International Art and Soul Challenge 139

 The theme for this fortnight was set by my team mate Hazel, who wants projects on the theme Happiness.

I started with what makes me happy. Well, that would be a whole range of things - family and friends, crafting, colours, flowers. So, this is what I came up with:

So, we've got flowers and pretty colours, and of course, the card will go to a friend or family member, so that covers quite a few things.

The floral image comes from a book called Embroidery on Paper for Every Occasion by Joke and Adriaan de Vette. It's one of the best books on paper embroidery I own (and I have several) but I'd never used this pattern before. And, technically, I haven't used it now, as I wanted something a bit squarer than the original, so I added an extra flower - the one on the right is a repeat of the other pink one. I used machine embroidery thread throughout.

Having competed the embroidery, I added a purple line around the card using a Sharpie, then added a shallow matt in pink.

To complete the card, I added some embroidery to the base card as you can see. This time, I used a brass stencil to prick out the pattern of ovals, and then I filled them, using stitches 2, 4, 6, and 8 holes 'long'. I've always been fascinated by the way you can make curves with straight lines, and I remember as a child, my dad making me a board with nails evenly spaced along two axes so I could do some thread art, so that's another reason for happiness.

And that's it. I do hope you can join us this time.