RCTN Projects Gallery

We're getting some great projects on here, but we've still got a lot of room for more. So if you read rctn, send me photos or .gifs of your work! If you don't, but you do needlework, start reading the Usenet newsgroup rec.crafts.textiles.needlework and then send them to me. :-).

The piece is intriguing. It was done originally on a red velvet petticoat, all 15 yards of it, during the 17th century for a wedding. It was a protest, but from the blurb in the description I'm not sure if she is protesting politics (although a couple of centuries after the Angevin establishment of the Hapsburg Dynasty over Hungary, there was still considerable opposition and the Mongols from the Steppes were making politics and life among the minor nobility in the Carpathians a messy business), the choice of husband, marriage in general, all of the above or exactly what.

Her wedding was clandestine, risky, and her father was later executed for treason (for other 'crimes'). Her name isn't given. Just a description of the gold and silver petticoat hem. But the patterns it consists of are still around (or at least period patterns with the same names). Royal blue, two colors each of gold and silver, I admire the team of seamstresses who used long-armed cross stitch around 15 yards of red velvet hem on the original.

Susan Profit's (tinne@eskimo.com) Stag, in gold and silver on dark blue Lugana, taken from a description of a seventeenth century wedding petticoat

Barb Bandel's (momxiii@nando.net) @ tag. I used that vinyl Aida "cloth" and stitched the @ in Caron Watercolors Confetti. That part I did in cross stitch. Then I used Perle Cotton 5 in black and filled in all around the @ in 1/2 stitches - like needlepoint. My tag is actually square in shape - I went out 4 rows on all sides. But then, I made the strap using a padded satin stitch - 1/2 of it is black, the other 1/2 is Perle Cotton 5 #3685. The back of the tag is all 1/2 stitches too. But as I did it in 3685 - I skipped every other stitch and in between I used the Watercolors. It is magnificent if I have to say so myself.

Martha Beth's (marbeth@ix.netcom.com) infamous @ tag.

Stephanie Peter's Christmas cards. Charts are available by post for all of these designs. E-mail Steph at bj64@cityscape.co.uk. (I want the cathedral!!)
Christmas Tree 1

These two projects are the work of Wombat, wombat@clark.net. She writes:

Hubster's Christmas stocking, started before he proposed. It took me till after our fifth anniversary to finish it. We both think it was worth the effort. The ribbons are from the Montgomery County Fair.

Emie Bishop and Mariann Golich's bellpull. I had a lot of fun with the different stitches in this one.

An ornament I (piglet@panix.com) just finished making for my mother. Finally! This is my longest standing UFO (mostly 'cause I was panicked that I'd muck up the finishing, which of course I did....live and learn). The design is adapted from a set of nutcrackers in Cross Stitch & Country Crafts (CS&CC) several years back (when I dig out the exact issue, I'll post that info., and the designer's name, etc.). I changed the coat colors from green to blue, and made up the back myself.

Throw tomatoes at piglet@panix.com.