See What the Beads in the Back Room Will Have

Early in my beading life, I came across Ann Benson’s bead embroidery books and kits (you can drool over some of them here). These taught me a lot about stitching beads onto things.  I liked her sense of color, bead shape and design; I didn’t like stitching on a piece of stiff paper with the design drawn on it. I developed a technique for pricking holes in the design and using a metallic-ink pen to poke through them onto a piece of stiff felt (much easier to stitch with). Then I just connected the metallic paint dots and had my design.

What I really loved learning about was how to finish the work, using colorful fabric and fusible webbing.  This led to many pleasant hours grazing the fat quarters section of quilt shops. I now have, yes, a drawer devoted to swatches of fabric for this purpose.

A friend of mine gave me some fabric she had dyed and it really pleased me to be able to use it, as I did here for an embroidered pin.

The back should look as good as the front, eh?  All the parts should harmonize. Thank you Linda.