I’ve been doing embroidery for about a year, and all that time, I’ve been thinking about embroidering my favourite denim jacket. I can’t tell you how many inspiration photos I saved to Pinterest, but I kept hesitating because (a) I didn’t want to mess up my favourite jacket and (b) it had to be just the right design.
I’ve been obsessed with the maiden/mother/crone moon, also known as the triple moon or the goddess moon, for a while now. (Look at the header of this site for confirmation!) So when it occurred to me that I could embellish THAT onto my jacket, it was a no-brainer. I got a little help from a pattern designer on Etsy, and then added my own interpretation of what stitches I could use. I love how it turned out.
I stitched the moons in Hungarian chain stitch, which is a little heavier and more ornate than regular chain stitch. The flowers are inspired by some of my favourites: cone flowers, sunflowers, lavender, roses, daisies and violets.
Once I had started embellishing it, I got braver about adding more. Embroidery led me to sashiko, which is methodical and geometric Japanese embroidery. Sashiko led me to boro, which is using fabric scraps to repair, reinforce and embellish, often paired with sashiko-inspired stitching.
I got these scraps of fabric with stars on them from a local fabric flea market. I cut out three different hues of stars and basted them on to the sleeve of my jacket.
I drew some straight lines on top to embroider across but couldn’t see the lines. This is an ongoing issue for me, finding ways to mark a pattern that are both visible and eraseable. I still haven’t found a solution that I love for pattern transfer. In this case I turned the sleeve inside out and drew the lines on the inside. Except that meant that I was stitching blind. I had to choose between seeing the lines and seeing the patches. I seem to do everything on hard mode! But, it worked!
I’m using multicoloured Acorn Threads by Trailhead Yarns, from Mad About Patchwork up the road from me. I tried to alternate the stitches evenly, but sashiko demands a level of precision a bit beyond my attention span.
In the end, though, I love how it turned out.
Hmmmm, what ELSE can I do to it?