If you’re in South Australia, then you would have heard of Cottage Crafts (462 Fullarton Road, Myrtle Bank). Well, it’s under new management, and the owners want to encourage younger people to get stitching … so they’re stocking my kits!!
There will be a window display of my work for a couple of weeks – I’ll take a pic when I’m next going past 
Yes, I’ve finally thought of a name for my ‘Red’ design – ‘Red Over Red’. 10 points to the first person who guesses my musical influence
Here’s the last stitch in progress:
And here’s Lily holding up the finished product:
Next weekend it will be taken to the local needlepoint shop to be made up into a cushion – yay! Then it’s photography, and hours of cutting threads and preparing the kit.
Since I’m addicted to cross stitching, I decided to start my Bats Clutch straight away! Here was my process … first, I traced around the clasp and cut out a pattern:
Then I traced the pattern out onto the canvas – the middle will be the bottom of the clutch:
It’s a pretty simple design – just some bats drawn onto the canvas with texta:
I’m really loving the lolly pink and black design, with added silver accents for subtle ‘bling’ effect:
Although I’m actually stitching the first part upside-down
This cute little clutch purse will be a prototype only – I’m sure I’ll get a lot of use out of it! I’ll probably make one for the shop after that
Thank you to all the kids (and adults!) who attended the ‘How To Cross Stitch’ workshop at Brighton Library today I had a great time, met some cool people, and sold some kits … and was pleasantly surprised that all the kids seemed to pick up the basic cross stitch, with some starting to create their own designs – very impressive!
The next one will be for the Adelaide Fringe Festival on March 3, and will be held at Glenelg Library.
Some of my designs were done a long time ago … for example, the Moon Phases kit was designed back in 2000, and my first website was created in 2005. A lot has changed since then, and since Anita has a very good camera, I thought it was time to re-take some of my pictures!
The Bookmark kits will have to wait until another day, and a couple of kits (Astrology and Landscape) were originally commissions, so are not with me. But here are the others – I hope you like them!
Moon Phases
Diamonds
Isis
Thoth
Spartans
Skulls
Hathor
Planets
La Sirene
Yep, this is how I create cross stitch kits … scribble all over the canvas in texta, stitch over the top, then spend time on Excel making up a graph so other people can follow my pattern. Probably quite a chaotic way of working … but pre-planning designs is not something I’m good at
My first ‘how to cross stitch’ workshop is scheduled for January 16!
Hopefully I don’t scare the kiddies … and create cross stitch OBSESSION, heh heh
The class is half full, so if you’re in Adelaide, give Brighton Library a call on 8229 9988.
You may or may not be aware that I use very high quality wool from the Australian Tapestry Workshop in all Threefold Designs cross stitch kits.
Here is a note from the Australian Tapestry Workshop about the new wool they will be dyeing and stocking – don’t worry, all kits will either be made up of one or the other!
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Wool & The Workshop (from The Australian Tapestry Workshop)
We are in the process of changing over the wool we use in our yarns.
All of our yarn is sold in 25 gram cones (180m) spanning 366 colours and tones.
Wool In Current Use
The yarn we have been using for a number of years is a high quality 3/20 worsted yarn (close to a 2 ply) which is not prone to pilling or fluffing, making it suitable for tapestry, knitting and other textile arts. The fleece type is 28 µm and comes from a Corriedale crossbred, known for its fine long wool.
We are transitioning to our new Eco wool supplied by The Merino Company through the Geelong Textile Mill. Only a few of our yarns so far have been dyed using this beautiful new wool, but we are slowly transitioning to the new wool and our master dyer Tony Stefanovski is using this wool exclusively now.
New Wool
The Workshop’s new wool is completely traceable through the supply chain back to the farms where the fibre is grown. We can confidently and proudly state that this wool is grown using environmentally sustainable and humane animal practices (absolutely no mulesing). It is important to us that we now have this quality assurance and control of our raw product.
The new wool is a Border Leicester/Merino cross, which gives a strong medium thickness fibre which is soft and white, and is slightly stronger than pure Merino. It is also thicker, being an average of 26 µm thick.
ALL of our yarn is durable, not prone to pilling or fluffing and is moth proofed as part of the dying process. All the yarn is dyed on the premises by master dyer Tony Stefanovski. The dyes used are the best available for light fastness and colourfastness, helping to ensure that the Workshop’s tapestries will last hundreds of years.
How’s that for a blog entry title? Thanks to Erica from Wildthing Vintage for including my work in her blog! It’s about how cool cross stitch is … and well, you know that I agree with that
Click HERE for the blog post!
Featured item was Evilyn stitching the Lime Leopard Print Bookmark kit
They’re up! My ‘Kits For Kids’ series is now available at my Etsy Store:
And thank you to my hand model, Lily (age 4.5) – not yet old enough to stitch, but she does have fun creating ‘sculptures’ out of plastic canvas and wool
Well … what an amazing day yesterday! I joined the gorgeous Kirsteene – who is Etsy’s new Australian Community Manager - on the Etsy stall. It was meant to be for a couple of hours, but I was having so much fun I stayed for four!
There were record crowds at Bowerbird Bazaar, with queues right down to Currie Street – insane! People weren’t allowed in until some had left, and a lot of people waited over 20 minutes to get in the door … that’s dedication! The Etsy stand was right near the entrance, so most people visited us on their way out. I had my Diamonds kit on display there, as well as other fantastic Etsy Adelaide sellers.
Anyway, a big thank you to Kelly for creating a Bowerbird Bazaar Treasury! Go and have a look at some of the other fantastic seller at this cool design market 
