posting about them.

Well, if you scroll down in the pattern, you will see that Heatherly is a happy Ink Circles customer and used some wonderfully appropriate stitch markers that I made for her.

Wow, I feel so famous now.  Should you want to order your very own set of geeky stitch markers made from capacitors, resistors, light bulbs and other leftovers from my engineering days, I have a number of sets over in my Etsy shop. 

I know you'll want to download her pattern if you haven't already: Microprocessor Socks.  I think I will make mine in green and silver.

Very cool additional note: Heather has just told me that her socks (complete with the circuit board and resistors display) have been selected to be part of an exhibit on science influencing crafts.  Is it still cool to say awesomesauce?!?

Rubber Meets the Road

The first steps down a new path for Ink Circles have been taken.  A lot of you know how much I love ink work, and many of you have heard me explain, "Sorry - this new drawing I did just won't convert well over to cross stitch."  We could go into the basic 17 types of symmetry and which ones would convert nicely and for which order (fold) they would work, but we'll save that for the math blogs.

A friend convinced me that my non-stitchable designs, however, WOULD be pretty cool as rubber stamped images. So, here is a peek at a few prototypes. I wanted to have a few in hand to play with before ordering up the etched metal plates and investing lots of moolah. I found a company that would make up a one off using a LASER to etch the design into real rubber.  Simon Stamp seems to have done a nice job, with the design printed on the back of the wood block - nice professional touch.  This won't be the same company the final ones will be from, as I'll be switching over to a company that's business model is to economically make bulk quantities. 

 

The designs are 4" across. It's my thought that it should give a big enough motif to be the main design on a card or something.  Anything smaller and it might be too hard to color or layer.  I'm hoping to offer both wood-mounted and cling-style.

Below is my original painted version of the right-hand stamp.  I hope that crafters will find these fun to make and color. Tomorrow they are going to be sent off to my friend Diane in Virginia. I can't wait to see what she does with them. She makes amazingly awesome layered and embellished things and has promised to make up some samples to show them off and explore some different ways to use them.  She'll also be able to confirm whether image size and level of detail is optimal.

Initially, I'll be focusing on mandalas, but might dabble in Celtic or ...

I'll be sure to share more with you as I move along the path and definitely a heads up when they are available for sale.

I'm anxious to hear from you what you think regarding anything from mount types to images to sizes.  And, if any of you have any experience making/selling stamps I would love to hear any input you have from that angle.  

WYSI-NOT-WYG

Okay, I'm done freaking out about this.  A few days ago I showed you Metamorphosis. The picture was taken in my front garden in diffuse daylight. I thought it looked pretty good on the screen with the light orangish fabric (somewhat overexposed) and the sweet purple asters.  I tootled over to the print shop later that afternoon to review the final proofs (truly a just-in-time job to make the online show deadline.) I was horrified.

Those flowers - BLACK background with gaudy dark smudges.  The fabric had become a creepy yellow color.  Everything was dark and ugly.  No can print. You can read all you want about subtractive colors and additive colors that translates to the pictures that look nice on your screen usually suck when you print them. I hadn't ever seen one of mine come out quite this bad.

An amazing thing, I was going to take a picture to show how unlike the screen photo the hard copy was. I had the screen and the print in my camera viewfinder and damned it the two colors hadn't changed yet still - the print actually looking more appropriately orange and rich than the screen. Oooh, mind games.

I have since retaken photos in just about every light setting, using every camera setting, every photoshop tweak I knew, every publishing program adjustment, and I still struggled.  Maybe it's just harder with the more saturated colors.  I want the printed photo on the chart to be accurate enough in color that if someone were to order the same fabric, they wouldn't be surprised when the parcel arrives.  It might be a touch more orange than you like! Now it looks super-orange on the screen, particularly with the new backdrop, but it prints so much better than the first.

Well, the online show has officially opened - I can tell, because "interesting things" have started showing up in my inbox. I'm waiting for my printer to call that the charts are ready for pickup. I have about 2 TB of garbage photo attempts to clear off my hard drive.  I think it's time for a cup of tea.

Changing Time

Just a few more days before the Online Needlework Show starts up (October 20-25.)  In my last post, I showed you the new Love Letters that I had finished up. Here is another preview for your perusal.  I give you...
Metamorphosis. Below, it presents a bit of an optical illusion to me - it looks like the photo is crooked, tilting down on the right. It also presents a bit of a challenge chart-wise. Like Namaste, 81/2 x 11" paper is not optimal for displaying long skinny things without lots of blank page.

This is the first in a series of charts where I’ve used Quaker motifs to illustrate a particular concept, in this case the transformation from one form into another. In seven steps the pot of flowers motif morphs into an octagonal design.  Seven shades of Gentle Art Sampler Threads also gently transition as the motifs change.  

I was going to call this Evolution, but didn't really want to get into any creationism-sparked arguments nor did I want to defend that an octagonal motif was somehow fitter than a pot of flowers.  So I leaned back on my initial inspiration, which was more Escher-like than anything, and settled with Metamorphosis.


If you get my newsletter (that was just mailed this afternoon) you got to see a sneak peek of a third new offering that I'll have for the Online Show. It's a piece by my Mum and is a bit different than your typical Ink Circles style, so we are releasing under her business name Norsk Needlework.  If you didn't get the newsletter, you'll just have to sign yourself up for such things so you don't miss anything.  Meanwhile, the design in it's entirety will be revealed at the show, along with all sorts of other cool thing from many designers.


Just a reminder that the Online Show is open only to Local and Online Needlework Shops.  We still invite the public to view and provide input to their shop owners.  In this economy, we're seeing a lot more of shops ordering only when nudged by their customers. So make your wish lists heard!