Charm School Week Eight: Stumpwork

Modesty

In the language of flowers, the cosmos stands for modesty. And so, Modesty becomes the charm for week eight of Charm School.

This week, I chose to stitch the cosmos from Di van Niekerk's Ribbon Embroidery and Stumpwork book because it's the one that appears on the cover. And I just fell in love with it.


The book presents a sampler with 17 different panels (this is panel #11). The book is arranged by panel, giving supply lists and instructions for each individual section. The overall sampler is stunning and would be a worthy undertaking if you are that ambitious.

The book recommends using Di's very own ribbon...which I do not own so I substituted Hanah silk ribbon and it worked beautifully. I also was supposed to use a medium weight interfacing -- I only had a heavier weight so I used that. I do think the flower would have looked a lot more fluid and light if I had used a lighter interfacing.

I loved this technique but it was extremely time consuming. Not a method that you should choose if you are in a hurry -- but I feel like the results are stunning and I will definitely use it again.


First thing I did was trace the shapes of the petals onto the interfacing using a mechanical pencil. The author recommends using a soft lead but I find I prefer the thinner line of the mechanical pencil. It was great that she provided all of the petal shapes and they were each numbered.


Next, I cut out the petals and ironed them onto the ribbon. I didn't have that beautiful pink color ribbon used in the model so I used this red instead. Next time I think I would select a ribbon that had a little more variegated color... I was very careful to keep the petals in numerical order because those teeny tiny numbers were very difficult to read on the dark ribbon...


Next, I cut out the petals using my embroidery scissors -- those babies are tiny!

Once the petals were cut, you use a slight bit of glue and paste them onto water soluble stabilizer that was stretched in a hoop. Oh, how I wish I had known about this technique when I was making my thistle a few weeks ago...


Again, I was very careful to keep the petals in order because, if you didn't, I think it would be a nightmare to figure out. Once the petals are all stuck to the stabilizer, you were supposed to use a lightbox or a window and trace the vein lines from the interfacing on to the front of the petal.

I skipped that part and eyeballed the lines...which went a lot quicker.

I then stitched all the vein lines on the petals with Caron Waterlilies thread and stitched the gold centers for the flowers onto white felt.


When that was finished, you cut out the shapes and dissolve the stabilizer in water. Very easy and the stabilizer dissolves within seconds.

Again, I kept the petals in order and proceeded to wet them one at a time -- once the petals were wet, I really couldn't read the numbers!


This trick was great! The glue stabilized the embroidery threads, helped keep the interfacing from peeling back from the ribbon, helped to keep the ribbon from fraying....it was the one step that really was an innovation for me. Brilliant!

After all the petals were dry, I finally got to sew them together into a flower. And, after six hours or so, that was a really nice tasting dessert!


I didn't have time to make the entire panel of cosmos flowers so I chose to put the flower together on green felt. I was really stumped how to turn this one flower into a charm this week -- plus, I was tired -- so I used this lace motif -- which, I'm not sure I'm happy with...


But can't you imagine how lovely this would look with a whole bouquet of flowers made this way? It would be breathtaking. This poor guy needs more buddies and a stem and some more leaves but time was short after six hours of work!

I have enough petals to work the other two flowers when I get the chance. The rest of the book is chock-full of wonderful ideas and contemporary approaches to three-dimensional flower work. It's really a treasure trove.

As for Charm School, I think this is the last week for me. Eight weeks of school has been enough and Summer is winding down. Time to transition and begin the embrace with the Fall season and all that entails.


Next Tuesday, I'll do a final wrap up and graduation for Summer Charm School. I have enjoyed studying in detail those books that have been gathering dust on my shelves and I'd like to continue that discipline.

I just haven't figured out how...