A Patchwork of Lovely Needlepoints

Hello there Lovelies. Thank you so much all of you whom visited and left such sweet comments; again you all made me smile! A few weeks have passed since jet setting on my dream holiday and I must say it has taken a little while for me to get back into the swing of things. I found for the first week I was just so, so tired. By the middle of the afternoon I needed a nanny nap and when evening descended I fell into bed at the earliest of hours. So unusual for me as I am a bit of a night owl. 

Anyway, between yawns and a sense of being in a drugged state, I thought I would accomplish a quick project (haha.....famous last words)!! A chair which I had recovered about 4 years ago was looking a little sad and dirty and was in need of a little pick-me-up. I decided to really add some pizazz and thought it would be fun to recover it with a jumble of patchwork needlepoints. My penchant for needlepoints has surfaced yet again.

This is a photo of the chair reminiscent of better days, which is a 'twin' to the funky chair I tarted up a little over a year ago.

Remember this one.......I am still loving it, though, it now lives in the parlour as a little revamp will soon be happening in there...all blues and lovely creams/whites.  Hence my 'new' needlepoint lovely is going to while away it's days in the family room, to replace my pretty blue, funky one. Are you a little confused?? I know I am!! So sorry, but you knew more often than not my brain is a muddly mess.

I gave the chair a lick of grey paint with the name of Marina Pearl and sanded it back a little as I rather like furniture to look a bit distressed. I am that gal who loves peely paint, rusty iron and oodles of scuffs. I am not a fan of brand sparkling new. The hue Marina Pearl is my new go to paint replacing Antique White USA which I have used for furniture for what seems forever. Somehow, I fancy the subtlety of this shade of grey these days.

Gathering a miscellany of needlepoints from my collection that sing a beautiful medley, I set about playing with them till I was happy with a pleasing arrangement. I thought I might border each needlepoint with these pretty ribbons that I purchased at Moods Fabrics whilst in New York. Believe it or not, these ribbons are the inspiration behind my 'new' chair. Who would've thought that a couple of lengths of pretty ribbon trims would inspire me to completely recover a chair. I know it is strange gal that I am. Besides I am always up for a creative challenge, always delighting in giving something new a burl. Who knows......it might just work out.....one never knows. =)

Let the stitching begin. As always, when I stitch a pretty such as this, there is always a dreadful shambles all around me! I seem to work best in disarray and mayhem! Who cares about the tidying up afterwards.........not I!!

I pinned each needlepoint to it's neighbouring piece stitching them together, covering the seams with the ribbon trim and fitting it to the chair. As I wanted the cover to be very tight, I found fitting the cover to the chair was a bit tedious because a lot of manipulation by the fingers was needed. Coaxing the needlepoints where I wanted them in some places, was a little trickier than covering with fabric, as needlepoints are thicker and a little harder to tease into their final resting position. I must say my fingers are carrying the battle scars of this tedious process but in the end, all well worth it regardless of the discomfit. When I was happy with the cover I both hot glued and stapled the cover to the chair. It always amazes me what one can do with a staple gun and hot glue. From playing with the needlepoints to stapling the last staple into the chair, the transformation took about three days. Easy peasy.....it really, really was.

A melody of needlepoints; English cottages, grape vines, roses, ribbons and bows, bouquets of flowers, Japanese ladies, sweet birdies, horses and riders and a little fox hunting......all playing very  nicely together.

I am loving how the chair looks. I didn't want a perfectly upholstered aesthetic so I affixed a frayed needlepoint of sweet birdies to the chair, leaving it to hang haphazardly. There are two oval needlepoints of roses which I also left frayed. I am loving this relaxed look. I then added some pretty faded pink crochet edging which I cut from a vintage bedspread, to the front and sides of the chair.

Love, love, love all the needlepoint busy-ness of this chair.

The sad thing about covering a chair with a smattering of needlepoints is that one doesn't have so many needlepoints any more. Oh well, I will just have to go back to my favourite bric-a-brac shop and see if I can unearth some more to replenish my stockpile.

Needlepoint chairs, needlepoint tarted up jackets, needelpoint bags (I stitched this pretty for my little overseas holiday)......my needlepoint pretties just will not be confined in a  common, hang-on-the-wall frame!

I have been stepping out in my tarted up jacket a lot lately. =)

Until the next time.............................

PS......Now about these boots......I found them in San Francisco....so, so funky.....so, so  very me!

Linking up this week with the lovely Jann's Share Your Cup  and Sum of Their Stories parties.

Will I......or Won't I............

.......wear my jacket that I have tarted up recently?? Me thinks I just might, though I fear a good few of the locals around here might well think...."what is she thinking"!! As Elizabeth Bennett of Pride and Prejudice fame once said "what do we live for, but to make sport for our neighbours"! AND....believe you me, me and my 'interesting' garments of choice do indeed give plenty of fodder for our neighbours!!  Come to think of it, me thinks they have not come across anyone quite like me before. How deliciously entertaining!!

This jacket is the before photo of my newly tarted up lovely. Oh dear........nice but rather plebeian.

 AND.....may I say a perfectly respectable and acceptable kinda jacket just the way it is. BUT.....I am me, a gal whom more often than not feels the need to breathe new life into a garment of clothing, by the adding of this and a whole lot of that.

Remember this............

And this.............

And then there was this..........

Needless to say, I love tarting up the odd jacket or two.

But I digress.....again! A little over a year ago I chatted about tarting up my op shop find with needlepoints and other such pretties. With Autumn beginning to cool things down here at the bottom of the world,  now is most definitely the time to add to the "Kim Sharman's Wardrobe of Interesting Tarted up Wearable Pretties and Curiosities". I thought I might as well throw caution to those rather chilly autumnal winds and refashion another article of clothing.

Having been a fan of Mandy Patullo's inspired textile collages for a while now, when I saw a book written by her I snapped it up. With a slew of inspirational pretties within the cover of this book, I thought I may as well begin playing with some ideas of my own.

Yet again, I gathered together a delicious jumble of needlepoints, ribbons, laces and other such pretties, probably too many pretties if truth be told. As you know, when undertaking this form of garment transformation I always garner a plethora of pretties. There is no way on God's sweet earth, that even I would add all these bits and bobs to an item of clothing. I just love to corral them all together as I am really just playing. I just love to gaze upon all these pretties for the trillionth time before I put them all away......again.

For the cogs in my brainpan to kick into gear, and for me to decide what could work, I find it easier to have a profusion of pretties on hand to inspire me. I might say at this juncture, when I do this form of design and stitching and indeed play with my pretties, it always looks as if I have landed smack in the middle of a bomb site. My work space always has the look of a 'pretties' bomb having been detonated. Alas, this cannot be helped. Thus, I spend an exhaustible amount of time cleaning up.

Remember all those glorious needlepoints I happened upon at my new favourite bric-a-brac shop......well I returned and purchased yet more.....just a few.

I started to play and after snippety-snipping needlepoints, I stitched these to the lapels and pockets, adding a sweet birdie resting amongst some pretty flowers. I carefully  snipped this embroidery from a cushion piece.

I rather love this English scene; a sweet little cottage surrounded by an even sweeter garden, with the church spire in the background towering to the heavens.

I stitched a butterfly to the lapel; also snipped from the cushion piece.

I decided the bottom pockets might sing a little more with a flap fashioned from some lovely vintage trim that I acquired a long, long time ago.

I played with an assortment of flowers and leaves down one side of the jacket, tucking them a little under the right lapel, but decided this was overkill.......just a tad.

In this instance I much prefer the jacket to be absent of floralicious delight. Really?? Yes really!! After all, I cannot cause too much of an overload of scuttlebutt for the neighbours! I don't want to be that sporting!! =)

I also thought about embroidering a vine of flowers and leaves trailing down the right front, but again, decided against it. I decided just the lapels and the pockets adorned with needle points would be the way to go. I have a few more jackets waiting in the wings for me to work 'miracles' on......perhaps a spot of hand embroidery will be just the thing for these.

But then some epaulettes of needlepoint would look mighty fine.....oh and a pretty button or two. I cut two snippets of a needlepoint  and stitched them onto the shoulders. These were such a pain to do as I had to unpick the lining and the shoulder seams. The shoulder pads also had to be worked on. I have no idea who constructed this jacket, but let's just say the person's tailoring skills were a little questionable. I discovered this jacket was made so that it was near high impossible to alter. The altering of this jacket only reinforced the notion that earning a quid in an alterations' place of business would be the last thing I would want to do. I am that gal whom when she spots someone walking up my path with an article of clothing in hand to ask me if I would alter and deconstruct it, I want to find some hidey hole and pretend I am not home.  I know, terribly uncharitable and un-neighbourly of me but I simple HATE altering garments from the outside in. It always takes a preposterous amount of time and effort. Me thinks I might think twice next time if I want to put these ornamental pieces on the shoulder again!

Just to give my pretty the finishing touch, I stitched upholstery fringing to the cuffs.....as you do.

Will I.......or won't I.....be seen out and about in this jacket dripping with pretty needlepoints?? Me thinks, the answer would most definitely be a YES!

I do rather like this tarted up jacket!! It will be perfect for stepping out this Autumn season, adding a little bit of interest to this far rural outpost. There will be some who consider needlepoints should only be seen in a pretty frame hanging on a wall or perhaps as the star of a cushion......but I rather think adorning an article of clothing with needlepoints is a most excellent idea.

I am going to be absent from blogworld for a little while as me and my good husband are off for an overseas holiday in San Fransisco. "San Fransisco???"....I hear you say. Yep.....that's right. For my 60th birthday present, my daughter and son-in-law (who live in San Fransisco), bought return air tickets for the both of us to pop over (3 air flights, 18 plus hours of flying) and stay with them for a while!!!!!! I know, how positively exciting. I am so delighted, I haven't quite come down from those arty farty, white cotton-candy, needlepointed clouds.

So........perhaps the next time we 'chat', I might just have a happy snap of li'l ol' me swinging from the rails of a cable car. Or....perhaps a happy snap of moi posing in front one of those architectural beauties, the painted ladies could be a goer. Gotta, gotta have a bo-peep at those ladies! Wherever our little holiday adventure leads us, my daughter tells me San Fransisco is the shangri-la for free spirits and those whom are a little offbeat; she says I should fit right in. Whatever does she mean!! In any case, whilst out and about in 'The City  By the Bay', I will be sure to wear some flowers in my hair. =)

If perchance you leave a lovely comment and I don't reply to thank you, please forgive me....I will reply when I return. Each and every one of you always delight my day.

Until the next time............

Linking up this week to the lovely Jann's Share Your Cup linky party.