Winter Evenings Are For Embroidery
I pulled out a few embroidery projects to work on in the evenings. I started the third (of nine) squash for the Squash Squad sampler. I’m in the midst of prepping the second of nine chickens in the Urban Chickens sampler, although it may end up being the first of nine chickens because I cannot locate the finished first chicken. The project I am having the most fun with, though, is this Robert Mahar anatomical embroidery sampler:
I bought this at Monster, a store in the Seattle neighborhood of Ballard. (Apologies for the lousy photo, but it’s 4:13 am in my office.) These aren’t intended—at least from the photos and instructions—to be heavily embroidered, but rather embellished here and there. I’ve done two blackberries and the blue veins so far. I’ll do the red blood vessels, the other berries, and some of the leaves and see what I think. I am enjoying this one so much that I may order the other four in the series.
No cutesie embroidery for me! According to the description on the website: The beautifully macabre imagery is sourced from 19th Century French anatomical teaching charts and botanical illustrations.
Monster has had Robert Mahar as an instructor in the past, and I think it would be fun to take a class with him.
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My classes in Missoula and Spokane next week have been canceled, which is something of a relief. The store in Missoula wants another serger mastery class, but only one person signed up for the T-shirt class so we scrubbed it. That one may be better scheduled in the spring. The students from my August class in Spokane want to take the pants class, but the store owner has some upheaval happening in her personal life, and after visiting with her on the phone last night, we decided to postpone that one.
Building up demand for classes is a process. It takes time to figure out what classes students want and also what times are good for scheduling. Some students can only take classes on weekends or evenings. Some prefer daytime. I’m not local to the stores, so that adds another layer of complexity.
In any case, this gives me another week at home before my travels for Thanksgiving. I’ve got plenty to keep me busy.
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I popped into our Joann Fabrics yesterday. They are closed on Sundays now, and when I walked back to the racks where the apparel fabrics are kept, I thought it was all over because the racks were mostly empty. In other areas of the store, however, I saw several rolling carts stacked with bolts of new, unwrapped fabric, including new apparel fabrics. Perhaps they are getting ready for Black Friday.
I worked yesterday morning at our church’s international fair trade festival. Attendance was good, as it usually is on the first day of the sale. We did some radio advertising for the first time this year and I think that helped. I’m going back to work another shift this morning.