Raccoon Embroidery - Taking a Break from the Joys of Motherhood

 I've been stitching away at my raccoon/zentangle/embroidery piece.  It's slow going but very soothing and portable.  I am using the word 'zentangle' loosely.  It's probably not strictly a zentangle but more of a doodle.  Here is the progress so far.  I had to extend the picture somewhat because I wanted the finished size to be 8 x 10".    It is really good practice in stitching.   I can see why young girls were taught to do 'samplers' back in the old old days ( not that I would approve of that kind of fixed gender role for women:)  I've had to think of what type of stitch worked best, and even tried some french knots.   At times I wished I wasn't so free and easy with the twists and turns of my pen.  Here's a close up.

I used double thread for the main lines, then switched to single threads to fill in.   I may use green threads for the background since I painted the leaves green but outlined them in black.  I am also using black single threads for the veins of the leaves. So a little colour in the background might be the thing to do.   I have another zentangle of a mermaid that would look good in multicolours of embroidery thread......


And here are a couple more photos of the pesky creatures who inspired this experiment.  I certainly don't encourage them because they are pretty destructive but they are darned cute!!

From photos, to doodles, to postcards, to stitches

I recently completed a few 4" x 6" pieces which I sent to be judged for a postcard exhibition.   Some were stitched while others were drawn with markers.   One piece was inspired by photos of a mother raccoon and her babies sleeping in my elm tree.  Mom had gotten tired of having 4 little ones jumping, grabbing at her and sleeping all piled on top of her on a hot summer day.   Soon, I saw her get up, wearily walk out on a limb and collapse onto it, legs hanging out on either side (she later returned to them).   Using the photos, I started doodling a caricature of them and ended up with a kind of zentangle in black and white with a touch of green.   This became my postcard entry as shown.   Then I decided to enlarge the picture and trace it onto a piece of white cotton which I am embroidering with black thread.   I will post a photo of the embroidery as a work in progress once I get a few more (hundred) stitches.  I decided to add touches of green on the leaves with watercolours as I did with markers on the postcard.