One of my friends showed me how to make a silk ribbon rose a couple of weeks ago, so I've been carrying around a small piece of duck cloth and practicing them in my spare time. Because, you know, that's totally what people do. My first ones look rose-like, but they def have some problems too.
Here's my best "practice" rose; I really think I'm starting to get the hang of it here.
As I practiced making those, I discovered some really cool embroidery artists on Instagram which led to exhaustive online searches for products until I felt lost down the proverbial rabbit hole known as the Internet. I realized there's an entire market of people who embroider tiny items like jewelry and hair accessories and things; this certainly piqued my interest. And the rest, as they say, is history. I decided to make my very own tiny embroidered necklace and to order all.the.things. so I could make all.the.necklaces. in all.my.spare.time. Not. Haha! Anyway, this one stitch led me to explore this new-to-me 'maker' genre and to get all excited at the possibilities. The very first thing I decided to do was make myself a tiny embroidered necklace although mine is quite simple in comparison to the works of art I'd been drooling over for a few weeks now.
Here's a closeup of the little necklace I made last week using my newfound silk ribbon rose skills and a darling mini-hoop from Dandelyne. (They have a great facebook page and are on instagram too!) While the jewelry part of the supplies aren't cheap, I think the stitching supplies themselves will go a long way to make several projects. For this project, I used a tiny piece of clearance duck cloth, two 1/2 price rolls of satin ribbon from Hobby Lobby, and a giant needle. I ordered the hoop from a Dandelyne reseller on Etsy and already had the necklace chain in my stash. In terms of product pricing, I have maybe $10 in this project. Of course, you then have to factor in your time and energy. (The super fancy ones on Etsy are selling for a minimum of $35 and up to $85 or so each.) I thought y'all might like to hear about the nitty-gritty side of this new-to-me craft that I'm exploring. Wouldn't these make darling little gifts for your family and friends? Hmm...
And here I am sporting my new, handmade necklace at the end of last week. Except for the fella, no one in real life noticed it, so that makes me kind of sad. I'm going to keep wearing it though, and maybe someone will think it's as cool as I do. My virtual instagram peeps seemed to like it. Haha!
I'm still working on full-size stitching too. For whatever reason, it doesn't make me tired to haul out my stitching bag while I'm parked in front of the tv in the evening, not like scrapbooking does, for example. Since I've been home from the retreat in Utah, I've spent quite a bit of time cuddling Charlie-dog who isn't doing well at all and stitching in the evenings. I'm still plugging away on my Pretty Little Italy piece from Satsuma Street. With any luck, I'll be able to put this piece to bed by finishing it this weekend. I'm itching to start something new because I get bored with the same color palette.
I love your adorable necklace! It looks a different color on you (picking up the pink of your shirt) than in the close-up -- at first I thought you had made two of them. It's so fun to get excited about a new "maker" activity. I bought Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's book on carving handmade stamps and now need to pick up some supplies to give it a try. :)
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