Finally finished sample felt piece

Back in February 2016 ( was it really that long ago?!), I posted about a new piece of felt I made, based on neolithic cup and ring carvings.  You can read that post here.

I found this photo to use as inspiration. (photo from:

 http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk).

This was my sample piece, which worked reasonably well.  I said I just needed to embroider it, to give the circles and spirals some definition and a raised texture.

Well, more than a year later, I have finally finished it.  The stitching does bring out the circles and it has raised them a bit too.  I think the felt needed to be a little thicker so that the raised areas would be more prominent.

Here are a few closeups so that you can see the stitching and the way the areas have raised.

 I do like the effect, although I wonder whether using a different stitch (rather than back stitch) would be more effective.

 I quite like the idea of chain stitch, although perhaps that might be too dominant, or stem stitch, or split stitch. That means I need to make another piece, doesn't it? (although I could have a practise on a scrap piece to see which stitch I like best).   Hmm...seeing as this one took me over a year to get finished (in my defence, I do have lots of other hobbies - gardening, paper craft, jewellery making and reading, which all need my time) perhaps I had better not make any rash promises about when I'll do it!

Stitching Sundays 23

 I have made a little progress with my winter decorations today, while listening to the radio and watching television (not all at the same time, I hasten to add!)

 Here are my bird decorations made from my hand made felt and then embroidered with simple patterns. I really enjoyed making them as they were quick to make and I am really pleased with the finished decorations.

You can see I used a purple pen to draw a rough guide, but it didn't really like the felt much, so it was very much a guide.  It should fade in a day or so.  I used back stitch for this pattern and straight stitch to make the stars on the blue bird.  I have a couple more to make and some more snowflake decorations too.