365 Days of Stitches

I have a problem when it comes to hand crafts…my condition?…”Shiny Ball Syndrome”.  Basically it means that I jump from craft to craft depending on what strikes my fancy while I’m trolling Pinterest.  I know I’m not the only one.  And while it’s fun to try out a bunch of new crafts, as an artist, it’s a problem.  The ONLY way to become accomplished at anything is to spend time doing it.  What’s the old adage? Mastery takes 10,000 hours.

So this year I have promised myself that I will “put in the time” with two hand crafts…watercolor and stitching.  Not that I won’t give into the Shiny Ball thing, that would be just crazy, but I believe that the pursuit of mastery opens us up to so much…so I’m giving it a shot.

This post is the beginning of that quest with stitching.  My inspiration…I came across  this Pinterest post by Sara Barnes of the blog Brown Paper Post.  Sara started what she called “1 Year of Stitches” and her pics look like this…

Tell me that’s not incredible!!! I love how she went back in in certain places and reworked some of her previous work.  Notice how the hot pink oval in the top left morphed.

So I’ve accepted her invitation to start my own year of stitches…one, because it’s fabulous looking and two, because I’ve become intrigued with embellishing with thread since my full-on swan dive into the gorgeous work by the stitchers at Alabama Chanin several years ago.

Right?!?

So I begin today, March 16th because why not today…and here is the detail:

• a basic 10″ wooden embroidery hoop
• add 1 (one) little vignette per day..to help with that, I’ve thrown my hoop into my sewing bag which comes with me wherever I go.
• I used a piece of cream linen that was lying around in my craft area…upcycle…yay!
• and on that note, I am using ONLY floss that I have on hand…got to stop buying supplies for new projects 🙂

So here is day 1…started with something simple but pretty.

Can’t stop looking at all the white space..:)   But the key is to embrace the process, the creation of something beautiful and the learning.  Tomorrow is St. Paddy’s Day so I’m thinking a celtic theme!

I’ll post updates as I move through the days…happy stitching if anyone else wants in…

Jackie