The Accidental Embroiderer

My latest project

Because I’m known locally as “an embroiderer”, I’m often asked to exhibit at one of the many craft shows we have here. But I always say no, because I’m a terrible seamstress. I’ve tried making embroidered bags and purses and shirts, but they’re always awful. And they take so much time to make, and if I don’t sell them they hang around in my studio for years. But the other day, I was about to say no to another invitation when I had a brainwave. Not bags or purses, but embroidered greetings cards! They don’t take any sewing - just trimming and gluing, and they’re quick and easy to make. And people like sending cards to friends and family, so they often buy a lot. And even if some cards don’t sell they’re small enough to fit into a folder until the next craft fair

So recently I’ve been spending every last minute making, cutting and gluing greetings cards, and I now have about 100, which I hope will be enough for the craft fair. I’ll let you know how it goes. But here are a few of them

 

A collection of cards

 

They're usually very simple designs compared to many of my more elaborate creations, but none the worse for that. They're just small stitchouts trimmed and glued inside what the craft shops call "triple-fold aperture cards", and I can strongly recommend them as an attractive way of using simple embroideries

But I'll be back next time with more freebies - perhaps including some from this card collection!

Maybe it's working? Try some freebies

 

Well, things MAY be getting better. There are still some problems with the images that I'm trying to post, but things are a little better than they were. So I'm taking a chance and posting some freebies

 In my last post I included a freebie based on a drawing of the Dutch artist M. C. Escher. It’s pretty obvious that I am a devoted admirer of Escher’s work, and I have turned a lot of his designs into embroideries. This week we have another - a design of four interlocking fish. It’s taken straight from one of Escher's drawings - it’s not my work in any way (apart from the digitising, of course!)

 

Four Escher fish

 

And just to carry on with designs based on older schools of art, the second design is a simple Art Nouveau motif, which might go well on a cushion or perhaps a quilt

 

Art Nouveau lives again!

 

Both designs are in embroidery only (no applique) and both are in .pes v.6

Click HERE to get the Escher fish, and HERE for the Art Nouveau square

 

And the best of luck to you! I really hope the system is working

 

 

I'm still here, but...

You could be forgiven for thinking that I've given up the blog - NOT TRUE! I'm trying desperately to post but I'm having major problems with Typepad. Writing is OK (as you can see) but it's become impossible to post images, and as there's not much point in a design blog without images, there's no point in posting at all. And I've got all these free designs that I'm desperate to give away!

I'm getting professional help with this so I really hope it won't be long before things are fixed. So here's hoping that it won't be long before I'm back and posting as usual. Thanks so much for your patience

 

 

The first of many?

Well, that break was just a little TOO long! I hope I haven’t lost many readers because of my long silence. But I did have a good excuse! The operation went well and I can now see a lot better than I could before, and thank goodness I can now get back to drawing and digitising

 

But before the operation I spent some time going though all my old embroidery files, and believe me, there are a LOT of them - several thousand at least. And it’s such a pity that all these designs are just sitting in my computer doing nothing at all. So I thought - why not give them away to embroiderers who might be able to use them?

 

So for a while now, most of my posts will include a selection of free designs from my past embroidering life. They will be a pretty random collection but perhaps you might be able to find a use for some of them. Now, I’d better warn you that none of these designs were originally intended to be passed on - they were for my use only. So there may well be glitches (un-necessary jumps, etc.) which I never bothered to correct. All these designs will be in .pes v.6

 

So - now for the first of what I hope will be many! You may remember that some time ago I posted a design that was roughly based on the designs of the famous artist Escher. Well, today I’m passing on a real Escher! The three interlocking birds were taken from one of his drawings.

 

A real Escher!

 

It’s for the 4x4 inch (100 mm x 100 mm) hoop. And you can download it HERE

 

The second design is a pair of interlocking fish - goodness knows where I got the idea but it makes an interesting embroidery.

Two interlocking fish

 

It’s for the 5 x 8 inch (130 x 180 mm) hoop and HERE it is

 

As always, if you have any problems with these designs, just let me know via the “Comments” page on the blog. Good luck!