Well, June's endless TIF is finally completed. When I was done I made myself notes on everything. The front shows a stash run amok, full of ideas and plans. It's stitched on an antique pillowcase I found with a monogram M. I used it until it fell apart.The two floral motifs came from 1940s British needlework magazines that were my introduction to my very good friend Jenny. The silk threads are from Rita's estate. The wools are Medici from my stash, mostly from Susan's former shop, and one green was purchased on my first trip to England in Burford. This trip probably never would have happened if I'd not "met" Jenny.
Most of the beads came from SJ Designs' line of beads and pearls. The wired flower centers on the right were leftovers from my niece's wedding last December. I used them as centers for tissue paper plum blossoms for her shower. Simple materials, really, and basic stitches.
There are penciled in drawings on the background of the front, showing designs that were lurking but never got stitched.
The back is just stash, pure and simple and includes fabric, lace, paper, beads, buttons, and other bits and pieces I found laying around. It carries the title for the piece, Stash Stories.This was a hard one to do. I think perhaps because once I began looking I saw potential everywhere and had a really hard time settling down to one thing and making a choice.
After taking the last stitch in June's piece, I began to work immediately on getting out the lurking ideas for July. I'm going to do a milestone. I'm going to be pretty blatant about it, mostly because I wanted to incise words into the top layer (carved into stone) and needed them to be simple. I'm going to use felt and needlefelt it from the front and the back. And I'm going to highlight the front corner of the stone, I think perhaps with some yellow roving needlefelted along it, to highlight the NOW.I like the fact that this piece isn't a full rectangle, so that the other month's pages will show as you look at the milestone.
