Monday 31 March 2008



Greetings everyone,

I am Melisende Fitzwalter, a member of the Shire of Thamesreach (London) in Insulae Draconis. Recently I have been concentrating more on Calligraphy and Illumination, but I am feeling the need to do some more embroidery. I haven't started a new project just yet, but I am enclosing pictures of the detail of my most recent (non SCA) project. A colleague of mine was getting married and asked if I could make two special gifts for the two fathers - embroidered bookmarks based on two different floor tiles from the 11th century Cathedral of Otranto (southern italy) which was where she was getting married. The fabric is silk as is the floss and I used a mixture of chain stitch, satin stitch and french knots, the hemming was done using silver thread. The colours are not very good in the pics - the silk was a washed-out sea-grey colour and was the same fabric as my friends wedding dress.

Thursday 27 March 2008

Something to keep you warm... :)

...again a new roundel for Anya's Laurel Cloak -
"Something to keep you warm" project
:)

Assisi tablecloth project

Hi,

Most of the readers don’t know me yet so I want to introduce myself shortly. My name is Eva Grelsdotter and I live in Barony of Aarnimetsä, close to canton of Unikankare (city of Turku). I have couple things that are closest to my heart in our society. One of them is cooking but embroidery is also very important to me. When I started in this society about ten years ago I didn’t have any clue about how to do any embroidery :D. Now I think that I need to have at least one embroidery project going on all the time. I have been doing mostly blackwork and other counted thread embroidery in recent years. I have started to make an Assisi tablecloth and here is a picture about it. I will send more and hopefully better pictures soon :)!



Eva

Sunday 23 March 2008

A new member

Greetings,
I am Baroness Siubhan inghean Fhearghuis, but that name may change. Thanks to Jahanarabanu Viviana, I have been dabbling in things Persian so I should choose a name to match. I live in the Shire of Flintheath in the Crown Principality of Insulae Draconis. I haven't been embroidering all that long, but I have managed to finish a couple projects. Here is the latest.

These will be the sleeves on a Persian robe once I get them attached to the robe. The top one was the first sleeve I embroidered. The unfinished part on the left is where I thought I would need the sleeve wider but then determined that the six repeats would be enough. The design is from a knitted fragment found in Egypt from the 11th or 12th Century (as found in the Here Be Wyverns book by Nancy Spies). The design was outlined in a stem stitch then the whole thing was filled with a chain stitch. These are both stitches known to be used in the Persian Empire in the 7th Century, so I am comfortable using them in a little later period. The fabric is wool with silk used for the design.
For any who wish to see the progress updates from when I made these sleeves, my craft journal is http://siubhan-crafts.livejournal.com/ .

I will try to blog soon about my current embroidery project.

Wednesday 19 March 2008

New pictures uploaded to Racaires Flickr Account :)


PICT0379
Ursprünglich hochgeladen von racaire
I uploaded some pictures I took in the historical museum of the town Regensburg in Germany after visiting the "St. Matthew's Tourney" with Arnulf and some other friends from our shire (January 2006)
Have fun! :)

Sunday 16 March 2008

Sleeve Progress


Here is the sleeve with the first half of one border complete! I'm really excited to be this far along. I can't wait to have it done and wear it, perhaps to Viceroy Tourney! This has taken several weeks to complete, but mostly due to the fact that I have to take a few days off in between. If I embroider too much in one night or too many nights in a row leaves me with a variety of aches and pains. I am committed to finishing this project soon, so that I may focus more on my weaving projects. For more information on this project you can visit my Arts & Sciences Journal. Once there you can use the tabs on the right to navigate through the rest of the journal to view other embroidery projects, weaving projects and research!

Tuesday 11 March 2008

Something to keep you warm... :)


Roundel3-007
Ursprünglich hochgeladen von racaire
...again a new roundel for Anya's Laurel Cloak and again I want to draw your attention to the

"Something to keep you warm"
project

:)

Saturday 8 March 2008

Yes, I'm still alive :-)

Hi all!
I just wanted to say that I *am* working towards the challenges, even though I haven't posted lately! Right now I've got some real life issues to get through (my visa renewal is coming up in June, and this time its a big deal), and I'm working tons of overtime right now. After the beginning of June, I'll know either way and will be better at getting back to people and posting progress (provided I don't have to move):-)

I saw what Thorvaldr is making for the project, by the way, it looks great!

Racaire, I'm so sorry I haven't gotten the pearls to you yet, I will do it! I just cant remember anything now but work :-(
And last but not least, the roundels RULE!!!!!!!! You rock my world!
Anya

Dragon Needle Embroidery Guild - Newsletter March 2008

Dear honourable Lords and Ladies, gentle members of the "Dragon Needle Embroidery Guild" & "- eMail Group"!

Spring time is near and it's again time for a short newsletter to let you know what is going on in our guild:

Update - Guild:
I am very happy to be able to announce that Lady Jahanarabanu Vivana is the new region guild head for Insulae Draconis - I am sure she will be a great representative for the members of Insulae Draconis and their needs.

Our region guild heads at the moment:
Aarnimetsä: Lady Eilgri Beccan (9 members)
Central: Lady Racaire (11 members)
Insulae Draconis: Lady Jahanarabanu Vivana (4 members)
Nordmark: - (in progress, 5 members) -
South: - (no members until now) -
(other kingdoms: 1 member)

I am very looking forward to work at the Guild Charter with such enthusiastic and great region guilds representatives like Lady Eilgri Beccan (for Aarnimetsä) and Lady Jahanarabanu Vivana (for Insulae Draconis) - many thanks to this great Ladies because you really brighten up and ease my work. :)

Update - Guild Membership Roll:
Many thanks to the new members from Aarnimetsä and Insulae Draconis for joining our guild - we have 30 members now :)

Update - Guild Badge:
Layout and registration of our badge is in progress :)

Update - Guild Charter:
In progress - at the moment you can vote at the Dragon's Embroidery Workshop concerning an expansion of the guild also to other fibre arts besides embroidery.

Dragon's Embroidery Workshop:
Once again I want to thank everyone who posted pictures of his/her work at the Embroidery Workshop Blog - please keep on posting pictures of your embroidery - regardless of which level your work or your English language is, please don't hesitate to share your work :)

Upcoming Embroidery Workshops:
Last reminder for the Embroidery Workshop "Whitework / Opus Teutonicum":
Mrs. Kohwagner from the Bavarian National Museum will hold an embroidery workshop concerning whitework / opus teutonicum on Saturday - 5th April 2008!
Information concerning registration - costs: 40,0 € + 7,0 € for material; registration: +49 (0)89 / 211 24 216 or per eMail: dagmar.bosch@bnm.mwn.de
I hope that the airport workers won't go on strike *knockonwood* at this weekend and it would be wonderful to meet some of you there if possible :)
If you get to know about an interesting embroidery workshop - please contact me

And last but not least - If you would like to participate in the "Something to keep you warm" Project/Challenge (http://keep-you-warm.blogspot.com/) of Mistress Anya and me - there are still some months left for starting and completing a new project! :)
...and if you would like to join the Embroidery Workshop Blog or know someone who would like to join the Guild - please don't hesitate to write me an eMail! :)

Yours faithfully
Racaire
Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild Head

Sunday 2 March 2008

Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild - Members

If you do not want your SCA name and/or group to be listed here,
please contact the
guild head

New members of the Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild - March:

~ added 02.03.2008: ~

30) Ida Järvinen (Aarnimetsä)
~ added 11.03.2008: ~
31) Lady Melisende Fitzwalter (Insulae Draconis)
~ added 19.03.2008: ~
32) Lady Siubhan inghean Fhearghuis (Insulae Draconis)
33) Katarina von Danzig (Insulae Draconis)
~ added 23.03.2008: ~
34) Mave (Central)

additional information:
Guild Head: Lady Racaire
Aarnimetsä - region guild head: Lady Eilgri Beccan
Central - region guild head: Lady Racaire
Insulae Draconis - region guild head: Lady Jahanarabanu Vivana

Yis
Racaire
Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild Head

I promised to post some pictures of stuff I´ve done... but haven´t been too active. Sorry! Here´s a picture of a blue rose (my badge) I embroidered on a linen towel. It was basically an experiment of how different stitches take wear and tear on items that get used and even washed a lot.

The rose is done with silk using mostly stem- and chainstitch. They have hold up fairly well, but the part that is done as laid work has not taken the washing well, you can see the linen through.

Poll: Expansion of the Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild

Dear honourable Lords and Ladies, gentle members of the
"Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild" & "- eMail Group"!

Times change and also do the needs of the members of our guild - therefore I would like to take on the idea of expanding the guilds focus also to other fibre arts like weaving, ... again.

And because I honour the opinion of the members of our guild I request you to take part in the poll that I started at our ‘Dragon's Embroidery Workshop’ to give me an impression of your tendency concerning the development of our guild in the future:

- Question:
What do you think about an expansion of the guild also to other fibre arts besides embroidery?

- possible Answers:
1) Yes, we should also cover other fibre arts besides embroidery.
2) No, we should remain an "embroidery-only" guild.
3) I don't care.

With many thanks in advance to everyone who will participate in the poll I remain

yours in service
Racaire
Dragon's Needle Embroidery Guild Head

Saturday 1 March 2008

2nd Blue Linen Sleeve

I finally finished the outline for the second blue linen sleeve. I have used yellow linen thread for the outline, which will not be seen when the sleeve is done. this does however retain the scroll design while I am filling in the red and yellow! This also allows me to fill in the bottom, complete the center and then fill the top without losing the border design.

Something to keep you warm... :)

...again a new roundel for Anya's Laurel Cloak and again I want to draw your attention to the

"Something to keep you warm" project