FIRST: You didn’t miss anything, tatting has nothing to do with early 17th century fiber arts - Kate is just interested in almost ALL the fiber arts, whatever their origin. She doesn’t tat on site here, either as an interpreter or in the Crafts Center.

The day in pictures:

Here is the workroom, which is a beehive of activity, photo courtesy of Robbin.

The Mayflower Sampler Guild came this morning, partly to see the jacket work but especially to see the EC sampler, which they gave $1000 to help conserve. They really enjoyed their visit, but because I didn’t think to ask their permission, I can’t post the photos Robbin took. Five of them bought embroidery kits, and there’s talk of organizing a stitching session for them to come as a group. We’ve had a couple of sets of friends come together to stitch, and they (and we) have really enjoyed that. Don’t be scared, just sign up. Bring your sampler if you want help, and we’ll help you figure it out. I never did a bit of this kind of embroidery until last winter, and now I’m stitching the detached pieces that will be sewn over the pea pods. A little practice and you won’t want to stop.

Lacey took on a very ambitious project a couple of days ago. Beth, one of the interpreters in the 1627 English Village, needed her stays altered. The front cups weren’t comfortable for her, so Lacey took out the stitching, extended it to the top edge, and reboned the fronts. It was also too big around, so Lacey cut the back down, redid the boning and put in new grommets. It was ambitious because it all had to be done on Beth’s weekend; she needs to wear it tomorrow morning. And here it is finished!

Because it is our anniversary session, Marcia made us a special dessert. When I mentioned that, several people said, aren’t all her desserts special? How much more special does it get? This much specialer. It’s as delicious as it looks - chocolate ricotta cake, or as Marcia’s son-in-law calls it, cannoli cake.

And speaking of old friends, look who came today! Laura, “our girl Friday”, last year’s intern, without whom I never would have made it through last summer. It was so good to see her. The four of us here, Robbin, me, Wendy and Laura, were also here for the very first stitching session last summer. There will be no cake with a “2″ on it, believe me.

Laura got very interested in the bobbin lace, and here is Robbin giving her a first lesson on the starter pillow Carolyn has left here for that very purpose.

It was a good day.

Here are some pictures from Friday. Carolyn, Devon, Jill, Margaret and Tricia spent some time consulting, discussing, debating, as usually happens at the sessions. Get a bunch of people, all of them experts in one or another aspect of historic dress, embroidery, lace, etc, and watch the information bounce around, speculation, comparison of items examined; it’s great. And of course the laptops make the whole process much easier.

Margaret, in the foreground, is finishing a blue sweater for Carolyn’s new grandson, who made his appearance in the world while Carolyn, Margaret and Devon were studying metal lace at the MET on May 9. Congratulations to the new parents and grandparents.

Laura brought a special show & tell treat this time. She made a frog needle holder, modeled on and inspired by a couple of original (16th-17th century?) needlework novelties, one in the V&A, the other, I believe, in the Museum of London.

Is he not adorable? The legs are a large rectangle of detached buttonhole stitch which is then seamed up the back and stuffed. There are wires in the legs so he can be posed. The feet are also needlelace. She braided the drawstring and worked out how to thread it through accordion-style folds so that he would have a plump body when it was closed. She said that was actually one of the trickiest parts of the project.

I realize now I should have put something in the photo for scale, but the whole frog will sit comfortably in the palm of your hand. You put your needle in his pink wool tongue. “Fatal levels of cuteness” indeed.

Last Friday the embroiderers at our April session got an unexpected treat - Mark was working in the Crafts Center making spangles. Lots of Mark’s work isn’t suitable to the Crafts Center, requiring a big fire like it does, but this work is great for that space.

Wendy and Tricia took photos and also video, I believe. Wendy sent me these photos.

Two tubes of the silver thread for the lace making arrived in the mail from Tricia this morning. Carolyn sent a note that she and Wendy will be down week after next to wind bobbins. Carolyn will finish off the wing piece that Bryce did, and start the next piece so Jill H can work when she comes in May.

Joann G’s embroidery sample arrived a couple of days ago and Kathy sent a big pile of embroidery kits out. Those of you who were waiting for kits, they’re on their way. I think that’s all the news for today.

Today, one of the sleeve pieces went “out of service”. This is a good thing, not like when that happens to your TV. I am plenty excited.

Out of service means we’ve hit a point where we can’t do anything else on it, until either we get more instructions or more materials. This is the first large piece to go out of service. Before today only the gussets were out of service. All that’s left on them is the gold work, and we’re waiting for the next iteration of that thread for Tricia to test.

Today Susan K finished the plain worms, and the only things left on this piece are 2 columbines, 2 1/2 borages, 1 1/2 birds, 3 butterfly wings, 1 “fancy worm”, and 1 1/2 roses. We’re waiting on directions from Tricia for these motifs: colors, stitches, direction of working, that sort of thing. So, OK, there’s still an awful lot to do here, not to mention the gold work and the oes. But let me enjoy the moment.

Wendy is even now working the prototype of the rose motif and taking detailed photos as she works which Tricia will magic into the awesome individual motif directions we have for the other motifs. Once we have those, we’ll bring this back to do the roses.

Did you catch that “fancy worm” comment? Most of the worms are simply done in ceylon stitch in either red or blue GST. The fancy worms are different, two colors and we haven’t quite determined the stitch yet. The term captured my imagination, though. FANCY WORMS. Is that an oxymoron or what?

I’m a little giddy, I actually worked two and a half leaves today, including one two-color leaf. Woo-hoo. I was working on the right side, which is in one of those huge, unwieldy frames. I stood to work on it, with the frame propped against the big cutting table. Tired now, but very pleased.

Bryce W was here for two days and has taken the first piece of lace as far as it can go. Turns out the 13″ piece for the wing needs 15 motifs and we strung only enough spangles for 13 motifs. Tomorrow Wendy will unwind some of the bobbins and add more spangles so when Carolyn next comes in she can finish off this piece and get the next one started. The lace is well and truly underway. No wonder I’m a little giddy.

Marilyn left a comment the other day, that when she got practiced at the trefoils she was able to do one in three hours. That is really zipping along, and part of the reason they’re called “dreaded trefoils”.

Hey, can anyone recommend a really sturdy needle threader? We keep busting the ones we have and can find. Any suggestions?

More tomorrow.

I haven’t blogged three out of the last four nights because I simply can’t think of anything to say. Nothing new has happened since about 10 days ago when Carolyn and Robbin worked on the real lace. I’ve been taking this project one bite at a time for over a year (remember the old joke about how to eat an elephant? One bite at a time…) and right now there just isn’t another bite on the fork.

Don’t mistake me - there’s plenty left to do. More silk embroidery (more trefoils!) more GST embroidery, more lace (WAY more lace!). And there are more things to figure out - how to manage the gold work, how to marshall the legions who’d like to sew on sequins, and don’t even mention the whole putting-it-together part (no, really, DON’T mention it!). And then when it’s finally done, there’ll be the creating an exhibit to go with it.

But right now, this week, no decisions or choices are in the offing. We’ve got an embroidery session starting on Friday, the first one with embroiderers AND lace makers working at the same time. That’ll be exciting. And hopefully some of them will bring some show & tell that I can then share with you. But right now…..

So, if you have any wonderments, anything you wish I’d explain, anything I explained so long ago you don’t remember where we’re coming from, anything at all, let me know.

To make up for assigning you the blog for the next couple of days, I’ll leave you with a picture. This is a detail of a gorgeous 17th century raised-work embroidery which belongs to Joanna Hill, a textile conservator and friend of Tricia’s. Joanna so kindly brought this embroidery to a couple of sessions last summer and let us all get really close to it and take lots of pictures. It’s the only real 17th century artifact I can actually post pictures of here. I love that the bird has a bug in its beak. Ewww.