Just finished embroidering a white Pillowcase Two H Birds. Usually, I draw my own pattern but these two hummingbirds are from an iron-on pattern by Aunt Martha’s Transfer iron-on patterns.
Here is the pillowcase all washed, ironed, and folded on the dining room table. I really took the easy way out on this, with the pattern and also failing to take pictures as the project gradually progressed. You’ll have to use your imagination.
This hummer on the left side has his beak inserted into the middle flower on the vine where I went with orange or pink petals with a dark maroon center. I used some unusual colors to show his feathers underneath his body in purple. His wings match some of the vine greens with the addition of turquoise in his flying feathers.
This hummingbird on the right started out as a basic green feathered dude. I added dark blue for shadows then a red under his neck, adding the black outline and feathers for his beak, feathers, and eye outline. Finally, I put some random golden brown scattered across his whole body. I like the way that the flecks of golden brown kind of make it look like his body is shimmering. I think I will use this process in satin stitching in the future again. His flowers utilize the same color as the bird on the left but there is only one blossom on this side.
This Cutwork Flower Tablecloth was a discovery at a garage sale. It was sitting on a table full of miscellaneous craft materials. When I unfolded it, there were stains all over it. Would I be able to get them out? I could smell cigarette smoke and the stains were brown. The lady offered it to me for $2 so I thought, what the heck, why not.
You can see that it was machine stitched (embroidered) in a simple flower pattern with leaves between the blossoms. I have already added a darker pink outline to the interior of the petals of this flower. The edge of the cloth and some of the areas between the leaves are cut out and edges are reinforced with stitching. This is called, “
However, the machine stitching is just boring, so, I intend to “spiff it up” with some bright lines and satin stitching until I can say I love it. See the blue flower on the left where the original machine stitching pattern makes you feel like yawning? On the right is a yellow blossom that has had orange outlines added to the yellow blossom petals and red french knots added to the center. Okay, now we have some pizzazz going, and we are on a roll.
I added embellishment all around the edge and then thought that the center of the tablecloth needed something more than the two little sets of a pair of pink blossoms. So I added some vines, and daisy’s in many colors. Yep, yep, yep.
This idea spread to the corners and sides until I had all kinds of flowers and plants around the entire border of the tablecloth. That is what happens when you go weed in the garden and all of the flowers are blooming.
Okay, a bit excessive but it was so much fun. It is a colorful addition to our tablecloth family.
This round tablecloth is my Mom’s favorite color. Whenever I see this beautiful blue, I remember her. 
My Mom, Mary did splendid crochet work. She did a lot of crochet using small needles with thin cotton thread as I was growing up. She also made afghans, sweaters, and other things out of regular yarn.
Her hands were busy in the evenings. Mom made tablecloths, table runners, pillowcase lace, and doilies. Here are some of the tablecloths that I still have that she made. This one is made with off-white thread, it has a star pattern in the middle with netting going out to the lacey edge.
This tablecloth is done using white cotton thread with a flower-type pattern in the middle, with a small row of netting and then a thick lacey pattern at the outer edge. The outer edge lace is almost like a ruffle.
First Tablecloth
You can see a row of flowers in a circular-shaped arrangement down the middle of the tablecloth that is bordered by curvy rows of daisies along each side. Each corner has the same rose that goes down the center. Spaced on the edges are a few rose buds with daisies. This took me a full year to finish, and there were many times when I thought I would never get it done. Doing a project like this teaches so much patience and perseverance. Believe me, it is quite an accomplishment to be able to finish this.
The more open rose bloom is a beautiful line drawing and the change in color from the darker red interior to the pink exterior is just classic. The leaves are expressive among the scattered daisies all around it. One of the difficult things to figure out was how to do the thorns on the rose stem. If the point is not done right, they curve instead of coming to a good point. Do you notice how many times the color of the embroidery floss changes?
Here is the smaller budding rose and daisy arrangement that is spaced along the side edges. It was great to have a smaller area every once in a while. Whew. The stitches used in this one are outline, line, lazy daisy and french knots in many, many, many colors.
This is a simple brown & white tablecloth with off-white embroidery to embellish the edge and corners. The reason I chose this kit was, that I had just completed a tablecloth that had many different colored flosses throughout. I thought having only a single color would simplify and speed things up. I would not be stopping to change colors all the time. Ha, ha.
You can see that this table spread does only have embroidery on the edges and at each corner so the center of the table is plain. Consequently, I select this cloth whenever I want the food to be the star on a table or if I have a decorative doily or runner in the middle.
What I failed to take into account was the complex type of stitches utilized in this particular pattern. There is a lot of satin stitch and curvey outline along with mucho chain stitch. The most difficult stitch for me on this tablecloth was the “fishnet”. The fishnet starts with laying down thread then tacking it down at all of the intersecting points. It is a bit tricky and took a while for me to get comfortable with it.
All the edges of the tablecloth have a border of flower blossoms on curved stems with two leaves. The corners have a larger blossom arrangement with seven different shapes. Each blossom has 3 petals and a base filled with solid satin stitch. There are two lower petals in fishnet and outline stitches. There are 3 french knots inside of each flower. The curved stems connecting the flowers are done with a chain stitch. There are two leaves on the stem, one combines the fishnet with satin stitch, and the other is all satin stitch.
It fit with the letters between the leaves and vine.
Here it is redone with the “i” and “e” changed around. Whew.
square,
star,
sun,
T is for train,
triangle,
U is for umbrella,
W is for watermelon.
L is for ladybug,
lizard,
M is for moon,
O is for octagon,
octopus, orchid (already shown on the previous page),
P is for puppy,
R is for rectangle,
S is for shamrock,
and frog,
H is for hand,
heart,
hummingbird, (and orchid above it)
I is for ice cream,
K is for kitten,