1 Year of Stitches / Embroidery

Studio Check-In: “1 Year of Stitches” Progress and New Colorful Cat Embroideries

Cat embroidery

Last year was a hec­tic (but good) year for me. One thing I missed, how­ev­er, was my own “stu­dio” work. I pledged (to myself) that I’d turn it around for 2019. And I’m doing it; I start­ed anoth­er 1 Year of Stitch­es project and opened up an Etsy shop. In efforts to keep myself hon­est, I want to use the begin­ning of each month here as a stu­dio check-in to share my fin­ished pieces and work in progress. (I post a lot of these things on my embroi­dery-only Insta­gram account, @brwnpaperbag_stitch. I’d love it if you’d fol­low me there!)

1 Year of Stitches

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 1, 2019

I decid­ed on a theme for this year which will dic­tate the imagery fea­tured in the hoop: plants, cats, and inter­est­ing objects. This month, I start­ed by stitch­ing philo­den­dron leaves and even­tu­al­ly moved to a cat to cro­tons to a Stafford­shire dog stat­ue.  I also used the dog as an anchor for plan­ning the bot­tom of the hoop—I’m going for dense stitch­ing at the bot­tom. Near the top, where the philo­den­drons sit, I’m plan­ning for it to be visu­al­ly lighter. Of what? Who knows.

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 8, 2019

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 16, 2019

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 19, 2019

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 23, 2019

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Jan­u­ary 30, 2019

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

Feb­ru­ary 2, 2019

 

Original plant and cat embroidery

Cat embroidery

Since the last time I shared my hand embroi­dery, I have fin­ished a cou­ple of one-of-a-kind pieces. One is ded­i­cat­ed to cats that love cac­ti, and the oth­er is about felines who are feel­in’ the fid­dle leaf fig. The lat­ter is inspired by my cat Sadie, who once tried to scale my fid­dle leaf tree. (She failed, but a good effort I sup­pose.) These are both avail­able on Etsy.

Cat embroidery

Cat embroidery

I’m also work­ing on anoth­er cat sur­round­ed by calathea leaves. It should be fin­ished by my next check-in!

Cat embroidery in progress

Plant and cat embroidery

Plant and cat embroidery

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project

1 Year of Stitches hand embroidery project