Happy Monday! Or should I say, Joyful Monday?

Because today, I’m going to show you a delightful little embroidery book for folks especially interested in folk-style embroidery on wool.

The book is full of bright, cheery color, fun stitches, instruction, and happy projects to stitch!

The book is called Joyful Stitching, and it’s by Laura Wasilowski, of Artfabrik. We’ll take a look at the book up close, and I’ll give you pros, cons, and resources! Come along…

It is joyful, isn’t it? The cover alone makes me happy!

Joyful Stitching offers a bright and colorful, simple approach to embroidery combined with wool felt and appliqué.

It’s a relatively short book (64 pages), published by C&T Publishing.

The book covers 21 embroidery stitches and six projects to create from beginning to end. There are some tips on finishing as well, and some instruction on appliqué.

As all good embroidery technique and project books do, Joyful Stitching starts with some basic information on fabrics (wool felt in particular), threads (Laura produces her own line of overdyed threads available on her website, but any cottons will work!), tools, and other supplies.

Throughout this section, the author includes tips on organizing threads and materials, along with other good information on getting started.

There’s a good section on transferring embroidery designs to fabric, and specifically to wool felt, which can be a tricky business. After all, you can’t really trace with wool felt!

Laura offers a few good options for transferring – which, incidentally, can easily be translated into transferring on other difficult fabrics (like dark fabrics or very heavy fabrics).

The stitch instructions in the book are presented in step-by-step photos.

Besides the clear instructional steps, these pages jump out in vivid color, too!

The projects in the book are simple in form, but a perfect little ground for practicing stitches.

Each project begins with a materials list. We get to see the full finished project, plus plenty of closeups, throughout the instruction.

Laura leads the reader step-by-step through stitching the project, with explanations and tips along the way.

The projects in the book consist of the colorful apple you see above, this exuberant heart, a hand, a little house landscape, a folk art garden or bouquet, and, of course, the chipper bird and worm on the cover.

In form, the designs are very simple. It’s the interpretation in different stitches and colors that bring the simple designs dramatically to life!

The Folk Art Garden project is where you’ll get a real sense of appliquéing with wool felt, and there are good tips to help you along the way and to put into practice on your own designs.

At the end of the book, there’s a simple presentation on finishing ideas – though there are other finishing tips within the projects themselves.

And, finally, you’ll find the line drawings for the projects in the book.

In a Nutshell

A really fun book! If you love wool felt, appliqué, a folksy look, embroidery, texture, and color, Laura’s projects will be right up your stitching alley!

Pros

Lovely presentation in color, good instruction, fun projects, very accessible to beginners and terrific even for advanced embroiderers who want to simplify and rev things up with a lot of color!

Cons

Not many! The book is a little short, as far as some project books go, but it is reasonably priced and it does what it promises to do – it presents you with some vibrant, happy embroidery projects and takes you step by step through them.

Resources and Where to Find It

Joyful Stitching is available through the following book affiliates:

In the US, you’ll find Joyful Stitching listed here on my Needle ‘n Thread Recommendations page on Amazon.

Worldwide with free shipping, Joyful Stitching is available here through Book Depository.

If you’re looking for hand-dyed threads and fabrics perfect for the projects in Joyful Stitching, you’ll find a nice variety available through Laura’s online shop at Artfabrik.

Looking for more Needlework Book Reviews?

You can find a whole list of books I’ve reviewed here on Needle ‘n Thread on my Books page! Granted, I need to update the list, but if you’ve not browsed it before, perhaps you’ll find books that you’ve been curious about and would like to know what’s inside them!

Hope you have a joyful week! And speaking of joyful, on Wednesday, I’ve got a really beautiful free pattern coming up for you! See you then!