It has been a while since I last added any news to my blog.
I am sorry, but life has been 'more than a little busy' this past year or so.
At the end of August last year I ventured overseas for almost six weeks on a needlework tour of Italy, visiting as many museums and galleries as possible throughout that country to view all their magnificent needlework created over several hundreds of years, visited needlework shops in many areas (e.g. Assisi) to purchase pieces of needlework and attended a needlework show in Formigine
to admire and purchase beautiful designs, threads and needlework accessories
being designed and created by todays talented needlework artists.
Here I am pictured (bottom left) with an Italian designer friend, Niky of Niky's Creations -
I also stayed for several days with a very talented and gifted Italian
needlework designer and awesome friend - Giulia of GPA Designs -
before travelling to Brussels in Belgium to participate in a needlework show -
exhibiting and selling my own designs there.
This show was organised by another lovely friend, Monique.
It was wonderful spending some days with her and meeting up
with another lovely Belgium friend - Gigi of GR Designs.
Here are two lovely pics - Monique (taken when she took me to Bruges) -
Before I left for my trip I drafted several blogs but never got them posted
and so the following is the first of those blogs :
Wednesday, 29 July 2015 - The Orford Sampler
Quite some time ago, a lovely lady, Gwyneth, whom I met because of our mutual love
for needlework, was needing to “down-size” her home contents in preparation
for her and her husband to move into a smaller home and offered her trio
of family samplers to me as her family of sons and their wives
did not wish to have or keep them.
Oh - you can imagine my delight! What a wonderful gift.
I will always treasure them - and I know that my daughter, Melissa, w
will also treasure them when it is time for me to no longer be on this earth.
This is one of the samplers and the first one to be charted so that sampler lovers
can stitch this simple but elegant piece.
You may recall me showing a picture of the beginnings of my stitched piece
in Blog #13 - the 2nd of October last year.
If not, this is how it looked at that time ...
and how it looked on the 16th of December 2014 ...
During this month of July 2015
I finally finished writing
all the instructions for this design,
typing them up
and creating the computer
generated chart
and had the complete design
printed -
just in time for Sampler Gathering.
Thus, this design in now available for purchase.
Design Title : The Orford Sampler
Design Code : BARB 2000
Design Price : $21.50
Materials : As per stitched model -
Fabric :
Permin Linen - 35 count - Lambswool
Threads :
Soie d'Alger - 3424 & 3425
Stitch Count : 106w x 156h
Design Size : 6" x 9.25"
Techniques :
Cross Stitch, Four-Sided Stitch
Vivien Caughley of Auckland has kindly researched the history
of the sampler makers of my three sampler pieces.
Three generations - grandmother, daughter, granddaughter.
This information is included with the design.
I sincerely hope you treasure pieces of needlework that have been created
by members of your family and that you have kept a record of their history.
So too, kept a record of your needlework journey and achievements,
as these may well be the subject of someone's research one day.
That's all for the moment. Until next time, bye ....
