I’ve been having fun lately weaving fabric as a base for embroidery.  In this case I wove  60/2 silk in 6 shaft false damask with gulls as a background for a beach themed embroidery of my granddaughter’s initials.  Said granddaughter isn’t 2 yet, so I don’t know that she has an opinion on it, but her parents like it.

Embroidery notes (if anyone is interested):

Most handwoven fabric benefits from being backed with muslin, to stabilize the stitches.

Transfering a pattern to handwoven fabric can be virtually impossible if there is any intricacy to the design.  I found tracing the pattern onto a clear soluble stabilizer such as Solvy, then basting it to the fabric and hooping carefully works better than trying to apply it directly to the fabric.

I finally finished weaving linen curtains after many false starts with beaming the 50″ wide linen warp and tying up my countermarch loom. The curtains are woven from unbleached 40/2 Normandy linen at 20epi and ~18ppi in a huck lace pattern of my own devising. They were inspired by Ulla’s 50/2 linen curtains. They are held up by temporary loops of ribbon from Michael’s. I am weaving a 9 yd ribbon of the same 40/2 linen in plain weave at 24epi/ppi for the permanent loops.

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I took Barbara Shapiro’s twisted paper box weaving class at the beginning of April. I used ¼” paper splints while most students used thinner, colored paper. My box is on the chunky side because of the thickness of the paper splints, but I like it.

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