Thanks Jude !

Today I finished stitching on my big piece

"Sun and Moons"

103 x 49 cm

(40.5" x 19.3")

The SUN and thirteen MOONS

(and a soft blue velvet earth)

(still need to fasten the sleeve

for the aluminum strip to hang it on the wall)

The face of the sun

(with lots of sun spots)

Sun and six moons

One (grumpy) lunar moth and three more moons

A blue velvet (Jude) earth and yawning moon

(a silk, and a "magic" Jude-feather)

And finally Mrs and Mr Moon.

again : up close

"us",  soft velvet !

(with aurora borealis)

It's hard to believe now, that I started in June 2013

NO ... I really didn't work on it all this time :

it was lying dormant for quite some time !

An on-line class "sun, moon, stars" of Jude Hill

was the starting point of it all

Jude is a great textile artist

(though she doesn't call herself that)

and my all-time favorite teacher,

who, unintentionally,

gathered a worldwide stitching community around her

of people who have come to love "slow stitch"

This was the humble beginning !!!

On a background of some hand dyed open-weave cotton

came that sun and dark indigo strips of Jude on the edges.

The "double woven" piece the border strips from,

came to me through Eva

(who didn't quite know what to do with it ...)

I unpicked the it, after talking to Jude of course,

and used it as the border for this piece.

Other "in between" layers were used too.

Also little pieces of thin eco-dyed silk of Heike

There were woven strips of my own fabrics too,

pieces that are dear to me.

Slowly slowly the concept and the piece grew ...

(click on "sun and moons" in the sidebar for the history)

After the first year it was mostly "a holidays piece"

(hmmm will have to find something for next year   ;-) ...)

A LOT of time went into the stitching (kantha) of the background

so the piece is now strong and has a lovely stitched feel everywhere !

We will enjoy it many more years

on the wall.