Copper Illumination

How was your weekend?  We have had some gorgeous, cool (lower 70's), sunny weather here the past few days. I'm afraid we are using up our allotment of nice weather days.  But enough idle chit-chat.

As readers of this blog know, Copper Illumination, a silk and metal design by Kay Stanis, was my challenge piece for my ANG chapter.  It was due this past weekend, and I'm happy to report that I made the deadline.  Some of you will remember that if I finished this project by the deadline, I got a small prize.  If not, I would have to pay $10 into the chapter's treasury--the old carrot and stick approach.

I did have a bit of trouble tracing and stippling that flower onto the copper sheeting.  Can you tell that it's a tulip?  Maybe if I could have had three or four sheets of copper to perfect my technique, it might have turned out more to my liking.  The larger, filled-in areas are blackwork which is not usually a problem for me, but on canvas you have to watch where you carry your threads on the back so that they don't show through.

The hyacinths were constructed with two layers of beads to make them appear fuller.  The stems and leaves are made out of jaceron; I've also heard it called purl purl.  It's a tiny metal coil, and here it was attached to the canvas through its center like a bead.

In this area, jaceron was used for the main stem, and it was couched down with silk thread.  The smaller stems attached to the flowers are short strands of Kreinik, also couched down with silk.  The turquoise borders that you see, and there are many of them, were also finished with couched Kreinik, both on the inside and outside.  That was the last thing that needed to be done, and it seemed to take forever.  This wasn't my biggest WIP, but it lived up to being a challenge.  However.  It's done now!

And here's my little prize:  it's a magnetic needle minder.

And I got to keep my $10.

So after all the prizes were awarded

(and money paid in some cases), 

we chose projects for next year's challenge.

Every who wants to participate brings three WIPs;

they have to be a certain size

(the bigger the better),

not more than 50 percent completed

(the less the better)

and they have to be canvas projects.

The gentle ladies of the guild then vote

on which project the participant should finish.

Given their past voting record,

I thought I had them all figured out.

The three projects I brought were:

1.

Ripple Rotation 2 by Needle Delights Originals.

Lots of color changes, but no weird threads

or weird stitches.

Here's what I've done so far.

This piece will measure 8" x 8".

2.

Ho Ho Ho by Debbie Forney,

a 3-sided holiday stand-up decoration.

Lots of weird threads and weird stitches,

including dozens of bullion knots

on Santa's beard.

This is what I have done.

The piece will be about 12" high (without ornamentation)

and 15" around the base.

3.

And finally I dug out this little piece.

It was a fundraiser for autism designed by Sue Reed

that I purchased about six years ago.

No weird threads, but some weird stitches.

It's probably not larger than 6" x 6".

It would make a good box top insert.

So the ladies voted, and they chose...

Ripple Rotation 2!

(hereinafter referred to as Rip-Ro)

And it wasn't even close!

What the...  what?!

What about Ho Ho Ho?!

It's larger, more complicated,

I have less overall completed on it,

and I was mentally geared up to do it.

Of course, if I had a project that

I have no interest in completing,

I wouldn't be taking it to the challenge.

There is certainly nothing preventing

me from finishing Ho Ho Ho.

And I would have done Rip-Ro anyway.

I'm not complaining.

It seems that I got off pretty easy this year.

They'll probably make up for it next year.

That's it for now.

Thanks for dropping by!