At long last I can present my finish photo. Not my mounted and ready to display shot, but my "all stitching done" pix:

and proof that I've signed the thing:

I finished it up within 24 hours of my last post. Where have I been since then?

Wallowing in post-project ennui. Knitting socks for Elder Daughter. Treating myself to a flat Millennium Frame for the next stitched project, which being silk, is not a good candidate for a round frame. Working on a lecture on embroidery patterns, to be given at the Hrim Schola XVI (also here)- an SCA event focused on sharing learning about needlework, to be held on 17 March. Working on TNCM2, which now looks to be topping out at 60 plates of source-annotated historical patterns, more or less. Handling work deadlines. Shuttling said Elder Daughter back to college, and Younger Daughter to fencing class. Mocking The Resident Male for being a latecomer to blogging. The usual.

Imminent Death of wiseNeedle

On a more serious note, I am also preparing to take down wiseNeedle. Some of the content will be salvaged and re-offered, like the patterns and the glossary. But the rest won't be.

Why do this after a on-the-Web run dating back to 1995? Mostly economics. I've supported the thing out of my own pocket since the beginning. It wasn't cheap because we need a commercial grade SQL service to support the yarn review collection, plus incorporation to protect family assets from potential suits by folks upset by yarn review content. Ad revenue made it a business, and taxes on that tiny income stream had to be handled, too.

Thanks to the advertising, wiseNeedle broke even for several years, but no longer. Yarndex made a slight dent in readership, but our independent non-sponsored stance preserved interest. Folk knew that when they saw wiseNeedle reviews posted, the information was all-volunteer and totally unsponsored. But when Ravelry broke loose, traffic here nosedived and never recovered. It's now at about 8 percent of what it was back then. They now take up the lion's share of knitting traffic on the Web, with their own advice boards and yarn review collection. It's clear that concerns beyond the hobbyist level - small time independents like wiseNeedle no longer have a place on the 'Net. Ravelry as a newly minted 500-pound gorilla, wins.

String and its URL will continue although we will be porting it to a lower cost service later this year. I am hoping to preserve String's back content, but I'm not sure how to handle wiseNeedle's sublinks. All of those (plus String's) may break. It's a shame that the yarn review back catalog of info will be lost. It covers lots of yarns dating back through time and is still a valuable resource for people looking to make substitutions. Unless there's an entity interested in buying and hosting the database (sans contributors addresses, to preserve their anonymity), it will be going away soon.

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O.k. Here I am:

Only inches away from total done-ness. Just a tiny bit more gridded void fill at the uppermost left hand corner, and to finish out two narrow strips in the final section:

I'll probably finish all of it up tonight or tomorrow. Then the only thing that remains is the signature strip.

I'm plotting that out right now.

Post-project separation sadness has already set in.

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This is new for me. I've had projects that spanned years (decades, even), but never before have I had one embroidery project that I worked on without stopping, that has taken more than a year. Even my blackwork underskirt was done in 10 months. But as of mid December, I have now spent an entire year working on my big blackwork sampler. I'm not quite done. Almost, but not quite:

You can see that I'm filling in the area to the left of the dragon. I've finished the first dark band, and am now on a lighter one just above it. Two more to go, balancing the progression of shade values on the dragon's right. Then it's a sliver of the voided leaf panel at the top of the work, to finish that off even with the edge of the strips below. And finally - I will sign the piece in the strip beneath the dark panel on the leftmost edge. And it will be done. Maybe two more weeks? More if work deadlines intrude.

Here's a close-up of the latest two strips:

The sharp-eyed will note that the voided one on the bottom is included in TNCM, on Plate 28:4. It's from Jean Troveon's Patrons de diuerse manieres..., published in Lyon in 1533. Those of long memory may remember that I've used it before. It's doubled, and appears on the left and right-most edges of my filet crochet dragon window curtain.

The Troveon's original is shown single width, but the halved fleur-de-lys motifs seemed to beg use as an all-over pattern. Also, the graph of the original is shown in reverse of mine color placement, with the foreground emphasized rather than the background, more like the treatment in the crocheted piece. (Come to think of it, that knot strip along the top of the curtain might be a candidate for the dark strip at the top of my current sampler section. Hmmm....)

The lighter strip I'm currently working on will be in TNCM2. It's adapted from a non-graphed (but oh-so-obviously-intended-to-be) design in Ostaus' La Vera Perfezione del Disegno..., Venice, 1561 and 1567. I've chosen to augment it here with the frilly edge treatment.

In any case, the holidays have departed here at String. The tree is undecorated, the cookies, panforte, goose, cassoulet, and other goodies have been consumed or distributed. And the long slog through the year commences.

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O.k., I've finished the upper right hand corner, shown here in a traditional String pre-dawn fuzzy photo:

And here is all that's left to go:

Just the upper left. You can see I'm finishing out the leaf strip that runs across the entire top. Then I'll find several smaller strip patterns for the area beneath it. I'll use two relatively narrow dark strips to set off the space, similar to what I did on the right, then fill in with lighter ones. But they will be different from the set on the right. I used five total there. I might use six on the left. It will depend on what strikes my fancy when I get there. After that the only thing that will remain will be signing the piece in the small blank area immediately beneath the mega-dark strip on the left hand center edge.

I get notes from folk marveling on my rapid progress. But it hasn't been all that speedy. The first note I posted about this project was on 2 January of this year. I had already been stitching on the piece since around the second week of last December, but hadn't written about it because I was in the middle of posting my tutorial on graphing line unit patterns using GIMP (November-December 2010). Here's the first snap of the thing, so you can see the progress since:

To be fair, just the small area I completed yesterday is larger than many contemporary commercial samplers, but even so, a project in a simple technique that takes more than year to finish even when working with daily diligence, isn't exactly being worked at light speed. Or is being stitched by someone with a day job...

In other news, there are major seasonal celebrations afoot. First is a happy birthday to Long Time Needlework Pal Kathryn Goodwyn -she of "Too many centuries, too little time." Long may she research and stitch! And I tease readers here again about her forthcoming Flowers of the Needle series, which I've had the opportunity to see in preview. It's worth every bit of slavering, panting anticipation.

Plus it's Cookie Season again in String Central's kitchens. That means the obligate ten varieties, plus Panforte again this year. I delight in having an apprentice baker now, and no longer having to staff the entire manufactory myself.

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Holiday over, we slowly revert to standard routine here at String Central. However, that doesn't mean we have nothing to show off.

First, Smaller Daughter - her class built models of castles, manor farms, and cathedrals as part of their Middle Ages history unit. You can't see the details she lavished on hers - the working drawbridge, the flower garden, the well (with working bucket), the stables, or the forces manning the towers, but now you know they're there:

Slytherin? Well, we are Salazars, after all... And there's the inevitable Castle Uprising Aftermath:

Too bad the teachers don't grade them on general post-project carnage.

Not less for being presented second, Elder Daughter has been taken with double sided double knitting. She has been adding double knit squares bearing mythical creatures to her Barbara Walker Learn to Knit sampler afghan. Here's a graph for her next square, an original unicorn, based loosely on a Siebmacher yale (heraldic goat):

Apple. Tree. Lack of distance between the two is noted. With considerable pride, I might add.

And finally in spite of the welcome and happy chaos of a house crammed full of family, turkey, and way too many pies - I did manage to move a bit forward on the great blackwork sampler:

The dark band with the frilly edging will be in TNCM2. The one just below it was in my first 1974 booklet. I recently rediscovered that I had graphed it from my all time favorite source. It's the pattern I used for my double sided double running stitch logic lesson back in August, 2010. You can find the lesson (and the pattern) here.

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A boring progress post today. I'm still filling in the upper right hand area, next to the dragon:

Three bands, about 60% of the height of the area filled. These patterns are all in TNCM2.

And speaking of upcoming books - I've been busy lending a hand to Long Time Needlework Pal Kathryn, helping her over some minor layout hassles as she readies her greatly spiffed up and recomposed Flowers of the Needle re-issue. I can't break official silence to say when and where, but I can assure you that it's going to be well worth the wait; and that I'll be sure to post links to Kathryn's site when it goes live.

In the mean time, off to bake pies and sterilize the house in preparation for the holiday.

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True to my word (although somewhat tardy) I post this week's progress:

I'm filling in the left edge area next to the dragon with narrower bands:

It's Question/Answer time again. These are from posts left here on String and from my various inboxes:

Rachel asks, "...the very bold patterns on the side, what type of stitch did you use to do those?"

Like the narrow border I just added to the piece, the dark bits in these patterns all use long-armed cross stitch:

I tend to follow this logic. Here's a close-up of the texture it produces:

When worked back and forth across an area it produces a plaited texture. There appear to be quite a few variants of long-armed cross stitch family, and a similarly wide family of names for it. I've seen very similar stitches called:

• Tent stitch - nothing to do with the common needlepoint technique of the same name. On the front this looks like standard LACS. I'm assuming that the reverse shows verticals. (Looks in vain for the one corroborating photo of this, to no avail.) On historical pieces this stitch tends to march back and forth to fill a voided background, with the stitching direction parallel to the strip's long dimension. But not always...
• Punto a spina pesce - obviously Italian in provenance. Hard to tell from the photos (and not being able to see the back), but the angle of the long-leap over may be greater than in tent stitch, but this may be an artifact of differences in warp/woof thread count of the ground. Or it may be possible that the reverse shows horizontals instead of LACS's verticals. It's interesting to note that the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston distinguishes between tent and punto a spina pesce. The photos do show however that stitching direction for this one seems to vary on the whim of the stitcher, combining horizontal, vertical, AND diagonals.
• Closed herringbone - also seems to closely resemble LACS on the front, but produces horizontals on the back. LACS forms a species cline (a related continuum) with the herringbone family.
• Portuguese Stitch, twist stitch, Slav stitch, twist stitch, long-legged cross stitch, plait stitch Greek stitch - all reported names for LACS. Some can be found here.
• Montenegrin Stitch - A related stitch, but with an additional vertical component. The stitch is used more for foreground stitching, rather than background fill, and the direction of stitching closely follows the design's lines - merging horizontal to diagonal, to vertical as dictated by the pattern being stitched. (It's hard to tell but the fifth band down on this sampler, with the strong blue up and down may be Montenegrin, or may be LACS).

There's a nice piece on historical use of cross stitches, including some members of the LACS family on Northern Needle.

Rachel also asks, "Are all the designs on your sampler going to be in your next modelbook?"

Most of them. Exceptions are the three direct quotations from Lipperheide, and the three small all-over patterns that can be found in Ensamplario Atlantio . Also some of the patterns appearing on my last two large samplers - Clarke's Law and Do Right - will also be in there. The exceptions being patterns that have already appeared in The New Carolingian Modelbook.

Lisa asks, "I've got Ensamplario. But where can I find outlines to fill in that book's designs? I really don't want to do a checkerboard."

The answer is "all over!"

To start, there are sources for outline patterns from blackwork's heyday. Around the same time as I got this question, Elmsley Rose reminded me that the on line edition of Trevalyn's Commonplace Book is still available at the Folger. It's a bit late for inhabited blackwork, but is not out of the question. It contains drawings in it that would be super for it (and even better for spot filled/stippled blackwork). This is the same resource that Kathy over at Unbroken Thread is using for her cap project. Of special note are the plates starting around the 7th page of the display (when 50 per page are shown). These peasecods would be killer; as would these plumes. Thanks from us all, Elmsley!

If you're not stuck on historical sources, all sorts of motifs and repeats are out there. I've done quite well using patterns intended for stained glass, and stencils as inspiration. I don't have pix (these being from the pre-Internet era), but I did a couple of pieces from a Dover book of Japanese stencils that combined simple florals with the geometric fillings, to excellent effect. Patchwork patterns are also very useful as framing devices for contrasting fills. Also I'd nominate coloring books as outline sources. Yes, coloring books. Maybe not a SpongeBob book or Disney special, but there are quite a few that show flowers, butterflies, seashells, or geometrics.

Late breaking update! I forgot to mention one source for historical and heraldic motifs, simply drawn. It's the traceable art collection maintained by a consortium of SCA heralds. They use it to simplify the process of drawing up heraldry. But there are all sorts of images in there that would make excellent small blackwork projects. Please contact the artists listed on the images before re-use.

So there are lots of places to look into - you needn't be forced to do a plain square grid.

Jane asks, "How many threads do you stitch over?"

To date most of my pieces have been on 36-50 count linen, worked mostly over 2x2 threads. But that's not the way historical pieces were worked. Their ground cloth weaves were in the 50-count and finer range, and they tended to stitch over anywhere from 3-5 threads. Three or four seems to be most common, and I can't rule out up to 6x6 either. Also, as I graph up more and more from artifacts, I do note that not all historical ground cloths were spot on even weave. Most are off just a hair in one dimension or another, usually compressed along the vertical compared to the horizontal (selvedge to selvedge). Also - and again I work from photographs, so I can't swear to the pinpoint count that up close and personal with actual pieces would bring - some of them do look as if they were stitched on skew counts. Taking one more thread on the vertical to make the output a bit more square in appearance.

I hope these answers help. Please feel free to ask questions. It makes figuring out what to write about MUCH easier. <grin>

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Amidst all the far greater havoc and destruction of the Halloween snow here in New England, we had our own minor incident. We lost the tri-trunked mountain ash in our side garden:

We noticed the trunk on the ground immediately after the storm, but it took a while for us to notice the second trunk reclining on our roof. I think it slowly sank to this position after the first day and did not land there in thumping violence, as did the one on the ground. There appears to be no damage to the roof, gutter, or thin stucco walls (lucky, that!). Unfortunately the arborist says that the last trunk is undermined and unstable, and the whole thing should come out before the next storm.

I really liked this small tree - dappled shade, spring flowers, tons of berries for the birds. To be fair, it can also be a bit of a nuisance to maintain because of its habit of thrusting sprouts and suckers, coppice-style. But in spite of the burden of snippage in the miniature spider-forest that springs up each May, the tree was appreciated all year round. For example, we host a robin flash mob each fall, because migration coincides with berry production. Some years late heat ferments them on the tree, so we get a drunken bird scrum instead of a polite lunch counter. But no more.

Later this week the tree guy returns with his crew to take the tree away, removing the trunk on the roof, the remaining standing trunk, and grinding the stump. I'd like to replace it with another mid-size tree, rather than waiting for a random one inch scion of the original to grow to tree size. But what to put there? Another small to mid-size ornamental, for sure. Another ash or rowan is a possibility. I've always been fond of hawthorns (but they're pest prone), and I've read some buzz lately about American hornbeams from "plant native" advocates. But not a dogwood, and not a cherry - both are pretty but over represented in this area. Whatever it is, it will be small and will take quite a while to preside over the side garden as did its predecessor.

Back to stitching progress:

Although I'm not quite at the right edge of this strip I will finish out my current background thread and stop. I'll move over to the blank area to the right of the dragon, and fill in some narrower strips, bottom to top. Once I've got that area completed, I'll finish the remaining right hand bit of the current strip. Why? While I do have my margins, centers, and quarters marked with lines of stitching, I've deviated from them ever so slightly as I have been working. Rather than risk being a thread or two off on completion on this piece, and being too lazy to count up and re-establish my line, I'll work from the bottom of my empty space, then when my edge nears the current strip, I'll eke it out to align with the now easy to see termination line.

Ulterior motive of course is that I find this particular strip very boring. The leaf double running outlines are fun, but there's a heck of a lot of squared background. Figuring out the little strips will be a breather before I have to return to do the other half of the thing.

Finally, shout out to a couple of folks who are waiting to see their gallery pix here. Apologies. I'm on it, but I'm way behind due to work deadlines and minor complications like trees falling on the house.

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Or in our case today, drifted leaves. Covered by snow during our unseasonable pre-Halloween snowstorm. Very odd to have to shovel a path for trick-or-treaters.

In any case, here are some leaves as yet untouched by the weather:

Progress on this current strip is slow. Like all voided background designs, it takes a lot of stitching to do the area cover. Still, I'm moving along. Here's the thing in full sampler context:

I'm still considering what to put left and right of the dragon, but have decided that whatever designs I end up using, both sides will be collections of narrow bands with short repeats, worked horizontally. But given the pace of the current strip, I probably won't be getting to them until January. Not only due to current production speed, but also because of holiday interruptions and some end-of-year knitting obligations.

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I've reached the top edge of my giant blackwork sampler:

The current panel will span the entire width of the piece:

It's adapted from a Lipperheide pattern. The original is shown with a pulled thread mesh background, rather than the squared fill I'm using. That background made the book's illustration very difficult to work from, so I had to redraft the pattern before I could begin. The squared voided fill takes a long time to stitch, so I am guessing that it will be a couple of weeks before I can address the areas to the left and right of my dragon. Not sure yet what will go there - possibly gangs of narrow borders, either horizontal or vertical. We'll see...

In other news, I am very proud of the whole String family. Smaller daughter has spent the last two weeks farming a sourdough starter "It's not fair! Other kids get kittens or puppies. Why do I get Francis The Yeast Culture for a pet?"

Yesterday we decided it was time to try it out. The Resident Male took charge of mixing up the dough, the various rises, loaf forming, and baking. Here is the result, crunchy-fresh and hot from the Dutch oven in which he baked it:

I wish this was Smell-o-'Net because the house is heavenly right now. Marian would have been proud of him, too!

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The dragon panel is finished!

I wish the shading on the tail end of the beast better balanced that on the head end, but what I have here is true to the original. If I ever stitch him up again, I may modify the pattern somewhat and either lighten the branch on the right, or darken something on the left. Still I've been fond of this guy since I first saw him in the '70s, and am delighted to have finally successfully charted and stitched him. He'll be the last two charts in TNCM2 (he's too big for one page).

What's next? A panel that will run the width of the piece at the top edge. This one will be another crib from Lipperheide, but unlike the last bits I borrowed from that source, it was too difficult to stitch it directly from the engraving. The background of that illustration is shown in the drawn squared filling (some museums label th stitch "punto milano", possibly Italian 4-sided stitch, drawn very tight). It sort of looks like a drawn thread ground, but it would have been VERY difficult to achieve all that thread removal given the scale and convolutions of the un-voided motif areas. In any case, I had to regraph it from the Lipperheide panel prior to work. Even though I drafted it up I do not think I will include this one in TNCM2 because it's available in another contemporary source.

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What have I been up to while posting the informational notes last week?

Fighting a long-standing battle - and at long last - conquering my nemesis.

I'm not sure if this is a dragon, or a lion, or some other beastie, but whatever it is, I've made failed attempts to graph it from its original source. I've gotten close a couple of times, but never close enough to do the panel justice. I think I've hit it this time - fifth time's the charm!

I've paired it with a border from the same source, but not shown in association with the dragon on the original sampler. Like most of the other strip patterns I've stitched over the past 18 months both of these will be in my Second Carolingian Modelbook (TNCM2).

How did the bottom panel turn out?

and how is the piece as a whole coming along?

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Incremental progress here must be excruciatingly boring to read about. But undaunted, I continue to post:

You can see that I continue to work the current Y strip across the bottom of the piece.

Now one of the few remaining readers here has asked about the narrow slice left bare - indicated above by the yellow arrow. It's not a mistake. It is an artifact of squaring out the repeats, but I intend to put it to good use. That will be the last little bit I stitch on the piece, and will be the spot where I sign or initial the work, along with a date of completion.

Still working on the graph for the next slice...

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More progress!

The new band is marching across the bottom nicely, bringing a dark footing to the thing. Here you can see that I outline first, then fill in the voided long-armed cross stitch (LACS) background:

Trust me, it's MUCH easier to work LACS inside an outline. I did it "feral," (without outlines) on the large dark panel in the center of the left edge. Plain old cross stitch is easier to count than LACS with its braided surface texture. That one panel probably took twice as long to do in LACS as a result. This band is moving along much faster. Another two weeks tops, and I should have the entire bottom edge finished. An aside - there's a mistake in the current strip. Pat yourself on the back if you can spot it!

In other news, The Resident Male has a project to showcase this week. In the spring we finally replaced our Carter-era washer and dryer with ones that work. Because we had to fit them into an existing alcove, and I wanted efficient front loaders, that took a bit of shopping around. Most front loaders on display in this area are giant capacity/top of the line units or are mini capacity apartment size stackers. Big ones wouldn't fit in the space we had available, and with kids, we wanted more capacity than the smaller, stackable models. We finally tracked down some mid-size GE units, well reviewed with good repair records, and ordered them.

Now one problem with these front loaders is that the openings are knee height, and users have to stoop to put the laundry in. This is why the makers offer height-raising pedestals as options. Unfortunately, pedestals for our smaller size units are not offered in the US. So the Resident Male, freshly inspired by countless evenings of home improvement TV, tackled the project himself:

We now have two drawers for storage of once-a-year type kitchen impedimenta - like the big turkey roasting pan. And no more reaching in for that last sock on hands and knees! I declare this project a success. Now how does the new washer perform? It cleans much more thoroughly than my late 1970s/early 1980s vintage Kenmore did, even removing stains I thought were lost causes. The washer/dryer pair sip water, detergent, and energy, noticeably decreasing our consumption of each. And they're quiet. We can now sit in the kitchen (behind the photographer) and have a conversation while the machines are running. But there are also a couple of minor drawbacks. Cycles take twice as long to complete; the mid-capacity model holds less than the old top loader, so there is one more wash per week; and for some reasons, sheets twist themselves into Gordian knots in the dryer, and do not dry well, unless I take the time to re-assort them several times mid cycle. Drawbacks aside, the new set-up is far superior to the old one, and the raised platform is the icing on the cake.

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Yes, through the crowdsource project and minor work chaos, plus hurricanes, child transport to and from college and camp respectively, I've managed to keep plugging away at my big blackwork sampler. I finished the small strip I was working on that evens out the edge of the stitched area. The pattern I just finished has an amusing motif in it that looks like a very fat owl to me. This one would be a killer edging for clothing, especially with the with the background done in a bold color, with the motif outlines in contrast. The drama of a deep crimson background and couched gold overstitching for the outlines would be over-the-top fabulous.

Now I'm working on the voided band that will be the piece's bottom edge. Although I like the way this strip looks, it's not my favorite to stitch. I like the eccentric nature of the diagonal wrapped bar that connects the up and down motifs. I also like that there is more than one version of this in museum collections, each different but obviously renditions of the same source pattern and that both versions I've seen have been worked in dark green. One version pairs strips of the repeat, mirroring them along a center axis. The other is just one strip, like I've stitched below. There are enough other minor differences between the details of the oh so similar motifs that make me think that they may have come from the same family or workshop, but were not part of the same original artifact. On my piece I've chosen to work one of the mirrored strips as a single rather than the stand-alone version.

What don't I like about this pattern? The miserable little squares. They offend my "right-side/wrong-side as much the same as possible" bias. The narrow Lipperheide strip just finished and the wide Lipperheide panel both with myriad "island motifs" - bits of stitching not attached to the main design - were bad enough. You can see some of the isolated flowers in the snippet to the top left, above, and the each-motif-separate narrow strip to the right. But the current pattern with its zillion little squares will leave me totally detesting it by the time I've spanned the width of the work. (The sharp eyed will not a mistake made and then picked out and restitched that was spotted after the detail shot was taken but before the larger progress photo was snapped.)

Now that I'm at the bottom, what's next? Why, the top third of my sampler, as yet unstitched! There's a particular figural panel I'd like to center in that space, surrounded by narrower strips to fit. But first I have to graph it up from the artifact. It's big and complex, and has been my graphing bugbear for the better part of two decades. Time to roll up the sleeves, grab the magnifying glass and get to work.

On Crowdsourcing

The just completed crowdsourced pattern was an interesting exercise. I hope folk enjoyed it. I am both grateful to and delighted by those who chose to participate. I really like the result. I might not stitch all of the contributed motifs on the same piece (opting to do themed subsets of them instead) but all were prime and all would be stellar stitched up.

However gathering up and regraphing them did take me away from work on TNCM2. About 1,200 people to date have downloaded one or more of the crowdsource installments over the course of the five week project. About 14 people contributed - Twerp, Jennette de Beauvoir, Sandy, Laura Kathleen Barashear, Kathryn Goodwyn, Jane Wyant, Alexandra Rule, Susan Davis, Pam, and 5 anonymous donors (again thanks!). It did take weeks more than I expected to fill the page.

Even so, I am thinking of running another one. I'm contemplating either another inhabited ground frame but with slightly larger motif areas, or narrow strip repeats suitable for a band sampler. I know I have two people who have expressed interest in contributing to a future crowdsource project. If you'd be interested in either contributing to or seeing one or the other formats, please let me know (no obligation - I won't hunt down folk and demand creativity.)

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More progress on the big sampler:

I've finished out the excerpt from the big Lipperheide repeat and started another. This pattern appears on the same plate as the one I just finished. Like it, this one was originally worked voided. It turns out to have the exact north-south stitch count I need to eke out the horizontal row, getting ready for a darker, wider strip at the project's bottom edge. It's also an extremely quick one to stitch up. The bit above only took about an hour or so.

Anna asked me what kind of hoop I'm using, and whether or not I've padded it. I reply:

It's a 7-inch Hardwicke Manor hoop I bought from Hedgehog Handworks, about 10 years ago, but didn't use until recently. In part because I'd been on an extended vacation from stitching, and in part because I didn't like the way it tensioned the fabric. At 5/8" wide it grabbed nicely, but never maintained the tightness I prefer for double running stitch. So finally tiring of my ancient dime store bamboo hoop last month, I got some standard fabric store issue half-inch white twill tape and carefully wrapped the bottom of my Hardwicke frame. It's hard to see, but the tape is angled at 45-degrees, and overlaps by roughly half a width on each wrapping. The end is tucked underneath and stitched to the bottom hoop's inside (left on the image, where the lump is), to keep the outside perimeter bump-free. The hoop's screw closure is long enough to handle the extra diameter of the wrapping. About six turns of the screw's threading are visible, and I had just popped the thing off the work for the photo.

I now love this hoop. The twill tape cushions the work and minimizes crush and holds the ground cloth drum tight. However wrapping the bottom hoop does reduce the effective stitching area by decreasing the inside diameter. Even with cushioning I would not recommend using a hoop for anything other than flat surface stitching using cottons. When I stitch with silk, metallics, or use any sort of raised or heavily textured stitch I pull out a flat frame.

Where is the crowdsourced pattern of the week? I've got a very nifty motif queued ready to go, but it's only one panel. I'm hoping for at least one more before I post the next update.(Hint, hint...)

Aside: Hoping all on the East coast were spared overly much grief with Irene. Only minor damage here in the leafy close-in suburbs outside of Boston:

Half a tree down, blocking our street, and another big limb in our back yard. Thankfully both fell with surgical precision, missing every structure, vehicle, power line and comms wire. I bow to the courtesy of my neighborhood vegetable friends. Also to the amazingly diligent Arlington, MA DPW crew, that had this cut up and hauled away within 45 minutes of the tree's fall!

Finally, for folk who landed here looking for Ensamplario Atlantio. (Word is still spreading about it.) It's here.

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First, thanks this week to our crowdsource design contributors - the patient Jane Wyant, and (as always) Long Time Needlework Pal Kathryn Goodwyn:

• #25 - Grapes - Kathryn's own needlework sigil, offered up to our collection. (Kathryn's deep love of grape motifs is legendary).
• #26 - TARDIS - From Jane Wyant, a Whovian tiny inter-dimensional call box should we wish to stitch in two places at the same time.

We've still got a few open diamonds. With some repositioning I think I can fit in seven more motifs. Feel free to send yours along.

On my own blackwork sampler, progress is being made. My Lipperheide panel is proceeding apace.

I am not going to have room for the entire repeat. There's a head of one of the four winds (possibly Boreas), and a horn tooting satyr that will have to wait their turn on a future piece. Unless Kathryn gets there first. :)

After I finish out this strip to the left hand edge of the stitched area I will fill in a narrower band below the sprigged chimney pots. Then I'll edge across the entire bottom with something nice and dark - probably worked voided style. I haven't picked out the designs for either of those strips yet, but as folk following here know, I enjoy bungee jump style stitching. Once the dark area is done that will leave only the top. Believe it or not, the part you see stitched here is only about 65% of my total piece. I'm not sure what I'll do up there, but that's still down the road.

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A break from the crowdsource project this week. No new designs came in, so unless I cheat and post more myself, there's no update. Feeling shy about submitting a design - please don't be! We're delighted to see your efforts, whether it's your first venture into drawing a pattern, or if you're an old pro.

Instead I share progress on my own sampler. As you can see, I finished the last band, described as "sprouting chimney pots" by Long Time Needlework Pal Kathryn:

And Kathryn is also to blame for the new band. She was gracious enough to lend me Kathleen Epstein's Old Italian Patterns for Linen Embroidery - a redaction of one of the legendary Lipperheide volumes. This is the only design on the sampler that will not be offered in my upcoming sequel to TNCM because it's in that book. If you're familiar with the original you'll see that I have adapted slightly:

My variation differs in the way that the background's handled. I won't be working this one voided like the original. I also tinkered a bit with some of the interior elements, the banding for example right under the central cherub. In the original the darker little vertical elements are filled in with cross stitches. Mine uses plain ladder like elements, which I repeat elsewhere in the piece. Thanks, Kathryn! You remain my chief enabler, even after all these years. :)

Now where do spaniels and sunsets come in? For spaniels, that's easy to see: the odd little critter in the lower right hand corner. He's got a spaniel-like fluffy tail, foot feathers, and floppy ears. Even the stylized dark area on his middle is reminiscent of the classic saddle-area markings on a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel (a breed that was fashionable at in the 1500s-1600s.) As I worked him I could almost hear him barking at the cherub that will stand to his right (you can see the cherub's hand and lower face at the edge of the stitched area). And if you're eagle-eyed you'll see the two mini-mistakes at the left hand edge of the completed work. Hint: I'll be picking out the left hand lady's upper arm and the hairline of the central angel-face.

Sunsets? That's implied. This week's vast amount of progress is brought to you by an impromptu mini-vacation the Resident Male and I took for part of last week - sans children, the youngest being in summer camp and the oldest being trusty enough to leave on her own. Three blissful days of embroidering while watching the tide roll in and out, basking in Outer Cape sunsets, wiggling toes in hot sand, snarfing up some fine food, and enjoying a production of A Winter's Tale. I am now armed against the inexorable slide back to fall, school, heavy deadlines, December, and snow.

Finally, for folk who landed here looking for Ensamplario Atlantio. (Word is still spreading about it.) It's here.

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Back from vacation! A week of Cape Cod sun, sand, salt water and doing as little as possible except enjoying those things.

This year my mom came with us and we had a great time. We spent most of our time on the sands right at our hotel, sitting, swimming, kayaking, even watching Provincetown fireworks from our room's deck. We did our now traditional beach paella, salmon teriyaki on the grill, and flank steak kabobs. I am rested but could be easily persuaded to do a wash-rinse-repeat of the whole week's experience. Seven days is not enough.

Arriving back home, I checked gMail to see if anyone had volunteered a graphed pattern for the crowdsource project. Lo and behold! There was one:

I present Design #1 - Twerp's StarBee. The first design in the series. Red lines indicate straight lines "off the grid" or not at 180/90/45-degree angles. I like this cheeky little fellow. A nice one, Twerp!

If you want to draw up one of your own to be posted here, please feel free to download the JPG at the project's kickoff page, then draw on it by hand or using any graphics program. You can email the resulting file, a photo or a scan of your design to me at kbsalazar (at) gmail (dot) com. Let me know whether or not you want your name or a link posted with your offering. I do reserve the right to do light editorial selection (this is a family-rated website).

Now, what progress have I made on my own stitching?

Some, mostly prior to our departure. I concentrated on two pairs of socks while we were on the beach.

I knit a pair of guy socks, with a simple broken rib ankle and k1p1 ribbing to finish. There is only one in this picture. The other is now at parts unknown. At best guess, I dropped it at dusk on the beach and didn't notice that it was gone. Either seagulls or the sea made off with it. Somewhere there is either a lobster or a tern sporting a new brown habitat. And I need to get another ball of the same yarn and knit a third to make a pair. (Grrrr.) The other pair has a lacy pattern in the ankle. More on that another day.

And here's the latest strip on my sampler:

To which I will return once the socks are done.

One last note - to date (using the click-through count of the fourth part) - over 1,000 people have downloaded the complete Ensamplario Atlantio since I posted it two weeks ago. If you are looking for it, it's here. It's a PDF file - you need a recent version Acrobat Reader to open it. You can get Reader for free, for both Mac and Windows. Although I've gotten some thank-you posts and a couple of questions from people unfamiliar with Acrobat, I've had very little other feedback, and only one bug report - of fonts not displaying properly on an iPad II running the latest version of Safari. I'm looking into that problem and may repost the files later this week.

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As you can see, I've finished out the dark, narrow strip on the right of the oak leaves. (I put a US penny on the frame for scale.)

It was a quick one, especially compared to the extra wide bands of long-armed cross stitch I've been working since March.

I like this design quite a bit, and I think it would be an exceptional choice for the top edge of a chemise (undergown), just barely peeking out at the neckline, as in Bronzino's famous portrait of Eleanora of Toledo. Eleanora had a killer wardrobe and sat for many paintings. I'm hard pressed to choose a favorite because each one is spectacular. (Thanks to the Elizabethan Portraits website for collecting these links.)

Now I'm filling in the strip on the left. You can't make out the design here, but it's already clear that I'm mirroring along a horizontal axis.

Now, how did I know to leave enough room for these strips? I didn't. I'm building this piece as I go, with little or no forethought on pattern choice other than a general idea of where darker and lighter strips should go. I still don't know which way is up. To date all of the designs are non-directional, with neither up nor down. That will change soon. I'd like to include some patterns that feature mythical beasts, but I haven't chosen them yet, and I haven't figured out where they will go. But my fave beast strips are not up-down agnostic, so once I've picked one and stitched it, my up/down decision will be final.

Back to shoehorning designs in. To fill in these odd spaces, the first thing I had to do was to determine their width. Easy. I counted the stitches available in the target space. That's design height, not length. I am not going to worry about centering these fill-in strips left-right. The just-finished area turned out to be 26 stitches tall. I had the center double bud design in the upcoming book. I also had a different pattern that used the little wiggle ancillary frame. I decided to use them together. However, each wiggle in its original form is 6 units tall. The center strip was 16 units tall - 28 stitches. Too many. I decided on a gambit often used in these period strips when borders are married to a main design. I stripped out a solid row of stitches between the wiggle and the main pattern but kept it at the outermost edges. This reduced the count to my target. An easy fix.

For this current strip, I've got a space that's 27 stitches tall. But I don't want to do another dark strip here. Something a bit less dense is in order. So instead of looking for (or drafting up) a single 27-stitch-tall pattern, I decided to take a 13 stitch tall meander from my first book and mirror it. (TNCM Plate 27:3). I'll write more about this one as more stitching gets done. Mirroring in this manner is another perfectly common way 16th and 17th century stitchers used to to build wider repeats from narrower ones. I may play a bit though. There are a couple of bits where I could work in a gratuitous interlace to join the two mirrored repeats. We'll see if that happens as I go along.

The blackwork fillings book...

I haven't forgotten. I'm putting the finishing touches on it right now. I've asked some native Italian speakers for advice on the proper form for the name. Some say that Ensamplario Atlantio is the correct form. Others say it should be Ensamplario Atlantico. I'm leaning towards the former because the latter looks to be a form of Atlantic, not Altantia, and the book isn't going to be named after the ocean. If you're knowledgeable on proper Italian (especially Renaissance Italian), please feel free to chime in. It's now up to 35 plates of designs, plus five pages of intro material. Ten of those pattern pages have NOT been previously posted here. So even if you've been downloading over the winter, there are ample new goodies for you in the final collection.

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I have been reliably informed that if this amount of stitching represents only 40% of the total surface area of my finished project, than I am most assuredly in the middle of a BAP:

So I guess I am...

In any case, here's the latest strip - the darker bit at the right hand edge, that I'd mentioned as being under consideration before:

Compared to some of the other strips, it's a toss-off, minor thing. But I like it.

The blank area to the right of the heavy black bit on the left side of the piece is next. That will also be in long armed cross stitch, but will be much less dense than the major bit of darkness I just completed:

As ever, I'm not entirely sure what will end up being there. Does anyone else do these exercises in bungee-jump stitching? Or am I the only loon who starts a year long project without planning the placement of every wisp of thread?

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Steady progress on the latest strip:

Now that life is beginning to get back to normal (or what passes for normal in this house) I can also report progress on the book front(s).

First, on the PDF collection of blackwork filling patterns, to be named Ensamplio Atlantaea, I apologize for the delay. This one will include all of the filling patterns published here over this winter past. And as an extra bonus for everyone's patience, I will toss in several more pages of additional patterns, not seen here before. It will be free, and will be available for download here at this site. Right now I have 27 pages of patterns (the original 150, plus a dozen more), and hope to make it an even 30. Plus cover and some sort of intro essay. It will NOT include free drawn outline patterns for use with these fillings, nor will it include detailed working methods, although I may abstract some of the double running stitch guidance previously posted here. I hope to have this one up and ready sometime in the coming month.

On the big book - my sequel, to be named A Second Carolingian Modelbook: More Counted Patterns from Historical Sources, I've got about 45 pages of patterns drafted out in whole or in part. Each pattern has annotation, noting its origin artifact or source, or if it's one of the few originals, that attribution. That's about 100 individual patterns, some of which are main strip plus accompanying border. I also have all over patterns suitable for cushions and body linen, narrow strips for cuffs and collars or seam decoration, and wide pieces that would make nifty tablecloth, sheet or towel borders. Right now about 2/3 of the patterns are for double running stitch, although there are some that are good for Italian two-sided cross stitch, long armed cross stitch, lacis, or other square-unit styles. There are also quite a few that were worked voided, some with straight or double running stitch defining the foreground from the background, and some not. Working methods/colors of the originals are also described, and full sources are provided for all graphs, so stitchers can look them up. I do not anticipate finishing this one any time soon. Feedback is that readers want essays on techniques, materials, and methods of employ. All that will take time. As will figuring out how to do the actual publication. (Right now an on demand service like Lulu or one of its competitors looks most likely). This book will not be free, but I am hoping to keep it affordable.

And in other news, it's the beginning of Birthday Season here at String. A much recuperated Smaller Daughter celebrated her 13th last Saturday, mostly by laughing with evil intent at the thought that others had decided that her becoming a teen was the cause of the end-of-the-world predictions for that date. Larger Daughter is now back from college for the summer, and celebrates mid-week. I note the passing of yet another anniversary of my 21st birthday at the end of this month. Today's home-cooked lobster feast was in recognition of all three fetes. The Resident Male, the odd man out in so many respects, does not have to share his natal day with adjoining festivities. We will recognize that occasion later in the summer.

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It's hard to come up with pithy or even vaguely interesting statements to accompany these progress posts. You can see I'm marching along. No new insights to share other than "long armed cross stitch takes almost as much time as it does thread."

As to the provenance of this one - the museum original I found was undated and without a stated place of origin. There are several works with pattens very similar to this, all collected in the late 1800s/early 1900s by several textile enthusiasts who harvested a vast amount of related work from the 1500s through 1700s. Some of the pieces clearly related to this design are all-over patterns, some are single width bands, and some are double width bands. To me (novice that I am) these have an Aegean look about them. The point of origin could be anywhere washed by that sea, including the areas prominent in trade with that region. The Italian states were aggressively trading in that area throughout most of history. As to date - again I haven't a clue. The working method - long armed cross stitch (very evident in the pictures, but sometimes mislabeled "tent stitch" by the holding institutions), in crimson silk on linen would not be out of place in the 1600s.

The band I stitched up has the most evenly proportioned detail of the group. I especially like the little side buds on either side of the center tulip shaped flower. Some of the other bands omit that detail, replace the evenly spaced grape like flower centers with writhing tendrils and birds, and simplify the rest of the pattern. It's common for these counted designs to become somewhat debased over time. Sequential copying can lead to garbling of the original, much like the game of telephone, in which a whisper passed down a long line of people can emerge totally different at the end of the queue. It may be a totally biased assumption, but when presented with several clearly related but slightly different iterations of the same pattern, I tend to see the one with the clearest, best proportioned composition and most detail as probably being among the earlier representations, and the more simplified, more haphazard versions as being later. Again - I'm generalizing, and not every pattern can fall into this continuum. But I have a hunch that entropy rules, even in embroidery design.

To answer some other questions - Christina asks if she can use some of the patterns from the filling collection on a blackwork cloth she's stitching for her daughter. I answer:

Absolutely! That's why I posted them. My restrictions are there to keep people from taking my pages and republishing them as their own work - something that's happened to me before. In almost all cases I bend over backwards for legitimate professionals, too, who request permission to use the patterns in their own kits. Please do not think I wish to hobble individuals who are stitching for themselves, especially those who are exploring the medium on their own. Please feel free to use the things! And if you like, since I'm in this for love, not money - any pictures or links you wish to share of works using the filling collection patterns are most appreciated. I get mega-kicks out of seeing what the kids are up to, out in the wide, wide world. (I'll even repost pix or links, with your permission.)

How's the kid?

She's doing much better, thanks! She's home now, and about to go back to school, although she may begin with half days to start. She's been slowly regaining stamina and strength, and has worked with a tutor on catching up with her classes. I am confident that she'll be back to her old non-stop self in a few weeks.

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Thanks to everyone who sent get well wishes to Younger Daughter. I can report that each day she feels a bit better, but it will take a while.

This weekend's kid recuperation gave me ample time to work on my stitching:

I've got the repeat established now, and all mistakes have been corrected. Now it's just a matter of finishing out this strip.

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"Don't burst your appendix if you can avoid it."

Younger Daughter is back home, after 19 days at Children's Hospital in Boston. She's still got a way to go before she's school-ready, but she's happy to be home with quiet, limited interruptions, and familiar food. Thanks to everyone who sent get well wishes!

I'd like to especially thank the staff at Children's, not all of whose names I caught. They're a very caring bunch, and did all they could to make the kid better and more comfortable. Here's her much cherished souvenir - a little squeezy ball they gave to Morgan to exercise her fingers.

We asked the nursing staff we were assigned to, to autograph our "game ball." We managed to get most but not all of them. Special thanks to Chris Mac, Sharon, Michelle, Josh, Maria, The Original Chris, Meredith, Rachelle, Caitlin, Paola, Cleanne, Cara, Audrey, Dr. Arnold, Dr. Hamilton, all of the residents on 10NW, and all of the other folk whose names slipped me by when I was in a sleep-deprived fog. The kids still has to go back to have the tatters of her appendix excised, but that's a one day bit, not another extended stay.

As you can see, while we were there I had lots of time to stitch. I finished out the oak leaves and acorns at the right, and started another band at the left. That one is very dense, in long armed cross stitch, so it's not exactly zipping along. Also stitching when sleepy led to tons of mistakes and ripping back, so what's here is probably only about half of what I actually stitched.

Even with all of the rework, stitching was a much needed self-administered sedative while I was being a bedside mom.

The plan is to make this strip the same length as the oak leaves. Eventually I'll either find or noodle out an even denser band for the narrow area immediately to the right of the oak leaves, and a less dense but similarly black band to put between the current strip and the established horizontal bands. I might take a break from dense work for a while though, and opt to work something in double running elsewhere on the piece before attempting those two strips. There's tons more room both north and south of these.

One thing to note. So far, all of the finished strips are bi-directional. At this point there is no up or down on my sampler. Either end could be at the top. I could even opt to finish this out in landscape rather than portrait orientation. Jury is still out on what I will do, but I do have a couple of strips I'd like to include that are figural, with clearly defined ups and downs. Stay tuned to see how I work them in.

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...should grow. Vaster than empires and more slow.

This week's progress is brought to us by an in-Barony performance of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, enacted by The Baron's Players. The troupe is made up largely of friends, and the performance was quite enjoyable, played as a farce it had some laugh-out-loud moments. And as I watched, listened, and laughed, I stitched. This is not considered a faux pas in the SCA, where diligent quiet needlework is an acceptable audience activity, provided the attendee is not so absorbed in it as to be insensible or unappreciative of the performance.

Here you see a sideways view of the accumulated stitchery to date, so you can get an idea of scale and placement:

One more full leaf, plus an acorn sprig and part of a second, and I'll be done with this strip and on to the next.

To Adelle, sorry to disappoint. I won't be drafting this project up as a kit and selling it, but all of the designs in it will figure in my forthcoming book.

For those of you who follow such things, barring major crises - I have every intention of being at the Carolingian 40th anniversary at the end of the month, where I will be part of the "dim memories from the ancient past" contingent. I will be wearing my dress with the blackwork underskirt, and in all probability will be seated somewhere comfy where I can watch the fighters and embroider. Stop by and say hello.

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This week's progress largely brought to you courtesy of a kid orthodontist appointment. The removal of Younger Daughter's braces was good for a leaf and a half:

In the photo above you can see the room left for the next narrow band. It's going to be darker than this one. But what to put there hasn't been decided on yet.

On the SCA side, I will be at the 40th anniversary of the Barony of Carolingia later this month, where I will be part of the "Long Forgotten Artifacts of Elder Days" contingent. Provided I can rustle up a dress.

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Deadlines have totally consumed me. No time to do more than post this minimal progress; and smile at the plaited look of long armed cross stitch, up close.

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A bit more progress since my Friday last snap (blogged on Sunday). Now you can see the leaves and acorns, plus the beginnings of the twining stems:

I've departed a bit from my original graphing, norming the acorn caps a bit.

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I'm finally finished with the grape strip. Yaay! Now on to my next pattern:

As described, this one is perpendicular to the esablished stitching direction. It will run north-south instead of east-west. I know it's hard to see from just two evening's stitching snippets, but this one is a fat center branch, with oak leaves and acorns growing off it and entwining it. Part of the leaf is at the upper left of the framed circle, and the beginnings of the acorn cap can be seen at the extreme right.

I'm working this one in foreground, using long armed cross stitch. I am not outlining beforehand (which I point out makes working LACS much easier because long runs of it can be difficult to count). I've already made a mistake which I won't be taking out, and I will probably live to regret my no-outline decision.

This is another of the patterns that I intend to include in the next book, and it is a bit interesting. I've spotted three examples of it stitched up, in three different museum collections. All three are described as being Italian. Two are monochrome, stitched in crimson on plain linen and feature the same matching border. The third is stitched in two colors and is unbordered. Dates range from 15th century through 17th century, and the working methods (although the look very similar in the photos) are described differently. The designs of the three pieces are extremely close, clearly all drawing from a common source. The two monochrome pieces differer in only the smallest of details, but enough to make me think they were not parts of a single original "separated at birth."

To date I have not seen a modelbook page with this pattern on it. But not every printed source survived, and in addition to full books of designs there were also single sheet broadsides. Maybe someday I'll see the ur-source for this oak branch pattern. Or maybe one of my readers knows of it and will chime in.

As to how long this strip will be, I'm not sure yet. At least as long as the stitched center area. Maybe longer. Because it doesn't fill the entire right hand stitching lane, there will be another narrower strip to its right. I'm not sure what that one will be but it will be darker, probably stitched voided style. If I can't find something spot on or close to my available width, I'll do an adaptation, or just make something up. But from the stitching pace of LACS, that will be months from now...

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Some progress and some answers. First, the progress:

As usual, not as rapid as I'd like, but work limits the amount of time I have to stitch. Now on to the answers to questions in my inbox:

What stitch are you using for the dark areas in the current band?

I settled on Italian double sided stitch (aka Arrowhead stitch), as shown on page 32 of The Proper Stitch by Darlene O'Steen . (I found my copy years ago when it first came out, at the now long gone Yarn Shop in College Park, Maryland.) However, I'm finding that over 2x2 threads I can't pull it tightly enough to emphasize the holes and make the appearance as mesh-like as I want. There's just not enough room to compact the weave of my ground cloth sufficiently. If I do another piece using this technique, I'll work over 3x3, or find a more loosely woven ground.

This is a squirrelly looking band. Is it original?

It's a redaction of a 16th century artifact in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Accession Number 79.1.59 . It's one of the many patterns that will be in The Second Carolingian Modelbook.

Which end is up?

I haven't decided yet.

Why is the current band so big?

No particular reason. I saw it, charted it out and decided to play test it. Yes, it's at a larger scale than the patterns I've worked so far, but it won't be the largest pattern on the piece, nor will it be the least dense. When it's done this strip will span the entire width of my stitching area. I'll run some other patterns perpendicular to the established direction, framing the part I've already worked. On the other side of this current band will be several more wide bands of various types. They may also be worked horizon to horizon. I'm improvising as I go along.

Have you done any planning at all?

Yes, in a way, but not by orchestrating the entire piece beforehand. Instead I set ground rules. I established stitching bounds and guidelines. I marked the outline and centers of the total stitching area, and added some additional guidelines at 1/4 width and length intervals. I am leaving four threads bare between all stitched units. I'm trying to balance density as I go. I'm working with only one color (good old DMC 310 black), using either one or two strands, depending on the effect I want to achieve. Eventually there will be spots in the ground for which I cannot find or adapt strips or spot motifs of suitable width or height. For those places I intend to use additional fillings from the Blackwork Fillings Collection. And I'm trying to use all-new patterns - stuff I haven't stitched before, with the goal of experimenting with as many of my new book's patterns as possible. So you can think of this as a preview of things to come.

Why aren't you jumbling these up instead of making reproductions? There are tons of beautiful repro samplers out there you can stitch. Why go to all this trouble?

Because stitching someone else's repro isn't something I'm interested in doing. I do admire those pattern drafters and stitchers who chose to do those things, but I find the concept has no appeal for me personally.

I've written about this before. (It's the base stance that makes me a "rogue Laurel" in the SCA.) Exact replication is an extremely high form of craftsmanship to be sure, but it doesn't manifest the highest level of understanding. Just as in a martial art, being able to reproduce the kata - the formal training exercises - shows extreme skill, but it's something else entirely to be able to take the kata's movement vocabulary, and improvise if attacked. Not everyone who can demonstrate kata in the dojo can turn that knowledge into effective fighting. Being able to go beyond kata skills is what differentiates the master from the adept. It's the same for needlework. Reproductions are kata. Making an entirely new piece from the same vocabulary, such that were the new item to be transported back in time it would fit right in - that's mastering true understanding. Now my current piece is NOT something that could be transported back in time that seamlessly. I do not make that claim. It's only a training and teaching exercise. But it is one that's stretching me in new ways - directions I could never achieve by working a stitch for stitch artifact reproduction, or from someone else's chart or kit.

I intend to keep learning, and I invite you to learn with me. Needlework is a very safe subset of life in general. But make it exiting. Face uncertainty and possible failure. Think about taking inspiration from whatever you find, wherever you find it. Go for broke, combine old forms in new ways (or new forms in old ways). Start with a blank cloth and bungee jump with me. The ride can be scary at times, but it's tons of fun.

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As usual, work is blasting my personal time, but I do try to engineer at least a half hour of decompression into my day regardless of the absurd hours I put in on the job. Continuing along with the current strip, you can see that I've finished out the right hand side, and am now at work on the repeats that are left of center:

The strip will extend the same distance on the left past the center area that it does on the right. In answer to questions from the frazzled, who saw that I had blown past my established margin and wondered why - I intend to work some darker strips at 90-degrees to the established ones, to provide some framing left and right of the center. I'm not sure right now which ones I'll pick, but that's part of the fun of bungee-jump stitching.

And I have plenty more room for leaping. The area stitched right now represents about 20% of my total available area. I'm still leaning towards having no text on this one at all other than a tiny sig/date in an inconspicuous spot. But I am looking at some of the larger beastie-bearing repeats and spot motifs. All in black, of course.

Oh - on the blackwork fillings collection - there's someone working a few of its patterns into a project, posting progress on line. Kathy from Unbroken Thread is doing a small but beautifully planned piece, combining blackwork with gold. I'm very impressed at the way it's turning out. Way to go, Kathy!

If anyone else is working from the collection (or any of my other patterns for stitching or knitting), please let me know. It's obvious I'm in this for love, not money; and seeing what the patterns are up to in the wide-wide world makes my day. I'm also delighted to post pix of finished items, with links back to the stitcher's or knitter's home.

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Now that there's more stitched it's probably easier to see the pattern repeat style that I wrote about last week (click on thumbnail below for larger version):

After working with lots of historical graphed strip and border patterns, I can say that the overwhelming majority of the form repeats in three standard ways:

The first one is a straight repeat - no mirroring, and no flipping. It's common for edging components on larger patterns, like the little acorns on the larger strip below (adapted from V&A T.133-1956), and (no surprise) for totally symmetrical pieces like the multicolor one (adapted from a Siebmacher design from a post 1600 edition that's not on line):

The second order repeat is a bounce-mirror. There are two vertical centerpoints and the design bounces back and forth between them, but never inverts. Lots of these feature mythical beasts, people or animals - motifs that have a strong up-down identification. Here are two examples from an earlier Siebmacher collection that's available on line, one with a nifty yale, and one with an abstract heart and flourish.

In the pattern with the yales (heraldic goats) the mirror columns are the center of the flowerpot behind them, and the center of the fountain like object between them. Even this pattern, for all of its complexity is a type 2 - a very wide type 2, with the two mirror columns being the center of the trefoil interlace near the right hand side of the photo, and the center of the heavy stem interlace about a third of the way from the left edge:

The third order repeat can be the most confusing to stitch, but is extremely well represented in historical artifacts. It's an elaboration on the two mirror bounce repeat in the second example, with alternating iterations flipped north/south for good measure. Although these repeats employ that flip, they're actually simpler than type 2s, above.

Why am I calling this one simple? Because there's really only one mirror column: the centermost axis of the flowers. The north facing and south facing flowers are identical. The design may be visually more complex because of the flip, but when stitched there is less variation - less following of unique chart elements - than in a large type 2 pattern.

Here are some more examples of type 3 repeats:

Now to loop around to my current strip, this one is a hybrid:

The entire four leaf grapevine unit repeats as a type 1 - verbatim, with no flipping or mirroring. BUT inside each unit we've got type 3 mirroring/flipping. The mirror column (which the mathematically inclined might call an axis of inversion) runs down the center of the unit, and to make things more complex, is skew, rather than a nice bisecting 90-degree line from top to bottom. This is the same symmetry that my current pattern shows.

Both are rather like sideways Z or S units, with a strong diagonal element down the center (in this case the heavy geometric beads, and for the red grapes, the main stem), with items mirrored and flipped to either side of the axis of inversion. The difference between this and red grape pattern is that the individual units in this one are connected. If I chose to, I could have worked the red grapes with every other unit mirrored (in fact, in the original the pattern is shown with a companion center cluster and the clusters I use repeated on each side of it, but mirrored around the center unit). I don't have that choice in my current strip of black grapes. The repeats are anchored to each other by those stems.

To sum up, there are many ways that repeats are formed in historical patterns, ranging from the simple to the complex. All are legitimate, with sourced examples of employ in historical artifacts (or in my case, pieces stitched from sourced historical designs). Understanding the symmetry helps deconstruct the complexity of the pattern, and (I find) makes working it easier.

So. Why else should we care? Frankly, I haven't a clue unless you're a historical embroidery dilettante like me. I find the way that patterns are used, the way that repeats are made, and the way that symmetry is harnessed for general effect to be endless sources of fascination. But I'm a pattern geek. Your mileage may vary.

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Here's the latest bit -

You can see the three fillings from the blackwork filling collection immediately above this new strip. It's very different in feel from the previous pieces. The proportions are huge. It will span edge to edge (half again as wide as the already-embroidered area, with 25% extra to the right and left of the stitched area. This pattern is one of the ones that will appear in the upcoming book. I've charted it from a 16th century artifact in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

The original is strip worked in red silk on linen, probably a band of edging on domestic goods - a tablecloth, cover, towel, or sheet (the museum has about 31 inches of this pattern - a bit over four full design repeats). The repeat itself is one of the less commonly seen constructs - more of a large sideways "S" than the standard mirror around two centers bounce repeat.

Here's a simple two-centers bounce repeat, with a minor bit of complication in the "bindings" that unite the two sprigs between the acorns:

There's an "up" acorn and a "down" acorn. The design is mirrored to the left and right of each acorn's centermost spine. The directionality of the bindings is a very minor departure from the bounce-repeat symmetry. Here's another, more elaborate example of the same type of simple repeat:

Again, there's a center line down the middle of the main motif flower, and the design is mirrored left and right of it. This one is a little bit more complicated because the "up" and "down" versions of the pattern are different, but it's still a simple two-center bounce repeat:

The pattern I'm working on now has a center, and does feature a limited mirror repeat It's an axis that runs through the bunch of grapes. You can see that I started there, at the not well-defined visual center - it aligns with the center of the pattern immediately above it. I don't have enough stitched yet to show you how this pattern falls out, but if you zip over to the artifact page, you will see that the grapes and flowers section is in fact a mirrored repeat, BUT the bead line columns do not mirror. (You can see I've started one to the right of the trumpet flower). All of the bead-columns in the original slant in the same direction. This method of building a repeat is quite uncommon. Which is one of the reasons why I'm playtesting this particular snippet.

The other reason is the sold black stitching. As discussed, I'm trying to work out the method used to produce the mesh like grids so often used in period voided work. I don't believe that the originals I've been looking at employ a withdrawn thread method to produce the perforated ground, so a pulled thread stitch is most likely. This piece used what looked like the same method, but limited to little accents. I have to say that I do like the look of what I've stitched so far in Italian Two-Sided Cross Stitch (ITSCS), pulled as tightly as possible, but I'm not satisfied that I'm using the same stitch as the artifact. Problems of thread thickness and tensile strength for pulled work aside (I'm using two strands of standard DMC cotton floss on 36 count linen), I can't get enough of a "pull" over my 2x2 thread background to produce the mesh-like ground effect. I'll finish out this strip with ITSCS, but will continue experimenting, seeking that mesh-like look.

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Thanks for the lively discussion! Last week's post was the most commented upon String has ever had. It's nice to know that others meet enjoyable people (and poorly socialized idiots) through stitching and knitting in public. And that many of us think alike during these encounters.

I'm moving along on my projects, both on fabric and paper. Progress has been severely slowed as of late due to work related deadlines and a bout of the Evil Flu that's been going around. But there is some slim progress none the less:

You can see that I finished the eye-boggling interlace, and am now working a relatively tame flower in frame segment. All three are patterns from the blackwork filling collection. I should be finished with this segment by mid-week at the latest.

Next up is a new one though. It's a double running stitch design graphed out from a photo of a period artifact (part of the upcoming book) but I haven't tried it yet. The new panel will feature some small areas that are filled in. In the original they are stitched in the same stitch that is used to make a totally overstitched mesh like background on many other contemporary pieces. This style of stitching is most often seen worked in red, so densely stitched that in the mesh like areas no background linen is seen, and it's most often used as the background on a voided style work, although there are examples of it being used as foreground, and (as in my upcoming trial - a spot accent).

Here's a good example from the Manchester Art Gallery - you can see that some of the foreground detail is filled in using plain old cross stitch, but the background and the solid fill detail areas are clearly different. This style is a pulled thread technique rather than a withdrawn thread one (neither warp or weft threads of the background material was removed during production of the stitching). Needlework authors cite several stitches as the working method to achieve these mesh like backgrounds including

• Italian Two Sided Cross Stitch
• Four Sided Stitch (aka Quadra, Punto Quatro, or Simple Fagot Stitch)
• Russian Drawn Ground (but this is a withdrawn thread rather than pulled thread technique)
• Double Fagot Stitch (sort of Four Sided Stitch on steroids, with each pass taken twice)

The first two are the most commonly cited. My limited experience with those two makes me lean towards the Two Sided Cross Stitch because Four Sided Stitch usually leaves a little dot of background fabric exposed in the center of each bundled stitch unit (here's an example - beautiful and regular, but the centers aren't covered with thread.)

Embarrassing as it is to admit - I've not tried any of these in context. Long Armed Cross Stitch, yes. I use it all the time. But the family of pulled thread stitches has always intimidated me. I've played with them a bit, but aside from an occasional spate of Italian pulled thread hemming, I've never employed them on a "real" work. But there is first time for everything, and I intend to try out the Italian Two Sided Cross Stitch. Stay tuned for more developments!

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Toodling along on my current sampler...

...working on another pattern shared in my blackwork fillings collection, just stitching along. Once the base repeat is established, I find I can copy off my own work, rather than referring to the printed pattern. Sure, this one is on the complex side, but it's a regular repeat and not what I'd consider particularly difficut; and without having to refer to a printed sheet, the project is totally portable. So I brought it with me to my kid's school chorus concert. There's always a long wait between the participants' early drop-off time and the public concert's start. Lots of parents stay rather than going home and returning later. I was not alone.

I'm used to knitting and stitching in public. I've gotten all sorts of comments over the years, ranging from real interest to veiled hostility. The overwhelming majority of people are interesting to talk to, and my project is always a convenient conversational icebreaker.

There are the folks who ask after the item being worked, or volunteer stories of their own about knitting or stitching. They're usually pleasant and I enjoy talking to them. There are invariably people who say things like "Oooh. I could NEVER do that." (What runs through my head is the reply, "With that attitude, I bet you're right" but I rarely voice it.) Depending on how dismissive they are I either smile sweetly and don't reply out loud, or try to explain that it's not anywhere near as difficult as it looks.

There are kids who are fascinated by what I'm doing. Knitting socks especially seems to boggle them. I have fun with them, explaining he project and chatting about the craft in general.

Unfortunately, not everyone is pleasant. Some people say that they hate wasting time. I usually point out that at this very moment (mid commute, in the doctor's office - whatever) I appear to be far more productive than they are. A couple of decades ago there were more derisive and ideological comments. Mostly from women, who were eager to point out that domestic tasks like knitting and stitching were ineherently demeaning, and should be shunned, especially in public. I would usually engage with them, responding that "freedom from" also means "freedom to," that I had a highly technical career thank you, and that I found relaxation in traditional crafts. We usually parted on less divisive philosophical grounds.

But this week, just sitting there stitching, I found a whole new public comment beast. The ones who decide that anyone doing something alien to the commenter is clearly nuts, deranged, crazy, a lunatic, or otherwise mentally abberant; and should be pointed out to everyone else. It also seems that these folk (aside from their insenstivity towards the differently abled) delight in being loud and obnoxious. Maybe it was the ambience of the high school in which the performance was taking place, but I felt like I'd fallen back among locker room bullies again.

What did I do? First of all, I didn't move my seat. I'd come early and sat underneath one of the few lights bright enough for stitching. When it became clear that glaring and not responding wasn't working, I asked the commenters to kindly be quiet, that they were disrupting the people around us - in my best Miss Manners icy-haute tone. "Bitchy, too" was the reply, and they went away. Like vultures everywhere they probably flew off to circle over someone else's carcass.

I won't stop stitching and knitting in public. Idiots are everywhere, and I refuse to let them win.

Have your own stitching/knitting in public story? Positive or negative, feel free to share.

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All in all a hectic week, even for one with a snow day smack in the middle. Work deadlines aside (constant drumbeat that they are), our domestic plant experienced a bit more chaos than usual, with major appliances deciding in concert to abandon their prime functions. But we've now beaten back the forces of entropy and now can wash clothes on the premises again.

That being said, work does progress on the book collection. I now have about 27 plates (roughly 60 individual patterns) substantially drafted or in progress, along with a good start on the documentation that accompanies them. Also a start on the bibliography. My notes are far from exhausted, and there are lots more pages to go.

I also continue to playtest some of them. Here's one I couldn't resist. It's from Plate 25 of my blackwork fillings collection. Work continues on that final PDF, too.

Even though this design is original and not sourced to a specific historical artifact, I think it would make a smashing all-over design for a coif or sweet bag. Especially if the little diamonds that surround the quatrefoil pomegranates were replaced by spangles. You can see the full effect in this larger rendition. The pattern collection's thumbnail made it hard to see the whole design's geometry.

Finally, in a new development, I've decided to give the blackwork fillings collection a name. I named my first book after the SCA group here in Boston, a group especially blessed with artists, artisans, researchers and folk who just plain enjoy hands-on exploration of the arts and sciences. The Barony of Carolingia is and ever will be my SCA "home." But I did spend some time down in the Washington D.C. region, and promised my House Oldcastle friends down there that someday I'd write "Ensamplio Atlantaea" - a pattern collection named after Atlantia. the kingdom that includes the D.C. area. So the blackwork filling collection will come out under that name (provided it passes muster with my language maven pals).

And in the interests of continuity, the new book will be entitled "A Second Carolingian Modelbook." That should make it easier to find for folk who found the first one to be useful.

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I've been working on the book, so my spare time is eaten long before I get around to posting here. There are now roughly 24 plate pages in process, either partially or fully complete and I'm working on the annotations.

In other progress news, I'm most of the way through this band:

Me-Zoe-You asked about the scale of the work, so included a penny and a standard foot long ruler. I'm working on a relatively coarse 36 count linen, at about 18 stitches per inch. The voided flowers in the current strip are slightly smaller than the penny. You can see that the four strips are each about a foot wide. This is going to be a BIG piece!

The cloth is quite a bit larger than the part shown - with enough room for four six-inch zones side by side. This pattern grouping occupies the centermost two. I'm not sure which pattern to do next. I'm also not sure if I'll work the rest of the thing all in parallel, or if I'll run some bands perpendicular to these. A couple of the patterns I've been playing with are so large that they'll need two or perhaps all three sections to show their repeats.

Plus with symmetrical bands and no words on this one yet, there's nothing so far that says which end is up. I still haven't found a motto I want to enshrine in this piece. It may end up being mute. Suggestions are most welcome - especially secular, non-political, slightly geeky (yet pithy) sentiments that are not the sort of thing one would expect to see embroidered.

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Another band on my new blackwork sampler. This one is graphed from an artifact.

This one is graphed from an artifact. I'm using the same background fill and edging as the original, and I haven't corrected the proportions. If I were to do so, the branch's straight run at the top of the flower would have been worked one unit shorter, reducing the leggy leap from flower to descending sprout like thing. This one is in the new collection, with full source annotation.

To answer Anna from the Netherlands - I can't say exactly when the book will be out. I will be self-publishing it through one of the various print-on-demand services. I wish I could work on it full time, but little things like earning a living have gotten in the way. I have about an hour each evening to research, graph, transcribe, write, and do lay-out. So I suspect that a final product won't be ready before a year is out. Sorry to disappoint. You will however get to see a few of the patterns in it as I play test them on this sampler and post my progress. I won't be able to do them all (there are lots) but you'll see a few of my faves.

In terms of change in the pix and presentation here - I've upgraded blogging software and the camera. The new one is much higher resolution than the old, and I'm still figuring out how to work with it efficiently, and how to keep that odd moire like effect from obfuscating the weave of my ground cloth.

Finally, just for fun, here's another snow shot from this week's storm:

This isn't the plow berm at the end of the driveway. It's what happens when (at least) 22 inches of snow drifts. Smaller Daughter (about 5'4" - 1.6m) shows off just one end of our excavation project. However Massachusetts doesn't reel long from these things. School is back in session and everything's narrower, but back to normal.

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Tooling along on my new sampler, on the TNCM sequel and on the PDF version of the blackwork fillings booklet I've been publishing page by page here on String. Here's my sampler progress:

Up to the next strip - another opportunity to try out a pattern destined for the new book. On the book, I've got about 14 pages (about 43 individual patterns) drafted out in whole or in part now and am working on finishing them and on the source attributions and annotations. I'm going to mark all patterns against this scale of authenticity:

• Republication, source unknown - Material republished from earlier works of the author, exact source unknown.
• Original, new - Original by author, no period source or inspiration.
• Original, inspired - Original by author, inspired by period aesthetic. No one single source can be identified.
• Original, attributed - Original by author, inspired by identifiable historical source(s)
• Transcription, adapted - Identifiable period source, transcribed by author with some modifications. Modifications identified.
• Transcription, verbatim - Identifiable period source, transcribed verbatim by author to the best of her ability

The majority will be of the last two categories, with a smattering of new works, mostly to eke out partial pages.

I'm not sure right now how long this book will be. The last one was 75 plates, with an equal number of source pages, plus indices and working notes. The new book will have the source pages, plus some indices, but will be lighter on the other material. Still, if it ends up being 50 plates long, that will mean a finished book of approximately 130 pages, once indices and bibliographies are added on. That's a lot of patterns, and a lot more transcribing from my notes, plus drafting and annotating for me before it's ready.

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I always try to finish off something from my in-progress basket on New Years Day. This year it was my Don't Panic sampler:

Not the best framing job, but for hanging in my office cube - it will suffice.

For those of you who wondered what became of me after posting the last page of my blackwork filling collection, I was a victim of the holidays, several uanticipated work emergencies, and a major computer hardware upgrade (and the attendant re-install/restore of my world).

I am working on organizing the 25 plates of blackwork patterns into a presentable document for download, including working up a cover and an introductry essay. I'm also working on the sequel to TNCM. I've got a start on the first 8 plates of that, plus annodations. The computer upgrade has delayed both of those projects, but they are progressing.

And in my copious free time (not), I've begun stitching more of the patterns that will be appearing in the new book:

I don't know if this sampler will include words or not. Probably not, unless inspiration leaps upon me in a dark alley.

And for those of you who wondered about what usually goes on here over the holidays, most of the normal things happened: 10 kinds of cookies (plus Ms. Jean's fudge); panforte; extravagant home-cooked dinners, a thoroughly enjoyable Christmas Day dinner at long-time pal Tom's, and the like. Now it's all over except for a vanishingly small amount of leftovers, and a house to put back in order for the long slog through the new year.

If anyone is stitching from the fillings collection, I'd love to hear about it.

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