Saturday, January 24, 2009

Hearts and Flowers!! (Valentine Ornaments)

I never use graph paper for designing, except to try out charted Bargello patterns - but in this case, being already familiar with the size and area covered with these small center motifs, I have spent most of the day "doodling" on paper and a bit of canvas too. I don't use graph paper, as I can't visualize the end result according to scale and how it will ultimately look, so just working directly on the canvas has always been the best option.

Anyway - today the subject has been hearts, and I'm sure this phase will last for a few days - so stay tuned. Once the count for the "bargello" hearts is worked out, I can see many many different ways to use them. This first picture is the 4-way type, so if you want to experiment for yourself, it was made with DMC cotton floss - 8 plies to make the smooth upright stitches on 18 mesh canvas. While I was looking at it, I suddenly saw a diagonal of flowers, as I had marked the canvas as I usually do for four-way Bargello - so started that too. After stitching the little flowers, I counted out and marked a vertical line intending it to be the same width as my 4 1/4" circle for making an ornament, and then realized that it would work for a heart also.

One thing leads to another when passing the time playing around with pen, canvas, and paper, and so I made the diamond shape that would fit well around a single heart or the double ones - for a keyring, ornament, or scissors fob - or whatever else use you can think of. A great small project! After drawing the heart onto canvas, and setting it up for 4-way mitered stitching, I realized that divided into the four sections, after stitching the hearts and diagonal trim, one could stitch the four separate sections with a "fabric" replica, such as gingham checks, mattress tick going in different directions - whatever the imagination can come up with.

Notice that this heart has two stitches at the bottom of the V at the top and the bottom of the heart too to accomodate the upright stitches. I counted and marked the place to start the flower trim when using the four heart center - to give you an idea of how it's done.
The chart shows another heart that's fun to use - and you can see how these are developed, and may doodle a bit yourself and see what you can do!!
The grey slanted lines suggest that you can make long, slanted stitches for the background of the little diamond shaped ornament.

3 comments:

  1. Hi Judy,

    Great ideas as always! :-)

    I love four way designs and I'm especially fond of hearts and flowers!

    Cynthia
    Windy Meadow

    ReplyDelete
  2. With many thanks for that explain what think up the designs in this technology! But continuation of this design will?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow!! Lovely design!! I'll try this on this Valentines Day...

    ReplyDelete