There is, of course, plenty to do. I have handouts to write. I have proposals to submit. A houseful of tasks have been delayed. I find myself trying to make up the last 10½ months in only 6 weeks. Probably not possible. Likely not a good idea.
I have done very little knitting this year. On the other hand, I've rediscovered my love of embroidery. My mother had a surprisingly large number of nearly-completed projects. While I gave away a bunch of things in the half-done state, there were others so close to completion I figured it was almost faster just to finish them.
Here's the first one.
This is a project from Cross Stitch & Country Crafts magazine May-June 1991,
pages 4-5 & 10-11. It is titled "Iris with Blackwork." The completed piece is about 8¼ inches square, making it just small enough to fit on my scanner for the picture above.
When I came across it in the mountainous embroidery stash, the iris was complete. Yes, complete — cross stitches and back stitching. The boring part was done. The satin stitches dividing the panels were done. At minimum the blackwork had been started in nearly every section, with the center section and the middle bands running left and right already finished. I am guessing my mother worked a bit of blackwork in each section because she changed some patterns from those in the magazine. Having a bit already worked made it clear which patterns went where. Maybe 60-75% of the blackwork needed to be completed? I happen to like blackwork. I love geometry! For me, this looked like an embroidery "meal" where someone had already eaten the less-appealing items off the plate and left behind a giant mound of dessert!
I've worked on this project off and on since spring. My eyes are very much at the point where I need my reading glasses to do this. This was not an "on the go" project! I am thankful I took my mother's standing Dazor magnifier light a few years ago. The newer models use LEDs. This older model gets warm, which is a feature in winter and a bug in summer. But it just can't be beat! A Dazor is expensive, but if it keeps you happily enjoying crafts into retirement, it is an excellent investment.
There's a small amount of couched gold work in this project. That was the last step. I found plenty of gold Kreinik Japan thread #7 in my mother's stash. Somehow there was not any 002C Kreinik Balger cord in her stash or mine, so I ordered two spools — one for now and a spare for later — from a vendor on eBay.
I was also fortunate to encounter the
T. F. Woodcraft
booth at Rhinebeck. They craft an assortment of obscure fiber tools, including
koma. There was an assortment of wood types. The pair I bought are holly from
a bush in their own yard! Talk about local sourcing. Koma are spools used for gold work. These are about 2¼ inches/5.5cm long. They fit easily in the palm of your hand. They are sold in
pairs, because gold work is typically done in pairs. The spools provide a
place for storing metal threads. Because they are square not round, you can
unroll only the amount of metal thread you need. If you tilt your embroidery
frame, they provide just enough tension to help the threads lie nicely while
couching. Not an expensive tool, but very helpful!
You'll notice in the bottom right corner I've signed the picture with both my mother's initials and my initials. This will be covered when the picture is matted and framed. I think this is the only piece with both signatures on it. There is an orange butterfly picture in the house in Pennsylvania. I remember the instructions asked you to mentally "flip" the butterfly to work the other half. My mother had trouble with that, so I worked the outline stitches to get it started. But I don't think we put both sets of initials on it? Most of the time we were embroidering separate projects.
This collaboration has been healing. I'm still unhappy with my mother. I asked her a decade ago to clean up things, please, so I wouldn't need to spend 6-12 months of my life cleaning up when she died. I think that legacy will always sting. You can't always help those you love; but sabotage, even unintentional, doesn't leave warm fuzzy feelings. She was available for her friends and other members of the family. Many people have told me how much they miss her. But I don't miss her. She wasn't active enough in my life for me to notice her absence. You miss what was there and is now absent. You don't miss what wasn't ever there. Finishing my mother's embroidery is bringing me back to our shared hobby. It is reconnecting me with the things we loved to do together. And it is reminding me of the positive parts of my mother's legacy. I'm healing enough that I'm not sorry she was my mother.
More projects to come.
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