Tag Archives: embroidery

Wish upon a Dandelyne and Win!

I have something pretty exciting to share with you today. Recently on instagram, I stumbled across the lovely Sonia, creator of Dandelyne. I fell in love with her 100% cute work. We chatted a bit, liked each other’s work and have very quickly become insta-buddies.

The next logical step was of course for me to toss her some questions and feature her gorgoeus work here. But that’s not the best bit – the best bit is a giveaway! Sonia has very kindly offered to giveaway one of her lovely items to one of my readers. How awesome is she? Yes – pretty awesome!

But first, my sticky beaking into the world of Dandelyne.

What’s the story of dandelyne?

Dandelyne blossomed as a result of an embroidered/appliquéd family portrait that I designed, and made, in July 2011. My husband and I wanted something a little different from your large, family photographic portrait. So I thought … I should stitch us up (so to speak). I was so pleased with the result that I wanted to sew more. I began sewing and playing with embroidery again. I felt 100% alive and it was from this point that the dandelyne parachutes began to float …

Customised Family Portrait by Dandelyne

Your mini-hoops are almost as cute as your embroidery – who’s brainwave was that? They look amazing!

Yes yes yes … hands up it was me and thank you ^_^!

I will take credit for the actual brainwave but, I must hand the credit over to my delicious husband for the laser cutting. The production line of sanding, drilling and construction is a team effort between my husband and I. It is most definitely a labour of love.

Sonia at work on her mini embroidery hoops

Have you always been a crafty type? What was your first crafty creation?

Yes! Every since I can remember I have always made things. I remember mum heading off to work in the school holidays and leaving me with her sewing machine. Oh the joy! I would make clothes for my cabbage patch doll Fiona Crystal (I still remember her name – wow!). I would inspect my own clothes to see how they were constructed and then make mini patterns. I think my first crafty creations were Christmas presents for my family. I made white and orange polka dot ties for the boys and fabric covered photo frames for the girls. Very special indeed!

Bunting Embroidery Hoop Necklace by Dandelyne

What do you make for you and your family? or do you get stuck just making dandelyne goodies (not that there’s anything wrong with that, but sometimes I know I forget about me & mine)

I like to think of myself as a bit of a crafty minx (wink) so I am continually making things for our home. Most recently I have made painted sticks to decorate the brick walls, curtains for the cubby, cushion covers, crochet blankets, aprons, bunting. You name it I’ll make it and if I don’t know how to do it, I’ll investigate how to. As a young girl I often dreamed of working on Play School and making all the props for the show. I thought that would be a dream job and I still do !

Sonia in her Dandelyne Studio – I have studio envy!

Are your stitched folk based on real life people?

Each of my little people are based upon qualities I admire in family and friends, elements of life that I love and things that have been said by my boys. It is so much fun giving each of them personalities. As I sew it feels like I watch them come to life. Here are a couple for you to enjoy:

Billy is the sweet blond cutie with plaits. She is a jill of all trades. She has a black belt in karate. Her love for cake mixture exceeds eating the cooked option and she absolutely loves reciting quotes from Dr Suess books. One of her favourites, “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”

Billy Mini embroidery Hoop Necklace by Dandelyne

Finn is the little spunk with white rimmed glasses. She absolutely loves to read stories by Enid Blyton. She also loves to paint and eat … wait for it … melted marshmallows in a biscuit sandwich. Have you tried this? Delicious and then some!

Finn Mini Embroidery Hoop Necklace by Dandelyne

Finally Fletcher …. cute little Fletch wants to be a Monster Truck Driver. His favourite colour is gold and he believes .. NO HE KNOWS … his crown has special powers.

Fletcher – Mini Embroidery Hoop necklace

What are your plans for the future of dandelyne? New ideas?

It is still such early days for dandelyne so I am extremely excited about the tangents that are possible. My head spins when I think about all the things I want to do and where I could end up. I honestly want to stitch up a storm. I am working on a new idea right now … are you ready … mini embroidery hoop rings – cuuuuuuuuuuuuute! I am super excited about these so stay tuned for these cuties … and so much more! XO (Put me down for one of them Son!)

Here comes the sun Mini Embroidery Hoop Brooch by Dadnelyne

Where can we find you?

At the moment I sell my products via my Etsy store and by word of mouth. Instagram has also been a great source of exposure and sales. My website is coming VERY SOON. I hope to be in MANY brick and mortar stores by the end of the year too. I have so many dreams for dandelyne so I want to be everywhere I can possibly be. I can also be found on Facebook.

Thanks so much Son for letting us into your bright and cheery world.

Now on to the giveaway!

Sonia has very kindly offered up your choice of her simply superb mini embroidery hoop hot air balloon necklaces.

Win one of these – the choice is yours, thanks to Dandelyne!

To win, there are no hoops to jump through (hehe). Simply leave a comment here and the winner will be chosen using random.org. I like to think of it as blowing on a dandelion flower – who knows which one will be the one? Oh and its open to anyone in Australia, the world and the universe. How cool is that?

Make your comment by 6pm Thursday 27th September Australian Standard Eastern Time. The winner will be contacted that night and announced here next Friday. Good luck!

Wow, wow and WOW!

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Have I told you before of my love for instagram? Yes, yes I have. Well this week, instagram introduced me to a wonderful embroidery artist from Japan.

The artist is Yumiko Higuchi. Now all of the information I have found has been in Japanese, so I am relying on goggle translate, which is a bit hit and miss. This is taken from the artist’s about page :

About the work

of embroidery design, the work is done by hand all the way up to finish the process.
I’m with the aim without being bound to the traditional method of representation of embroidery, please make the work seem yumiko higuchi.
It’s something nostalgic, landscape painting that would burn the eyes, longing. Have been put to such work is the artist’s personal feelings.

My translation of the translation is that all the work is by hand, using traditional methods. Please link back to the artist, or you will hurt his/her feelings very badly! So please, if you are planning on pinning anything to pinterest, please click the pics and pin from the artist’s websites, not here.

So on to the amazing. Remember this is all hand stitched – every bit.

Dragon Fruit by Yumiko Higuchi

Wine label by Yumiko Higuchi

Playing cards by Yumiko Higuchi

William Morris Bird Embroidery by Yumiko Higuchi

Botanical Garden Purses by Yumiko Higuchi

Sigh! The skills are incredible, are they not?

I thoroughly recommend have a browse through Yumiko’s blog, website including shop and Yumiko’s pinterest and of course search the user name “yumikohuguchi” on instagram.

Anyone thinking of buying me a present would do well to note the purses – if only they weren’t all sold out :(

Pin it? (Not about pincushions!)

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Not so long ago, I started to get into Pinterest. What better way to keep track of awesomeness I thought? Then I started to read about some issues with it from lots of different sources. I am not going to go into it all now, but suffice to say, it was enough to stop me using it for a while. There have been some policy changes and while I am not sure if the issues are resolved fully, I am warily pinning again.

(Although, preparing this blog post has made me think again. I think it is so important to make sure you are pinning the actual person who created the thing’s work. Not re-pinning a pic someone put on their blog and did not link to the creator. There were some other wonderful things I was going to share, but folks have not pinned in the honest way I believe they should. I will not perpetuate it by linking to someone who has done the wrong thing and I will be removing those things I have inadvertently pinned.)

So, what can I show you that I have been pinning? Here’s a small glimpse. Clicking the images will take you to the source of the pic, not Pinterest. Credit due to the creators don’t you think?

I pinned this because of the border stitch. There is no pattern, the maker made it up as she went. Clever lady!

Hot Chocolate Cupcakes! If I show this to my girls, they will WANT to make them. Very clever – from Diary of a Ladybird blog

From Martha Stewart – amazingly tiny crochet

Lovely embroidery and a lovely story of how it came to be made – very sweet blog post from The Smallest Forest

Textured crochet method – loads of possibilities for this – from a Russian blog

Great idea – wonderful tutorial too. I might just have to make some for xmas pressies From Dog Under My Desk blog

The hot chocolate cupcakes is a case in point. I first saw them in my Facebook feed, posted by a recipe website. Ooh Yum I thought & went to look for the recipe to Pin it. Hmm. No link with the pic. Not on their website. Curious. So I searched “Hot Chocolate Cupcakes” in good old google and found the true source of the pic - Diary of a Ladybird blog. So I pinned from there.

So there you have it. I love how Pinterest can organise the wonderful things you can find on the internet, but I am still not 100% comfortable with it. I will be more wary when re-pinning from now on. I will make sure the pin is a direct link to the creator before re-pinning or just pin the from creators site myself. How about you? Are you trustworthy with other people’s work?

Where do you get it?

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I’ve added a new page today to make it easy to find where to buy my pincushions. It just up the top there, next to the Pincushions page.

More recently, I have made the change to made to order for some of my designs. There will always be one off, ready to go pincushions available, but some will now be made as orders are made. This will only add a day or two to the order.

To whet your appetite, here is my newest made to order design – the rainbow. Rainbows are so eye-catching and bright, and a natural occurance. What better way to decorate than with all the colours of the rainbow? I stitch this free hand, no patterns or lines, just me, a bunch of bright coloured embroidery thread & a needle. Happy-making

Embroidered Rainbow Pincushion

Treasures

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Last weekend I got out the family crafting heirlooms from my camphor chest.

I wish I knew more than I do about it all. All I do know is that it was all made by my great-grandmother on my Mum’s side. She was amazing. She could knit, crochet & embroider and probably a whole lot more too.

Hand Knitted Bedspread

Knitted baby blanket

Hand sewn & embroidered tablecloth

Can you see a faint line around the middle of the tablecloth? I have no idea how it was done, but it is perfect on both sides. This is it up close :

How?

This tablecloth was done by embroidery Cutwork – you sew it & then cut away the middles. These days you can do it all on a sewing machine with special fabric stabilisers. Imaging doing it by hand?

Cutwork Embroidery tablecloth

I’m guessing my great granny had a round table or 2. Here’s a fillet crochet tablecloth. I can’t wrap my head around the time this would have taken.

Fillet Crochet tablecloth

Hankies didn’t escape the Great Gran’s touch

Hankie love

Of course, in those days you needed a pretty cloth to put your crystal perfume bottles on – more fillet crochet.

Dressing Table Cloth

Now this is another bedspread – my mum has memories of this always being on her Grandmother’s bed. I thought it was damask, but Mum thinks not.

Damask?

Now we are up to the pride of the collection of Great Gran’s creative works. This is truly mind-boggling. It is a bedspread done with fillet crochet using the finest of cottons. I have no idea how on earth she managed this, with poor light and a vastly different lifestyle to ours that would have left very little time. It must have taken months if not years of work.

Peacock Bedspread

Details

Wow huh? I am so glad that this has all survived to come to me. Treasures! Somehow I can’t see my creative things being as revered by my descendants LOL. Do you have any treasures?

When life hands you lemons….

Felt ladybird tutorial

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I have a bit of a fascination with ladybirds. Or is it ladybugs? I think it depends where you live. No matter what you call them, they make an appearance quite frequently on my pincushions. Such a cute little things with bold bright colours. What’s not to love?

Today I thought I would share with you my very simple yet effective way to sew a felt ladybird. You could sew it on just about anything.

The only things you need are scraps of red & black felt, black embroidery thread, scissors & a needle.

Step 1

Cut a square-ish shape from your red felt scrap. I vary the sizes a bit, but a good starting point is about 1/2 an inch or just over 1 cm. No need to be too precise.

Step 2

Then with small scissors, round off the corners. Keep trimming until you get a nice round circular shape for the ladybird bodies.

Step 3

Cut a small rectangle from the black felt scrap for the ladybird heads. About a 1/4 of an inch or half a cm long by half that wide, just so they are in proportion with your red circles

Step 4

Then round 2 corners to made a rough half oval shape.

Step 5

Thread your needle with 2 strands of black embroidery thread. Position your ladybird body & head on your work – no need for pins, just hold with your fingers. Come up through the head from under and sew 2 small stitches on either side of the black felt head to hold the it in place. Then come up through the head in about the middle near the body. Sew one big long stitch straight down the middle & over the top of the body. Do not stitch through the body, but over it.

Click on this picture for a close up view

Step 6

French knot time! (Click here for a you tube video on how to do a french knot) I like to do my french knots wrapping the thread twice around the needle. If you want a bigger knot, then do 3 wraps, or just 1 wrap if you are after a smaller knot. I like to position my knots symmetrically. Of course you can place them where ever you like & how many you like too

Step 7

Now its time for the final details – the legs and antenna. To do the antenna you can do simple small straight stitches and leave it at that, or you can add french knots to the ends as well. Then its on to the legs. Start from near the top dot but come up from under the body. Each leg is made with 2 straight stitches at a right angle or less to each other. They look like little “v” shapes in isolation. Sew 3 each side.

And that’s it! Job done

Off you go – go sew some ladybirds!

This Tiny Existence

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Today’s post is all about amazing embroidery. I am a member of the EtsyNEAT (Etsy Needle Arts Team) team and today the team blog has featured This Tiny Existence.

Embroidery pattern by This Tiny Existence

With One Enormous Chair Embroidery Pattern

I am blown away by the intricacy of the embroidery. I love, love the everyday scenes transformed into stunning works of art.

Fun Retro Kitchen Embroidery

If you’d like to find out more about This Tiny Existence, check out the EstyNEAT blog post all about her.

Wow! What do you think of her work?

The Evolution of the Peacock Pincushion (so far)

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I have been making pincushions for a couple of years now & I love coming up with new designs. I’m afraid I have a bit of a problem with making the same thing more than once, which is why there are so many different designs in my etsy shop.

Every now & then though, a design comes together & I know instantly it is right. It was like that with the peacock pincushion. As soon as I made the first one, I went “Yes!” in my head. It all came together well.

With this design, I have managed to overcome my “wont do it twice” attitude. I recently finished more detailed, embroidered versions and it got me thinking how the design has evolved over time. A good chance to go back & have a look at what has gone before.

Here is the very first peacock pincushion. He was made with acrylic felt. I love the olive green colour of the base.

peacock, pin cushion, pincushion, spincushions

First peacock pincushion design

I made a few this way, then I decided it was time for a tweak, so I moved the feather eyes about a bit

Second generation peacock design

As you can see, I made a few of these. Still needed more tweaking though and to be honest, I wasn’t as happy with these.

Then I had a change in materials. I discovered eco felt. (Felt made from used plastic drink bottles)

New felt, new colours, back a step design wise

What happened next was the start of making kits for people to make their own peacock pincushions. Slight colour change, but still with the eco-felt. This is how it is still

peacock kit, pin cushion, pincushion, spincushions

Final design for Peacock Pincushion Kit

But I wasn’t satisfied. I knew the design was a hit, but I was a bit bored with it. I wanted to make it just a little bit more special. So I thought I’d add more embroidery

embroidered peacock, pin cushion, pincushion, spincushions

Embroidered Feathers Peacock Pincushion

I made a couple this way, and knew I needed to make more, which led to the latest incarnation with even more embroidery and a move of the feather eyes again. I am pretty happy with this one. Might make a few more hehe.

embroidered peacock, pin cushion, pincushion handmade, spincushions, felt

The latest incarnation of the Spincushions peacock pin cushion

Not sure where the design will go from here, but I am sure that is not the end! Stay tuned for more developments.

If you like a giveaway, head over to this page and leave a comment for a chance to win something very cool and very unusual

A motto I am trying to follow…

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Sometimes I am gulity of focusing too much on things on the sidelines – looking at supplies, making lists, “researching” on the web. I forget sometimes that what I love to do is actually make things.

Hopefully this will remind me to do what I love more often.

This beautiful embroidered piece is made by CleverApple. I love her embroidery, so lovely.