Carved Heart Embroidery

Nerd alert: when I was a little kid, I loved doing embroidery and cross-stitching. I have vivid, happy memories of my mom helping me trace pictures from the Friend (a Christian kids’ magazine I loved) onto muslin to embroider, and I spent hours stitching away. (Maybe this is what’s wrong with kids these days . . . they don’t know how to cross stitch. I cross stitched, and I turned out swimmingly, ergo, today’s children should be cross stitching more. Embroider today for a brighter tomorrow!)

Unfortunately, I lost interest in it as time went on, and other hobbies stepped in to take needlework’s place. But a deep, beautiful, slightly inappropriate love affair with Allison’s embroidery on Little Lovelies (here are some of my favorites from her blog) made me want to pick it up again. Then I saw this project at Miss Lovie a few weeks before Christmas—a little heart carved in a tree, complete with initials. It seemed like exactly the sort of Christmas gift I could spend hours making for Jeff, who would not appreciate it at all. And I was right!

Isn’t that sweet? I normally don’t go for the cutesy-pootsy “we’re so in love”-type projects, but I thought this one was cute without making me want to gag at its hormonal teenaged romanticism.

The original tutorial includes a printable pattern that you can trace onto your fabric to stitch over. Someone--and I don’t want to name names, but someone in this house who has an absurd obsession with electronic gadgets and is about 2 feet tall--broke our printer, so I couldn’t take advantage of the pattern. I just sketched out something that looked vaguely similar to the pictures and got to work. Mine is also much larger than the one in the tutorial—something like 5 inches across instead of ornament-sized.

I really love how it came out. I’m not entirely certain what to do with a single piece of embroidery art . . . I think I may want to start embroidering again, make some more little pieces, and cluster them together on a wall somewhere. This little project revived a long-dormant interest in a hobby that I had all but forgotten about. But for now, there’s just the one, and it’s perched awkwardly on Jeff’s nightstand. Three cheers for useless Christmas gifts!

Vintage Embroidery Hoop Art

Okay, this one's a little late getting posted . . . Simple Simon & Co.'s Vintage Crafter's Challenge ended a month ago. But let's pretend that I've been hanging on to this post so that those of you getting bored and lacking inspiration can now be reminded of their fun series and click back through all the great projects! Yeah, that's it! (Truth be told, I kind of forgot about this one until I was unpacking and found my hoop art. Instant blog post! Yes!)

In case you missed it, here's the series in a nutshell: Elizabeth and Liz love vintage fabric. They sent out packages of vintage sewing goodies to some bloggers to see what we would do with it. So here's my take! (Originally posted here)

When I received my package of vintage goodies in the mail, my first thought was, "Oh dear, these poor ladies have lost their minds . . . "

". . . how do they expect me to cut up these beautiful fabrics?!" It felt like sacrilege to slice up such pretty vintage finds.

I loved that sweet floral polka-dot print and I was crazy about the grass-y green linen with the lace border, as well as the vibrant blue bias tape, yellow cording, and adorable buttons. It was a beautiful collection of vintage fun, but I was a little distressed at the thought of cutting into the fabric. I spent a few days stressing over potentially destroying such lovely material if my project didn't turn out before I finally got down to business and created some cheerful vintage hoop art:

I knew that I wanted to make something that would highlight the beautiful fabrics--my creative efforts are usually more on the functional, wearable side, but I just couldn't get over how lovely the fabric was, so I really wanted to put it up on display.

 

 And when I think "vintage," I think of a friendlier, more neighborly time . . . so a cheerful little message seemed like the perfect touch.

I finished it off with a colorful rolled flower made using the green lace and bias tape, with a cluster of yellow cording and a button center.

I think it's such a fun way to highlight some amazing fabric in a really unique way! Not to mention that I get a smile over being greeted with a "hello" from my hoop art every time I walk through my door!

I'll be sharing this project at some of these link parties!