Ribbon Embroidery

 For the June Festival Stitchers program, I designed and taught this 5"x 7" greeting card. 

I designed it a bit on the fly, and I was not sure what I was going to turn it into. When I finished it, I thought about putting it in premade card blanks. But my design was a bit too wide. Since I also dabble in paper crafts, I had an oval die cut and cardstock I could use to make my sample above, but I needed something for class. So, I went back to the drawing board and made a few adjustments, so I could teach it to fit into premade card blanks with the oval already cut out. 

I gave everyone an option of Ivory or white cards and aida cloth. We use ribbon from the club's stash. We sometimes get donations from people who no longer stitch or have passed away, and one of these included a bunch of silk ribbon.

I used my book An Encyclopedia of Ribbon Embroidery Flowers 121 designs by Deanna Hall West, American School of Needlework (1995), to decide on the flowers.

Have a great day!!

Ribbon Embroidery

The Foothills EGA Chapter project for July was a ribbon embroidery needle book. I felt is was too large for a needle book and had so many already that I just finished it without the felt pages, to decide what to use is for later. Here is the outside of it:

That is a 6 inch ruler to give you an idea of how big it is. I made spiderweb roses and some french knots for flowers in various colors of silk ribbon. I used various shades of green ribbon for the leaves and made them using lazy daisy, french knots and leaf stitches. I was not sure how to do the stem on the pot - which was originally a piece of brown ribbon that would need to be make into the pot shape, so I changed to wool. I placed the stem under the brown wool pot and appliqued the pot down. I then did a running stitch up the stem and then did the flowers at the bottom of the topiary. I stitched the lace piece on the pot using white sewing thread and a basic sewing stitch.

Here is the inside once I decided to make it into a note pad holder. If I had decided that from the beginning I would have liked to put some stiffening inside, and maybe ribbons on the sides to tie it closed, but this still works!

I just added a strip of Ultrasuede near the top to hold the pad and the pen. I think the pad is 4 inches by 6 inches. I also embroidered my initials and the year on the backside.

That about covers it for now!