Sunday, April 18, 2010

mid-90s handkerchief

I got very interested in embroidery in college (and have pics of samples I did then to upload, too - I'm going to piece them onto - into? - my band sampler), but then got caught up in quilting, and then stamping, and didn't pick up embroidery again until my late husband and I moved to Florida in 1993. There was a quilt store called Rainbow's End in Dunedin that we found when we first lived in St. Petersburg (I loved St. Pete!!) which was just AMAZING. Still the largest quilt store I've ever seen. And they carried silk ribbon and books by Judith Baker Montano!! I just love her. I was SO excited when I found her website last year and saw that she does a three day Crazy Quilt Retreat every November in WICHITA, but then I couldn't go. I am determined to go this year!

Anyway, her books inspired me to make a set of four handkerchiefs for my husband. This is one of them, which I then used in a shadowbox for my bathroom (with his shaving brush and pocketwatch). One was buried with him, and go figure, I never took a picture of it (silly me). I can't remember which one that was. One was a rocket, one was wheat, and one was cattails with dragonflies. The willow tree has always been my favorite, though (probably why I know where it is and not the others!)







It was hard to get close-ups of the tree. I deleted a lot of them. I can't even really tell what stitch I used on the trunk - it looks almost like a braid. I'm guessing it was a chain stitch of some sort, since I really, really love chain stitch. :-)




I got off work at something like 6:30 in the morning, and Ian didn't get off work until around 8 most mornings because he always stayed late. So, I would just sit up there in the ICU breakroom (I worked in the lab, he was an ICU nurse) and embroider while he finished up. It was very domestic. :-)