W.I.P Number 42 - Finished

Over the last few weeks my W.I.P. spreadsheet list has grown some & reduced some. After finding a few WIPs in odd places, the list got to be at 42, but has gone back to 41 with the finishing of this bookmark. I started this a number of years ago for a bookmark swap with one of my on-line groups. The bookmarks required at the time were all finished & sent, & this piece of fabric was left over, waiting for me to do another one. I pulled it out of my stash before Christmas, thinking I could do a quick present for someone, but that never eventuated, & the fabric stayed at the bottom of my sewing tin, until the last few days.

The fabric is one I created myself, sandwiching threads & paper between homespun & organza. I then surface stitched over the top with chain stitch & woven wheels, finished the edges with machine satin stitch, and decorated the bottom with a tassel of the same thread.

Mmmmm................. maybe I have started my Christmas present making for 2009 very early.

W.I.P Number 32 - A Challenge

I have been adding to my W.I.P spreadsheet, which is now up to 41 with finding more hiding away in odd corners. So I decided I needed to work on something from this list to give me space in my cupboard. When I opened the door, this piece slid out onto the floor. Do you think it might be trying to tell me something? So I have listened, and decided that this piece will the first piece to be "finished".

OK, so what is it you all ask. Well, some years back, the Stitchers Plus group that I belong to, had a few meetings playing with creating different backgrounds. This is just one sample from those plays. It is a piece of muslin that has been painted with Gesso, scrunched into a shape, then painted with colour. I had to do some thinking of what to now do with the piece. Mmm...... maybe a post card, maybe a box top, & then I thought that maybe I could cut it up & make it into a number of brooches. Any other ideas out there? Just another challenge for me to work out.

WIPs, UFO's & Stash Sorting

It is that time of year when I take stock of everything that I have done over the last 12 months, review what I have finished & what is still left to do. Ten years ago, after completing the Intermediate Certificate with the Embroiderer's Guild here in Sydney, I started a little book of all my new projects that I started. As I worked on each one, I would make notes in my book, including what my thoughts were, where I was headed, & what I still had to do. Over time this little book became very disjointed and bits of all my projects were all mixed up together. Last year I decided to tidy up my method & put everything on a huge spreadsheet, with each project having it's own worksheet. Much more organised!

Two days ago I decided it was time to add a new page of all my UFO's. These were all listed in a word file ( after sorting out a cupboard some years ago), & I thought I could cut & paste everything from this word file to my spreadsheet. Somewhere along the line, after much setting up of new worksheets, cutting & pasting, I forgot to save my file. OOPS! As you can imagine I was "Not Happy Jan" and uttered a few choice words. ( I blame lack of sleep from New Year!)

So yesterday I spent the day sorting through one of my sewing cupboards, the one with all the UFO's stashed away & hiding out of sight. As I sorted, I made up my new UFO worksheet & carefully saved it after each entry. So now my spreadsheet reads like this:-

Page 1. Fabric stash - all 37 pieces of dressmaking fabric (with more still to be listed)

Page 2. UFO's & WIP's pre 2008 - all 34 of them ( and still more hiding in other places)

Page 3. 2008 worklist summary with 9 projects still outstanding & not finished

Page 4. A finished items list with markings for pieces for exhibitions

Page 5. 2009 work list summary ( so far this page is empty)

The pages continue with each individual project having it's own page of work notes. It makes everything easy to find. Sometime in the future I may add a page of threads.

Today it is the turn of the magazines. Not sure what I will do with those yet, they are taking up too much space in my cupboard so something needs to be done.