Techniques & materials:

Cotton fabric background

Satin ribbon

Sewing machine thread, Metallic threads, Linen thread in various sizes

Handmade paper from linen fibers and paper strips

Free machine embroidery on water soluble stabilizer

Needle lace, Needle tatting, Bobbin lace, Knitting, Crochet, Sprang

Textile fragments provide a glimpse into cultures.  The lines in this piece represent the connections and exchanges between cultures.  Knowledge of textiles is distorted “through the lens of time” just as the samples of various techniques are distorted in this piece.  Textiles found in some archaeological digs were discarded, not studied.  We can never know what did not survive.  Fragments found and studied show how textiles degrade and how textiles have been used and repurposed.  These fragments also raise questions such as how extremely fine linen thread was made hundreds of years ago, yet it is not manufactured today.

It is Bebilla, knotted lace for the centre, and Tatting surrounding it – from the ‘chains’ round outwards!

I found the UFO a short while ago, and just tucked it back where I found it, - then, when this challenge came up, - Ha!! I have it already partly done!!! Then just had to find some patterns of Oval mats that would fit…!!! I think it worked well.  I do not know what thread I used for the Bebilla, but the #60 I tatted with seems to be similar, and worked well, I thought.

The Tatting was worked from something I photocopied from a Library book, and I have no reference for it. Sorry.

My recent project is from Susanne Thompson’s book Torchon Lace Purse Pendants.   It is bobbin lace. The cord was made on the Lucet. I took a Lucet class through IOLI. Thread is Oren Bryan 12 cotton. 

While gathering leaves I made in various technique classes, I was thinking about the loss of aunts, uncle and family friends in their 90’s and 100 ½ and a song stuck in my head.  Even after wonderful long lives, “it hurts to say goodbye”.  Another phrase from the song became the title for this piece.  I stitched part of the lyrics to explain the role of the leaves.  The title of the song and writers’ names in the margins credit the inspiration for this collage and direct viewers to a specific song since there are several about autumn leaves. 

The leaves were made by machine stitching on tear-away stabilizer, machine stitching on water soluble stabilizer, bobbin lace, and embroidery on the ground fabric.