of thought

Well, I decided to finish it…

It had to sit lonely on my sewing table for a bit. First I let it sit until I could bring myself to finish off the thimble portion around the equator rather than ripping it out. I liked it well enough when that part was done but still was unhappy with how heavy that section was. I had no clue what to do in the pole areas to bring it all to a cohesive design.

The problem is that doing a thimble ring at the equator gives such a strong horizontal line to the ball. Most of the stitching elements we use at the poles (kikus, spindles, starbursts) are more vertical and so don’t blend well with the distinctive equator area. I wanted something to better blend with the horizontal element so it didn’t seem so removed from the design.

So I let it sit for a few days before I picked it up to play with it. After a few tries (and very careful ripping out on the white ball) I mapped out a star polygon on 8 points. You can just see the side of it (blue) in the picture above. Because the points were so widely spaced, it ended up having a very horizontal character and complimented the thimble ring nicely. Cool!

Then I did a smaller one at the pole and got another surprise: this one transitioned from the horizontal character to a slightly more vertical one because the radius was smaller. Ah ha! Finally the design was flowing nicely from the poles to the equator without a jarring shift from vertical to horizontal.

Now I am really happy with it and not so down on thimble stitching on temari. I still think that thimbles (and other cylindrical objects) are the best suited for thimble stitching (surprise!) but occasionally I can see a specialty use for it in temari. I don’t think I will design this way again for quite awhile.

March already! Time flies when you are having fun. This thimble did not turn out quite as I was expecting. Once again I was experimenting with the number of rows between switches from one path to another.

This thimble is done on my usual form, 50 mm, with Orizuru No9 thread. It is a variation of the bi-colored scales pattern on 10 sections. There are two zig zag paths, one worked in navy blue and the other in the coral/reddish orange color. Rather that alternate row by row I alternated by 2 rows, 3 rows, 4 rows, 4 rows, 3 rows, 2 rows successively.

Alternating by more than one row gives a zig zag appearance to the line around the middle of the thimble. More rows = bigger zig zag. By varying the number of rows I was hoping to get a progression of smaller to bigger to smaller zigs. I did, but they are more subtle than I was hoping for. I might try it again with 1, 3, 5, 5, 3, 1 or maybe 5, 5, 3, 3, 1, 1. I wonder what would happen if I added a stripe? So many little ideas…

I thought I would try thimble stitching on a temari again since I have been making all this progress on thimble stitching techniques. Here’s what it looks like so far:

A bi-colored scales variation on a temari

I am pleased with the way my newly found thimble skills are transferring to temari. My edges and stitches are more even than they ever were before. I love the colors that I am using. However, I think I am coming to the same conclusion that I did the last time I stitched thimble style on a temari… I don’t like it.

I just don’t like the heavy design around the equator of the ball. I was much happier with it when I only had a few rows (before the gold) rather than now when it is more than halfway filled in. The more rows I add, the less I like it. I also think that I don’t really like designing from the obi up so to speak. Usually I focus on other parts of the design first and use the equator area to tie things together. Or, the equator area ends up being part of the over all design like in a NS stitching design (Merry go round). Starting here and then trying to decided upon something for the poles just isn’t working for me.

So, this is looking like another one that I will not finish. I think I will take out a few rows and see if that makes me happier. Then I’ll see if I can think of something that utilizes the thimble stitching but not with such total coverage. In the end, I will probably have to take all of it out and rewrap the ball since it is white. White temari do not play nice with ripping out.

Minty Chocolate!

This is the latest. I had a great time stitching this one and it kept me sane yesterday when I had all sorts of comings and goings at the house. (Long story…) I love the way the colors turned out; it inspired me to name it.

Mold size: 50mm

Core: 3/8 inch quilling paper wrapped about 8 times around

Padding: wrapped sewing thread

Thread: Orizuru No 9 medium green and chocolate brown color

Pattern: modified bi-colored scales on 10 sections. Alternate two rows of each color.

Have a great Thimble Thursday!

This is the temari that was talking so loudly to me the other day. Isn’t he a handsome fellow now that he is all stitched?

This is basically a transfer of the design from the recent green and yellow one I did on 32 centers to a C8/14 centers marking. Both are stitched with hhg aka a single continuous path. I think I like this new little guy better than the original version. I am finding that I really like stitching designs with continuous paths. There is something quite relaxing about it.

Stitching was fun because of the way the stitching path goes, and not so fun because the mari was as hard as a rock. I wonder what I put in the center of this one or what I was thinking about when I wrapped it. I definitely did not have the even hand for wrapping that I do these days. The design thread was DMC floche and the marking thread was Kreinik #8 braid. It was one of the vintage colors so is not a sparkly as some are but it suited this temari nicely.

Here’s a pic of the two designs side by side with a ruler for scale. DH tells me that I need to include objects for scale once in awhile so that my readers will know how big things really are. He was mostly referring to my thimbles but really it is true for other things too.

big = 30cm circumference, small = 17.5cm circumference

Ooops. The color in the pictures is off. Neither one is quite right but the one at the top of the post is the closest. The mari wrap is a yellowish green (more green than it appears). The design threads are royal blue and purple.