Friday 30 April 2010

Flowers Up-date IV and thimble related mumblings

Here is the last of this year's peonies. It has been unusually chilly this year, we are still wearing woolen jackets and it's rather unusual for soon-to-be-May. However, we were able to enjoy the flowers longer.

This is my second latest thimble. It has been quite sometime since I last finished the thimble. I have been making a lot of base rings both for thimbles and pin cushions, but they are all for my shop and therefore have to be unfinished. I do not dislike making base rings so making them is not a core for me, but every time I got the fun part, i.e. stitching, I had to stop and it's not very enjoyable after awhile. It was good that I actually finished one for myself.

When I firstly explain how I make my thimble bases long time ago I believe I said that any slippery fabric, such as fancy shiny lining was not suitable because my thimbles were working tools and thimbles with slippery lining would not stay put on the finger. Well, I should have known better but when I stopped by at the craft shop the other day I found very beautiful and shiny satin bias bindings on a shelf. I walked past the shelf eyeing the tapes but had to come back and brought three packets in dusky pink, dark violet, and dark olive to the check out counter. They are cupro, very shiny and very pretty. I told myself that I had enough thimbles, so much so I could sell, so I could make purely decorative ones, too, just so I could admire them. Why not, indeed. Since I haven't proudly posted the finished one, you can safely suppose it didn't turn out favorable. First of all, it's so slippery that I was not able to wrap the base mould with it tightly enough. I somehow managed it and then wrap the core paper around it and turned the edge of the bias binding over, and it was simply a disaster. Cupro bias bindings, at least the ones I bought, are woven looser and the edge of the tape frayed easily and it just didn't work at all. Now I have to figure out how I can use up all three packets of bias bindings...

2 comments:

  1. Hi Chloe Particia,

    I just wanted you to know that Cupro is what we call Rayon in English. It took me a long time to work out the translation. Even my Japanese sister in law couldn't work out what it meant. It must be translated to Japanese from a language other than English. I love the diamond shapes in this thimble. Is it made by weaving?

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  2. I haven't seen any posts later than 2010. Is this website still up and running?

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