Beading

Got the goodies package from Mary Alice - yay! She sent me 2 packs of blue beads; the small and the large ones. I debated about using the small beads for the petals, for a more refined look, but decided on the bigger beads instead. I'm in the middle of doing the outer petals, using the para technique with a large pale blue bead and a small medium blue bead. I will finish this up before going back to Japanese embroidery.

Progress with the kikko's so far...

Kikko

Back to Antique Mirrors. I'm improving on the kikko's. The pencil marks certainly helped. Here's the blue kikko - I was attempting to use the diagonal holding to better define the shape. Not a great success, but compared to previous attempts, much improved. I may re-stitch it later.

Then I realize that where the padding cotton does not form a right angle with the top twisted thread - due to the way I stitch the padding cotton - that it requires more padding. So where the angle is shallow, I added 2 more strands of padding cotton. The bottom half done brown kikko is the latest - and the best. I'll see how it looks once I've completed it with the lighter brown color. I also tried to make a better corner by exaggerating the point.

I'm thinking of staying with this piece instead of switching to Goldfish next week, which I had initially planned. I had framed up the Goldfish already. The fabric is a really pretty watery patterned silk.

Japanese beading

Mary Alice taught a Beginning Japanese Beading class that was quite fun. The project is a rose brooch. It is much easier than Antique Mirrors, I will have to make a conscious effort not to neglect Antique Mirrors while working on the beading. Discipline, discipline!

Mary Alice agreed with me that the kikko was badly done, so here's the revision. I made a thinner twisted thread, and used a T-square to line up the weft. It looks better now.

I got two more pieces - one is Midori Matsushima's goldfish, taught at Blue Bonnet Studio a few years ago:

Mary Alice talked me into doing Phase 8 - Fuzzy Effect, with this piece Ducks on rocks (Is that a drink?!) I think I'm set for life.

Kikko

The kikko's did slightly better today. I'm using the ruler to line up the stitches along the weft line; and still had to put in some "sneaky" stitches when stitching the kikko corners. I also maintained tension on the twisted thread while pulling from the top and pushing from the bottom. This allows the twist to remain more constant.

I am going to wait for Mary Alice's suggestions instead of making things up by myself.

Antique Mirror

I'm back to doing the Japanese embroidery piece - as Mary Alice is coming this weekend for a class. The chrysanthemums are done, the later ones look better than the earlier ones (the brown ones on the right side are the earliest ones)

The kikko on the other hand, was bad. According to the Susan Stevens book, she suggested using cardboard underneath to help define the edge, and flat silk in preference to twisted silk. According to the box chart, the kikko's should be padded with 8 strands of cotton, then stitched with twisted silk. After trying several variations and gotten to the point where I cannot re-stitch anymore without ruining it, I'm finally using an acid-free watercolor paper stock, then 4 strands of cotton padding on top, then twisted silk.

The first kikko was really badly stitched - although thankfully it doesn't look as bad as it really is; the twisted silk covers up a multitude of sins.

Hopefully after seeing everybody else's work in the upcoming JE class, I'll be inspired to do better and be less sloppy!