Blackwork & A Dark Mark

Boy, that title sounds rather grim, no? Lol, I crack me up sometimes. Nothing like a good play on words. But this post isn't dark, I promise.

Remember a while back when I mentioned a trip to the Renaissance Faire for Mom's birthday? Yes, yes. Good times all around. This year I decided to take some embroidery along for the day. I didn't want to take just any project though (I was working on the Halloween Pin Up Girl at the time), I wanted to take something that would be accurate to the time period in case the queen happened to peek over my shoulder... as if!

I've wanted to try blackwork for some time, it's gorgeous, and nobody does it better than the always inspiring, Beefranck, and this was the perfect opportunity. I found a simple pattern online, got it on the hoop and packed up a small embroidery kit to take along. I worked on my little piece through out the day. I thoroughly enjoyed stitching in one of my favorite atmospheres whilst laughing with mom (hello, Taming Of The Shrew), and knocking back a good strong cider. Huzzah!

Mom did catch a few snapshots of me stitching at the faire, but after viewing them on the computer screen, which is a whole lot bigger & clearer than the screen on my camera... I vetoed them. Too much boobage, ahem... cleavage, ahem...decolletage. Hey, those corsets are tight! So, sorry -- no pictures from that day. But I can share the outcome of my first experiment with blackwork!

Not too shabby! I love the simple, yet striking graphics of this type of embroidery.

At another Ren Faire, a few weeks later, I met a woman who was working on her own piece, it was also blackwork. She referred me to a couple of books to get me started, and I wasted no time seeking them out on Amazon. Lookie~lookie!

I'm really looking forward to digging into these books, I think I will after the Christmas making/stitching/sewing rush is over. Now... I just have to learn that double running stitch so this stuff looks good from both sides.

And in other news...

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows!!!

Have you seen it already?

Whad'ya think? Whad'ya think??

I loved it, major big time!! I got to tag along with Jill and her friend last weekend when they surprised me and popped in to a craft fair I was working at. Yay, suprise visits!!

You guys know that I'm a completely unabashed Harry Potter fan, right? Jill is too, thank goodness (She named her dog Hagrid, isn't that great?!?) but I think I might have scared her friend. My Potter love/knowledge/obsession runs deep. It may be too much for some people... I get that.

Hello, my name is Lisa and I'm a Potter-head. Hehe, there ought to be a 12 step program.

Anyway... my niece Alex is a Potter-head too, and in my attempt to hand-make all my Christmas gifts again this year, she is getting what will hopefully be, some pretty awesome Potter related stitchery! Since she doesn't read this blog, I can share a peek at what I'm making for her.

(sorry for the poor picture quality, these all came from my phone...)

For those of you who don't know, this is a Dark Mark, you can read more here if you're so inclined. Basically, it's a sign of the baddies in the books/films. Alex doesn't necessarily like the baddies, but she's in the US Army, so I'm not exactly going to stitch her up some cute little Pygmy Puffs to hang on her wall. She'd get laughed out of the barracks. This is much more suited to life in the armed forces, wouldn't you say? Hooah!

I love this pattern, I bought it from Kristy Kizzee's Etsy store, Bombastitch. I've only been able to work on this about three times for a couple hours each (I'm slow and not very good at counted cross stitch, in fact it makes me cross eyed and a little insane, so I have to stitch this in small doses). I've missed a few stitches already, but I don't think it'll be too noticeable overall. The cool part about this piece, which doesn't stand out just yet, is that the floss I'm using to stitch the Dark Mark is glow-in-the-dark!! I can't wait to see it finished & glowing in its frame! Alex is going to bug out! I'm going to bug out and not going to want to give this away... I do that a lot.

Ok, well before you bug out, I better wrap this post up, it's getting a little long in the tooth. I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving weekend! Tomorrow it's back to work! Boo!

 oxo,

Lisa

p.s. There's still a week left until the Fabulous Mystery Giveaway! Don't forget to pop over and leave a comment on this post for a chance to win some really coooool stuff!