2010 in review

Excellent, WordPress. Thanks!

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 6,400 times in 2010. That’s about 15 full 747s.

 

In 2010, there were 7 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 43 posts. There were 4 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 1mb.

The busiest day of the year was June 16th with 88 views. The most popular post that day was Recently Commissioned Merit Badges.

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were maryyaeger.com, housewife.splinder.com, pintangle.com, iheartguts.wordpress.com, and animary.wordpress.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for crewel embroidery, merit badges, crewel, bead art, and merit badge.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

Recently Commissioned Merit Badges September 2007
5 comments

2

Merit Badges at Gallery Hanahou January 2009
13 comments

3

Denise Perreault’s Fabulous Glass Tile Curtain May 2007
3 comments

4

Designs for Life: Uniting a Community Through Textile Art and Bioscience May 2007
3 comments

5

Before Breakfast: A Merit Badge Inspired by Lynda Barry May 2009

Roanna Wells at Waterperry Gardens additional info

Roanna’s site, with photos (did we neglect to describe this elegant, minimalist, calligraphic and atmospheric work?)
Don’t ask me how it’s possible to be all of the above, just take a look:
http://www.roannawells.co.uk/roannawells.co.uk/solid%20air.html
At Waterperry:
http://www.artinaction.org.uk/event_demonstrator-details.asp?ref=13&artref=489

P1020020

P1020020

Originally uploaded by Karnataka10

Rosanna Wells

Bevis Bawa’ garden in Sri Lanka

P1020011

Originally uploaded by Karnataka10

this piece is made from two lengths of linen/cotton mix fabric coated with an emulsion capable of taking ink jet inks, cobbled together with indigo dyed paper string in bold over stitches and then embroidered with raffia, silk and rayon yarn. The photographs were taken in Bevis Bawa’s garden on the west coast of Sri Lanka. He was a brilliant garden designer, and brother of the architect Jeffrey Bawa.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Embroidery Show at Gallery Hanahou

The Forget Me-Not embroidery show at Gallery Hanahou in SOHO opens Feb. 6.

Beadwitched Earrings at Quilt Visions Art Quilt Gallery

Beadwitched Earrings

My witch earrings and pendants can be purchased at Quilt Visions Art Quilt Gallery in San Diego. For information enquire at visions@quiltvisions.org or 619-546-4872. If you incline toward the tactile, you’ll enjoy viewing their web site. Be sure to visit on your next trip to San Diego.

My fairy jewelry-making kits are also available in the Gallery Shop. They come in three styles: original pastel, woodland colors and a slightly larger fairy with vintage repro flower and leaf beads.

Pictured: larger fairies (kit makes 9)

If you’re interested in making your own witches, see this post.

Medieval Embroidery Research

I’ve been in a research frenzy the past few weeks, following my interest in medieval embroidery via the books I picked up in England last year, public libraries and the web.

I’ve just about finished my crewel piece, The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. It’s a little too large for my scanner bed and I haven’t gotten it photographed yet. I also haven’t decided if the related medallions will be attached separately or stitched onto and overlapping the main panel.

I’ve discovered a number of great resources that I will pass on. I will be creating “static” web pages so that the resources will be easier to track for those doing parallel work.

Whew! and welcome to Stabbed!

Whew! trying to set up a second blog turned out to be way hairier than I thought, but thanks WordPress, it looks like you’ve ironed out any previous problems. I’m still a little freaked by the time it took to try to get a header working on typepad, so for now, Stabbed! will have only a template design. I would like to become loyal to one blog provider, so I hope WP that will be you.

Welcome to my blog for embroiderers. The work discussed here will not be counted cross, and probably not needlepoint either, unless you create your own designs. I think it’s a terrible thing to start out a new enterprise excluding people, but there is just soooo much published about counted cross, so let’s just get that out of the way right now.

Right now I’m working on a large crewel embroidery. I’m fairly new to crewel, having spent the last ten years embroidering with cotton floss, and mostly images no larger than three inches. This is an exciting new endeavor for me, and I’d love to chat about it. In the US crewel has been out of vogue since the 70s. I got interested in it because one thing led to another:

I was researching medieval textiles and stumpwork for a new embroidery. As I moved towards the Elizabethan era I started remembering and wondering, “what happened to crewel?” The New Crewel by Katherine Shaughnessy caught my eye and although it’s a terrific book I wanted to go back and find Erica Wilson and older work, because I was looking for a medieval-feeling for the piece. I’ve been in love with a certain art style for years now. It is:

· Located in 14th to 15th century;

· primarily illuminated manuscripts;

· includes what is called the “International Style”;

· characterized by bright pigments;

· highly narrative;

· full of symbolism but portrays everyday activities in a naturalistic way

· miniature in scale and illustrates the text it accompanies

· really the first graphic novels

· includes artists like Van Eyck, Durer and the Limbourg Brothers

As you can see, I could go on and on about this period.

I didn’t want the sheen of floss and like the texture and color of Appleton crewel wool, even if the range is somewhat limited. So here I am. More soon.