Smithsonian Institution Window Crewel Pillow by Mazaltov's

 

Happy New Year 2022 to you all ! I hope you are all well and had a lovely Christmas .

The weather has been very stormy here . One big lightening strike took out our power and caused much  misery . We are back on again now , thanks to a good electrician .

Yes , it has been so gloomy . I,d love to see a bit of snow to brighten the place up , but snow rarely happens here . 

I have got a nice log fire going in the wood burning stove , to cheer us all . I sit and watch the flames from my comfy armchair . Deep in thought . I try to steer my mind from so much worry and depressing news on both the t.v and the internet .

Got to keep cheerful ! My embroidery comforts me  . I'm still working away on the Smithsonian Institution Window Crewel Pillow by Mazaltov's .  Such a long name I know ! That's what it says on the kit ! 

It is a 1970's vintage kit , but in the style of an 18th century embroidered pillow . It had not been started , but did have some of the wool missing . The colours are nothing like on the coloured picture on the front of the kit and the instructions would be very confusing if I didn't already know how to do some of the embroidery stitches.  It is very pretty and I think it would look nice on my kitchen chair .

I had thought that it would be fairly easy to do , but there are so many teeny tiny elements to stitch . I am finding it can take me an hour to stitch just one or two small flowers or a leaf . I do usually like to stitch slowly , but now I find myself trying to go faster as I had rather thought that I,d have finished this by now ! 

I try to do a couple of flowers  in bed , before switching off the light and it helps me to get off to sleep .

I have finished all the red and green areas  and am putting in all the lemon yellow flowers .

I'm saving the delicious orange flowers until last . They will be my reward for all the tedious red and green ! 

I ran out of the red crewel wool . Back in the 70's I could have contacted the company and they would have sent me some more wool ....anyway ... I  managed to match it up with some red wool from my crewel wool hoard in the cupboard !

Matching up the small piece that I had left , was very tricky and I think I must have spent a couple of hours trying to get the correct shade .

So what did Santa bring you ? I have a couple of new dolls to show you in up coming posts . So watch this space ! 

The Smithsonian Institution Window Crewel Pillow by Mazaltov's

 O.K. I,m back ! I have been flitting about from one project to another , not being able to settle on any one thing . The pandemic has really unsettled me and unlike other people who have taken up new hobbies and learnt new skills during the lockdowns .....I have just found myself ..well ....frozen !

I have a more serious project being prepared in the background , I am still gathering everything I need for that and I need time alone ,solitude , in absolute peace and quiet . It has been very hard to find , peace and quiet and solitude .

So anyway , in the meantime I have found a vintage kit that I can carry with me on our travels , doing a little here and there , now and then . Nice and easy , not worry about it too much .

I,m sorry I don't seem to have taken a picture of the kit in it's packet , I,ll have to take one and  add it later ,  but it is the Smithsonion Institution Window Crewel Pillow by Mazaltov's . A complete unstarted kit , probably dating from the 1970's I should think .

                                                   It turned out to be a right pain ! 

I began stitching it and it seemed to me that the colours were just not right somehow .

I carried on with it according to the instructions . There are only two shades of blue and two shades of green so I thought it must be correct ?

I embroidered the whole of this border in very fiddly whipped stem stich  .

I was thinking to myself " do I stitch this according to the instructions or how it looks on the picture ?

I decided to do it - as it looks on the picture . After all , the picture of the completed design was the reason I chose the kit !

I worked out in my mind that it very much looked to me as if whoever had bought this kit originally , they maybe took one look at the scary instructions and gave up without even starting it ....then maybe they used some of the wool for something else and then when they decided to re-sell the kit , replaced the missing wool with  the wrong colour shades . The wool was all unravelled and I really did need to sort it all out and make each colour into nice tidy twisted skeins .

I cant believe that the manufacturer would have put the wrong wool shades into the kit .

      So , I sorted out the correct looking shades from my hoard .

Unpicked most of it , that pale yellowy green really offended the eye ! I might leave the fiddly Whipped stem stitch , it took me so long to do !

                                          ......   and started again !