Sun, Moon and Star Update

I wanted to write you a quick update today 

as I am flying out in the morning for the south of France.

 I won't be working on my piece while I am down there 

but I wanted to show you my progress so far.

I picked the lower left hand corner for my first sun and I wanted it to be red.

 I really liked the way this cotton gauze and silk gauze looked together...

I layered them over a piece of golden velvet and appliqued them onto my square 

and then created the face. 

I have never used the silk gauze in my sewing,

 I mainly had it on hand for the shop for nuno felters.

 I think in the future I will avoid it for this type of work.

 It snags easily and I wasn't expecting that. But it is here now so it will stay.

 Unfortunately two of the other squares are layered with the silk gauze on top of cotton.

 I will have to take special care with them.

 Ah well, lesson learned.

I had a lot of fun with this applique method. 

One I really haven't used before but I found the silk was such a dream to handle. 

I started with Silk Charmeuse which is as always gorgeous

 but it is a bit thick for the corners I am working on. 

So the second ray I used silk habotai which is perfect for those extreme angles,

 then I pulled out a pile of silk ribbons because they are so nicely variegated and the 12 cm is wide enough that I was able to do the third ray with a ribbon.

 I will definitely be using this method with silk in the future. 

It gives me much more control of my angles and curves

 and I think with practice will even go a lot quicker than my old methods, 

Hand stitched satin stitch is a long consuming thing and was not always the effect I was going for in the past so I am glad that this looks so good without it.

I am sure I will be eager to pick up where I left off when I return home.

 I am so happy to continue stitching again. 

My eye doctor agrees with me that resting has not solved my eye problems and so there is no sense in continuing to go without sewing. I will return for observation in another 45 days. 

Hope you all have a blessed holiday season,

                            

Back Again

I see from my last post date that it has been almost a month.

 When I left you I was in the middle of creating my base for my new piece. I had cut all my pieces and pre-basted them ready to join them together. 

Which I did. 

Then on rising the next morning I decided that the order was completely wrong and took it all apart again! SO...I had it all apart and ready to rejoin but it didn't happen.

Instead I have spent the last month trying to recover from an ear infection, a sinus infection and inflamed bronchial tubes. 

The entire time I had a non stop headache so there was no sewing for me!

I am finally on the mend and today is day three of no headache. I can finally think again, and even better yet, I can sew again. 

So last night I stitched together my squares in the order I want and pressed them out. Here it is...my final base for Sun, Moon and Stars.  I was surprised that I didn't gravitate more for the blues, I have so many to pick from but the other pieces spoke to me and I could see stars dancing on those black and maroons and suns glowing from those mottled golds and browns and splashes of fuschia. So now my mind wanders to my suns. 

         My first will be the one I saw in the beginning, my beautiful, powerful glaring red sun. I will place it on this square. It speaks of turmoil and strife which was where my head was at when it came to me. Our sun, glaring down on us in all its powerful glory.

And now I am back to mulling over how I will bring this figure to life. Hopefully I will be back a bit sooner this time!