Who dares to rush into a Pebble Adventure?

[Marjolein Mieras]

 

Do you recognize this?

 

 

It is a free project from "Stitch" from some years ago, you can find it here: http://www.embroiderersguild.com/stitch/projects/encrustingcalico/i...

We, Deb and Marjolein, have admired that project ever since. Now we have decided to rush into this "Pebble Adventure".

Does anyone want to join us? We can share pictures and experiences here or provide links to blogs or flickr.

[Marjolein Mieras]

I found it  fascinating to deal with the wrinkles. You can shape them as you want and use them as a part of your landscape.

 

[Marjolein Mieras]

Meg, do you have more detail pictures? I know, there are three already ;)

[Meg Mackenzie]

Marjolein, I took a bunch of detailed pictures so that I could relive the fun of it if the work sold at the exhibition I put it in recently. Would you like me to post them here as references?

[Marjolein Mieras]

Please post them here ;)

[Mosaic Magpie]

Just when I thought I had seen everything a pebble could be.......

Meg the stitch variety and thought that has gone into creating this

is amazing.  You have captured the look you were going for, perfectly.

These closer photos show how well your stitches were formed, nice work.

I am like Marjolein, I want to make another pebble!

Deb

 
Meg Mackenzie said:

Thank you, Marjolein. I'll contact her.

Yes, they are Ghiordes knots using a mixture of hand dyed threads and metallic blending filiment. It makes them terrifically fluffy. Here's a better picture.

[Mosaic Magpie]

Meg,

I have a few questions please.

When you began this project did you plan for it to be this large or did it grow as you worked on it?

How did you go about entrapping this many objects? 

Did you hoop the both layers of fabric with the object in between as you attached it in place or did you stitch them down and then add the top layer to begin embellishing?

Thanks,

Deb

[Meg Mackenzie]

Hi Mosaic Magpie, thanks for your comments and questions. I planned for it to be this large. I got a piece of butcher's paper and sketched a quick pool shape and said to my husband: "Please cut me a piece of MDF in this shape." He used the Butcher's paper sketch as a template so I got just what I wanted.

I dyed the calicoin a tie-dye style so I got the look of light on the bottom of a pond, and I dyed some threads at the same time.

I drew a few lumps on the paper to get an idea of where I wanted the trapped objects, then I just went for it. I didn't hoop it. It simply would not have worked. I couldn't work around a hoop, because some of the objects were so close together. I trapped the objects in between the layers, adding a few small stitches as I went to hold the layers together, then I laid the project flat on the board and arranged the gathers like rivulets in the sandy bottom, stitching them here and there to keep them in place. So long as you keep the bottom piece of fabric flat, you can entrap anything. Although I did wrap the washer and curtain ring in plastic wrap first so that they wouldn't rust and ruin the fabric.

I used a spray glue to glue a layer of polyester batting to the backing board to provide a bit of padding.

Then it was read to take on holiday with me to stitch in the details.

[Judy]

Hello Meg. Your RockPool is incredibly beautiful and all your creative stitches are perfect.  You did the most fantastic job of creating it.   Glad you found the Pebble Adventure group.  Hugs Judy

Meg Mackenzie said:

Hello all, I am quite new to Stitchin fingers, but one of the lovely members has directed me toward this challenge and suggested that I share my work here. I am loving all of the encrusted pebbles that you have made. They are all so unique and beautiful. What a great voyage of discovery!

Here's my take on the Jennifer Rochester project that inspired this challenge: I decided to make a whole rockpool for a competition held at my guild:

There are some more detailed pics in my photo gallery. I really enjoyed making this!

[Meg Mackenzie]

I'll post the detailed pics tomorrow - well, today really - it's half past midnight here already. Where does time go?

[Mosaic Magpie]

Meg,

Thank you for answering my questions, it is interesting to hear how everybody uses a different technique to entrap items.  What I find very interesting in you finding a husband that will take a pattern, cut it from MDF and you get exactly what you want!!!  LOL, it is great to have supportive husbands, that won't look at you strange when you ask to have a pebble cut from MDF. Really when you think about it they could write a humorous book, "You Want To Make What? And You Want Me To Help?" subtitled "My Life With A Crafty Wife". 

Go get some rest and we will all be waiting to see more detailed photos!

Deb

[Susan Cuss]

Wow! Meg, this is a fantastic piece! I haven't heard of Ghiordes knots, but I love how they look. Wonderful stitching and design! 

[Meg Mackenzie]

Thank you for the lovely comments all. Some of the questions have made me think a lot more about the process than I did when making this, as I visualised what I wanted and "just did it". 

Deb, I love the idea of the husband book. Yes, I ask for the darndest things as well, and Andrew always makes them for me, bless his cotton socks! I asked for little house shapes from timber last year. He asked how many I would like, and I said that 12 would be nice and that anything more was a bonus. He came in a while later and said he'd finished. He had made 82 little houses! Now that's a handy man!

Here are some additional detailed images as requested.