Good morning! It’s an exciting launch day here at Needle ‘n Thread! I love it when we can finally release a kit!
Autumn Fire is the third Stitch Snippet project for this year, and it is truly more snippet-ish than the Bee-Jeweled Pincushion and Cotton Quartet.
Autumn Fire is a small project. The embroidered autumn tree is just over two inches tall, and it fits in a custom-cut arched mat (supplied with the kit) for a 4″ square frame.
Here’s a little more information about the project and the materials kit, which you will find available here.
As we work through Autumn Fire together here on Needle ‘n Thread over the next few weeks, we will learn how to control and manipulate solid colors to achieve gradual color changes (just like autumn trees!), using silk and cotton threads.
We will be stitching on linen, but it’s not a typical needlework linen. It’s a linen made for the clothing industry, yet it is still perfectly usable for hand embroidery. If you’ve worked the previous Snippets with my materials kits, you’ll see that there’s a definite difference in linen types that are made for the various industries.
We’ll be transferring the design by tracing it or by free-hand drawing it, depending on what you are comfortable with. (Don’t worry! You’ll be supplied with a design to trace!) We’ll talk about how to trace a design and how to free-hand it at the same time, making unique adjustments. And we’ll talk about the advantages and disadvantages of different types of transfer methods and approaches. These are topics you’ll want to know about, if you plan to stitch your own drawings or designs. In the materials kit, I supply the pen I like to use when tracing designs for this type of project.
Finally, after embroidering a beautiful fall tree using only a few simple stitches, you’ll learn how to block and damp stretch your finished work and then lace it to a mounting board for framing. Once you can confidently do this, you can frame your own needlework at home, using found or thrifted frames, saving you a bundle on custom framing.
When, Where, How
Once you have your materials kit, you can follow along with Autumn Fire as the project unfolds here on Needle ‘n Thread. I’ll share all the how-to information, plus stitching tips and troubleshooting. It’ll be like watching one of my regular projects unfold here on the website, only you’ll be able to stitch along with me! You can use the comments sections on the blog to ask questions and interact with other stitchers following along.
If you’re a member of the Needle ‘n Thread Community on Patreon, you’ll receive each installment of the project as a PDF download, which makes it easy to print or to save for later.
I’ll post the first lesson on Autumn Fire next week. Follow along at your own pace! It’s not a huge project and it won’t take too long to work, but if life gets in the way, that’s ok – you can come back and catch up. The blog posts will show up here on the website on about a weekly basis (maybe more frequently), over the course of three to four weeks, depending on what is happening in the studio. (We’re prepping for a big move at the moment, so there could be some interruptions.)
Other Goodies!
With this launch of the Autumn Fire materials kit, I’m adding quite a few more goodies to my shop. The needle threaders and scissors we talked about the other day are available. Floche packs, linen fabric sample packs, hoops with twill tape, and three new volumes from the works of Giuliana Buonpadre are available.
For Autumn Fire, the 4″ hoops that I’ve added to the shop are the perfect size for working this project.
The 3″ hoops make great smaller hoops for finishing ornaments and the like as “hoop art,” and Autumn Fire will fit perfectly in a 3″ hoop if you want to finish it with a hoop. The 3″ hoops are also wonderful additional hoops to have on hand for test stitching, or when working stumpwork projects. I like to use small 3″ hoops for stumpwork wings and petals that are worked separately from the main embroidery project.
If you have difficulty threading needles, the beautiful collection of needle threaders will come in handy! With Autumn Fire, we will be working with a #10 needle and a #8 needle. I use the micro threader to thread single strands of floss into #10 needles.
You can find all of these products listed here in my shop – along with whatever other goodies are in stock. Feel free to browse! If anything you want is sold out, drop me a line and I’ll add you to an advanced notice list.
So, that’s today’s exciting launch! We’ll be pretty busy in the studio over the next three days getting these treats mailed out to you, and then next week, we start a new project together! Yay! I can’t wait!
