Embroidery - My First Love

Day four of my "no knitting" month and it's not easy.  Usually I knit or crochet everyday, not just in the evenings but anytime I have a few minutes spare.  So not having that occupation is really hard.  I am getting plenty of jobs done around the house, especially de-cluttering, which is much needed.  However it's the evenings that are the hardest.  I can't watch television without having something in my hands to work on.  I have far too much energy to just sit still, so I need to find something to occupy me - I'll have to sort something out soon or I'll be climbing the walls!  At the moment I'm reduced to frogging old knitted cardigans!

One of the activities I want to spend more time on this month is embroidery.  I love embroidery, it was my passion before knitting took over.  Now my older eyes can't cope with sewing for too long, and then only in very good daylight, but if I can manage little and often I shall be happy.

Last month I completed an embroidered tablecloth.

I bought the cloth in a charity shop in Chester, many many years ago.  As you can see, the previous owner had made a start.

Every year I would promise myself that I would finish it, I'd sew a bit then it would be put away again.

This year, thankfully, I have fulfilled my promise.  And I'm very happy with the finished cloth.  Especially as now I can start a new embroidery project.

I'm very excited about this new project.  Inspiration came from Pinterest (as always).  I'm going to embroider little squares and then join them together to make a wall hanging.  I will make 54 squares in total - one for each year of my life - and I've already decided the subject for each square.

To make it more interesting, I making it into a lucky dip, so that a subject is picked at random.

Some of the subjects are open to any interpretation, so it gives me freedom to play around with ideas.

I don't expect to get this project finished in a hurry - embroidery has a very leisurely pace - I will embroider when the mood takes me.  I have completed my first square.  The subject picked out of the jar was "insect".  So I couldn't resist embroidering some bees.

I'm happy I've made a start and looking forward to the next square.

Today I'm going to start planning some sewing projects, I've set up my sewing machine and I'm itching to get started.  I think this is going to be a very productive month.