Cloud Nine

This is Cloud Nine (Cornus florida). What a lovely name for a flower. It's a dogwood whose name means "In a state of blissful happiness" and although the flowers are white in nature, in Brazilian dimensional embroidery they can be any color we want.
     The flowering dogwood, native to central and eastern North America, is also the "Flower of the Year" of the Brazilian Dimensional Embroidery International Guild, Inc., and each year our designers try to think of interesting ways to preserve these flowers in stitch.

I used an interesting cast-on/bullion combination stitch and made the center veins with a drizzle and two needles. It's one of my BDEIG Seminar classes this coming June, and because the flower of this particular variety is white, I used the lighter color shown below.  In addition, I'm going to once again show a new dimensional stitch that I developed some time ago and named the "Interlocking Stem Stitch". It makes a beautiful raised border and I've used it on several designs, even one time as a cholla cactus skeleton and again as the posts of a stake and rider fence. Most often, though, I use it for a pretty raised border. Here's a picture of the design as I'm teaching it:

It almost looks like a Christmas card, doesn't it? I'll have this Millefiori design ready for everyone to stitch as soon as I stop playing on this blog and finish writing instructions. I hope you all like it.

Rosalie

Ornaments

Basic B.E. stitches may be found in most Brazilian embroidery books in print, or you can visit the BDEIG Website for step-by-step instructions, diagrams and photos.

To practice some of these stitches and make a small framed oval ornament or a fabric postcard, just draw a circle slightly smaller than 1" for each ornament. Make bullions or cast-on stitches with more wraps or loops than the length of the fabric bite. This will cause the stitch to curve slightly. Add sparkle with metallic threads, beads, or stitch some silk ribbon flowers on your ornament.

You can add evergreens by drawing curved lines and overlaying them with straight stitches. Start with a heavier floss like Nova first. Add straight stitches with Lola next, and then add a layer of Glory straight stitches. Or you can substitute this last layer with a metallic thread. (I like to use Sulky sewing threads because they are durable, but there are lots of choices.)

If you would like more ideas for Christmas ornaments (and approximately 93 other B.E. stitching projects), take a look at the Education Projects Book available from the Guild's Boutique page on the website. It is a wonderful idea for a Christmas (or other) gift for a stitching friend. Here's a picture of just the cover, with no clue to the wondrous treats inside:

You can order your copy by clicking on the link above. I'm including the pattern and tutorial for the ornaments here since it is my own copyrighted design.

Here's the mini-tut:

Lola or Ciré: Outline stitch all ornaments. At base of ornaments add 3 or 4, 4-wrap Brazilian lazy daisy (LZ DZ) stitches. Stitch the ornament cord with outline stitch and Lola, Ciré or metallic thread.


Top Ornament:
-- Place beads at dots.
-- Add 4 colonial or French knots around, at the 2, 4, 8 and 10pm positions.
-- Accent with fly stitch, LZ DZ and/or bugle beads.


Center Ornament:
(Note: I like to use two strands of floss when I make double cast-on stitches. Thread both strands into a needle and knot one end of each floss strand separately. You’ll have two loose floss tails at the other end, and this will prevent the kinking and twisting that the floss sometimes likes to do.)


-- All stitches are placed vertically. From center top to center bottom, place a twisted double cast-on stitch. Cast one loop on with your left hand and then one loop with your right hand. Do this 12 times. (12 pair of cast-on loops)

--Twist the stitch as follows: Before going down and out, slip needle beneath the double cast-on 2-3 times and tug. The stitch will twist. Finish the double cast-on by passing needle down through fabric, and out.
-- Starting at left side and, working from left to center, make:
             15-wrap bullion – 18-loop cast-on – 24-wrap bullion
-- Repeat these 3 stitches on right side of twisted double cast-on, reversing stitch counts.


Bottom Ornament:
-- Place a 20-wrap bullion horizontally across the center of the ornament. Above and below, make two rows of running cast-on stitches (not anchored, but continuous). Cast on 8 loops for each stitch. There are 3 cast-on stitches next to the center and 2 cast-on stitches above and below.
-- Optional: add beads at center of each cast-on stitch.


This is just a sample of the goodies in the BDEIG Education Projects book. And, you know, there's absolutely nothing wrong with making a Christmas (or other) gift to yourself!


Seasons Greetings!

By the way, if you have questions about any of the stitches or techniques I write about, leave a note in the comments section and I'll write more. 

Let's Make Mistletoe

You can add mistletoe to your holiday embroidery.  I like Cire #051 (Shaded Light Moss Green) or #053 (Shaded Light Avocado Green) for my mistletoe leaves. Some of my leaves are stitched with a "long-tailed lazy daisy stitch" -- one side is longer than the other, and saves adding a stem -- and other leaves are stitched with a regular lazy daisy stitch (also known as a detached chain stitch):

Oh!  Did you notice those "mistletoe berries"?  They are "pearls" -- the cheapie discount store brand with pearl coating.  I broke apart a really old necklace with graduated-size beads, peeled off the coating and stitched them in place, some small and some larger, with regular white sewing thread. The smallest "berry" on this embroidery is approximately 1/16".
       To make them realistic, I pulled out my black Sharpie and colored the thread where it comes out of the bead. I like to think it looks like the "berry bottom" of the mistletoe berry. To stitch your own mistletoe berries and leaves, just use your Marvy wash-out pen and draw a curved line on the fabric. Next, add the lazy daisy stitches beginning at the tip of the "stem" and alternating stitches on each side. Remember, you don't have to stitch a separate stem if you extend one side of the lazy daisy stitch (or even make a twisted lazy daisy). Here's another picture from one of my Millefiori B.E. designs called "Remembrance", which was designed by my friend Phyllis:

Other flowers were on the original but I did something you might like to try, too. Pull out any one of the B.E. prints from your stash and substitute flowers, leaves and colors to make your own holiday design. I also added other beads and buttons and whatever I wanted until my heart was content.


This little Millefiori design called "Winterlight" also has mistletoe tucked among the greenery. When I first designed it, I thought it would make a pretty Christmas greeting card or could be framed as a small tablescape with holiday decorations arranged alongside.

This is a detail photo of the same design stitched with different colors:

By the way, this design was stitched on white fabric, but I wanted to "glitter up" the background, so I thinned down some some sparkly acrylic paint from the craft store and brushed it on.  By the way, if you paint any backgrounds, be sure to thin the paint to a very watery consistency. Otherwise, paint will stiffen the fabric and it will be difficult to needle.

One of these times I will write about coloring backgrounds ....



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