The panel at the Embroiderers’ Guild has often been referred to in some texts as a coif. The confusion may have occurred because the dimensions (width and height) are similar to many coifs. But it is a panel. We took a look at the edges and it was obvious that the piece was in its entirety and not cut from something larger. The small amount of linen around it had either nail marks or holes from being stretched on a frame. There was an embroidered stem stitch outline around the four sides and the embroidery appropriately started or ended at the boundaries if the motif was cut by the boundary.

Other details that are different from the jacket: there are less flowers, only nine types instead of the 11 borage being repeated twice) of the jacket. (I had to read this twice, my brain doesn’t move as fast as Tricia’s. The jacket master repeat is 3 x 4, therefore 12 motifs, but there are two borage so only 11 different motifs.) The borage and strawberries are missing. The blue and red flowers (carnation, gillyflower, or cornflower?) on the pieces are different between the two pieces, but not much different in terms of tracing. Just embroidered differently.

The calyx of the foxglove is stitched in silk and not gold. There is a different technique used for the detached pea pod parts, detached buttonhole in silver strip wrapped silk on the jacket and silk buttonhole over a gold thread (return) for the panel. The roses have an extra set of detached petals. Some of the thistles have an extra layer of detached buttonhole. The coiling stem is also a different stitch. On the jacket it is plaited braid whereas on the panel the stitch is ladder with wheat sheath. This stitch is much slower to work than plaited braid and done in two passes. Overall, the panel has a higher level of detail work which is absent from the jacket.

Tricia

Norma has been here stitching at least a couple of times before. She comes from Connecticut.

This past weekend for show & tell Norma brought her in-progress nightcap, the project Tricia taught last February in Williamsburg. It is an awesome piece, even in-progress. The kit came with a slate frame. Oooh.

Plus Norma brought another couple of Tricia’s pieces – the glove and a rose with goldwork set into a box. I particularly love this one. It unites two of my favorite things, red and something to put things in.

Norma also brought a box with one of Elizabeth Creeden’s designs set into the top. This is a mourning piece, and is dedicated to a friend of Norma’s who passed away while helping out another friend. The second friend and her family were all down with what seemed like the flu. Norma’s friend Kathy went over to help out, but turned out they didn’t have the flu. They were slowly being poisoned by carbon monoxide. Norma’s friend Kathy died as well as two members of the family. Norma finished this piece in tribute to her friend, and part of a very long tradition of women memorializing loved ones through needlework.

During the weekend Norma completed fifteen detached butterfly wings. I haven’t had a chance yet to count how many there are total, but 15 must win her the Butterfly Queen crown. Thanks, Norma.

Catherine, Laura and Jen joined us for last weekend’s embroidery session. All of them have been here before and so are considered “veterans.” They certainly showed their experience; they all accomplished a great deal.

Catherine was working on the unwieldy back piece, and stitched three complete roses along with a few odds & ends here and there. Laura mostly worked on the collar & cuffs frame, finishing the cuffs to the point that they are ready for goldwork. She also stitched the detached butterfly wing piece, and then sewed it to the collar, which made the collar done-done-done.

Jen was working on an equally unwieldy front, and did some of everything, including fancy worms. Fancy worms are composed of two parallel rows of ceylon stitch, in two different colors, with the head stitched separately in a third color but also in ceylon stitch. These worms also get black back stitched antennae (thus making them not technically worms, I know) but are not wrapped like the plain worms.

Here are all of them with their frames. They were friends from before this project, and traveled here together sort of like a girls’ weekend away. They have such fun together, it makes the atmosphere of the weekend sort of like a party. A few different times we’ve had friends meet here both to enjoy each other’s company and to work together on the project. It puts me in mind of all the different sorts of women’s gatherings to work and talk, like quilting bees or houseraisings (OK, there the men are working I guess but if you don’t think it’s a lot of work to feed timberframers, I’d like to introduce you to a couple of cooks I know…..)

Thanks, Rosemary, for catching my error in the dates for the August session. The formal session is 8 August to 11 August, a Friday to Monday weekend. However, Tricia is planning to be at Plimoth all week, from Monday 4 August to Friday 8 August (that’s what I was thinking of, I think) working on the gold. Anyone is welcome to come work for a day or more that week, running into the weekend session or not. Please let me know what you’d like to do so we can plan accordingly jhall@plimoth.org

Sunday Astrida was planning to leave about 3:00 pm to get home to New Hampshire in time for her husband to participate in one of his favorite hobbies. She stayed late to finish a rose; here she is pleased and proud, and a little tired too, with still a 2-3 hour drive ahead of her. She left around 5, I think, but not before Mr Astrida called wondering was she almost home? Not so much. We thank him for his patience and understanding – that rose couldn’t wait.

And here’s JoAnn, working furiously away to finish her last motif before leaving. Here are Wendy and Linda encouraging her work, and here’s JoAnn, also looking pleased and a little tired. JoAnn stitched a pink, a motif that’s taking most stitchers between 7 – 10 hours to do. It was the last big motif on this piece that we have directions for (we’re waiting for marching orders on the borage, the bird & the fancy worms) and the big blank space there was really bugging Wendy for the last couple of weekends. Must get that pink done. And JoAnn did! There is one pink left on the jacket, a “split” one that’s divided by the line where one of the gussets will go.

to the Loudoun Sampler Guild! They sent a $250 donation to the Textile Conservation Fund!

This is even more wonderful when you know this story – the original estimate to conserve “EC” was about $3800. The Mayflower Sampler Guild donated $1000 specifically to conserve “EC” which kicked off the Textiles Conservation Fund shortly after the new year. Then, not too long after, the Swan Sampler Guild made their largest single donation yet – $2500 to conserve “EC”.

Karin was thinking that, even though the initial estimate was a little higher than we had in hand, we should just go ahead and “scrape up the leftover somewhere.” I seconded her thought and she made an appointment with a conservator.

And then this showed up, completely and totally out of the blue! And such a fortuitous amount, too. Thank you, thank you, Loudoun Sampler Guild!

Today we had our first UK stitcher on the jacket, and our second, and our third! Sarah, Susan and Anne are all here for Celebrations of Needlework in Nashua, NH this weekend. They came by, with stalwart stitcher and lacer Robbin for the day to stitch on the jacket and visit the shop. It was a pleasure to meet them all. I hope they have an excellent time this weekend and enjoy the stitching.

Tricia was here, too, and she brought new sets of directions for the instruction manuals – we now have directions for the strawberry flower and the rose, to go with the ones for the pansy we got last time. She’s working on the prototype for the columbine, which I’ve been fascinated with from the beginning – it may finally force me to try working with the GST just so I can work one!

Today Wendy counted up the motifs that were done this weekend. I had high hopes for this session and I was not disappointed. There were many hands working and a great deal was accomplished:

16.5 worms. The plain worms, not the fancy worms. We don’t have directions for those yet. But the plain worms gave us plenty of head-scratching moments, as we tried to figure out what color each should be, comparing the photos of the original and the different pieces of the jacket. The half worm disappears into a seam, and it was the back half that was stitched, which led to some merriment. Oh, and Debbie thinks they’re actually slugs, since they have little feelers on they little heads. Are slugs ickier than worms?

3.5 pansies. Pansies take a LONG time to work, and they’re not as spectacularly colored as the pansies I’m familiar with. Still very pretty, and after these 3.5 were done, there are not that many left.

2 whole pinks. Pinks, or carnations, and in the 1627 village gillyflowers (hence very popular with me). Also take a long time to do, and we’re almost done with them, too.

6 leaves, 1/2 a pea pod, 1/2 a rose hip, 1/2 a thistle calyx, 1/2 a honeysuckle, 1 set honeysuckle buds, and one little edge of a pea pod that vanished into a seam. It was just a tiny line, but it was fiddly to work since the way it was oriented meant a long column of one buttonhole stitch per row rather than one long row of stitches. Abigail did that one. Some of those half motifs were partially done at other sessions by other stitcher, some were the kind that disappear into seams or off the edges of the pieces.

AND TWO of the dreaded trefoils. That’s a thistle in the bottom of that photo, with the calyx of course the green part below the blossom. Debbie did one of the trefoils and Linda did the other. Linda was with us only on Saturday.

Not to mention 9 lace motifs in only two days (that was Bryce, speed lacer.)

Here’s a picture of Wendy working that very first rose motif. She stayed late tonight to finish it, “so her boss won’t yell at her.” We’ll see what Tricia thinks of the result, maybe next time we can add another motif to our repertoire.

Thanks, everyone. I so enjoyed this weekend.

Here’s two pictures of Bryce working, both from Friday. And here’s what Bryce said in the comments about her time in the workroom:

I had such a wonderful time making lace. I urge all you lacemakers out there to try it! It’s a little fiddly, but not difficult. The people — staff and embroiderers both — are wonderful. The food is as good as they say it is. All in all, a great place to get away from everything for a couple of days. Thank you! I’m hoping to get back!

I’m glad she had such a good time, that is the point, after all, to have a good time doing something you enjoy with other people as crazy I mean passionate and dedicated as you are. Well, that and making the thing. That too.

I mentioned that Wendy is working the prototype of the rose motif this weekend. I wanted to expand on that a little. Before she started stitching, she and Tricia sat down with some detailed photos of this motif, both prints and digital images enlarged on Tricia’s laptop. They sketched out the shape and drew in the direction of work, determining which stitches and and colors should be used. Here are a couple of pictures of that conversation. This took maybe a half hour, give or take, and they’ve done this with a couple of other motifs, too. It’s one of those fascinating things that happens almost unnoticed, I think all those working in the other room had no idea this was going on. I just happened in and thought you’d like to hear about it.

So they decided how to proceed, and Wendy will finish the prototype this weekend as I mentioned. If it looks like the originals we’ll be good to go. If for some reason it doesn’t come out as expected, then it’ll be back to the drawing board to see if a different method will result in a more faithful reproduction, just like the process Mark went through with the spangles. Sometimes this is called experiential archeology. Whatever you call it, it is pretty cool. Likely this level of intense scrutiny would only happen in trying to create a reproduction, which is one of the reasons why I do this sort of work.

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.