Dish towels (and Temari, of course)

I made these towels for a gift, and the occasion for the gift is past, so I can show you now.





I stitched most of these while I was on vacation in April. It was the perfect stitch-in-the-car project.



I can remember once when I was a kid we got a new set of kitchen dish towels, with this type of embroidery. I was all excited, and asked my mom who had made them, and what was involved. The set we got was made by my aunt's mother (my mom's brother's mother-in-law) and I thought it was wonderful that she would stitch dish towels for us! Mom must have noticed my enthusiasm, because for Christmas that year I got a "kit" to stitch a dish towel, with the floss, towel, needle and hoop. I stitched and stitched on that thing forever! I enjoyed the stitching a lot, but didn't make real fast progress. It became a UFO (Un-Finished Object).

About 15 years later I found that towel, with the rusted needle in it, and I finished the embroidery that afternoon. It's worn out now, but before discarding it to the rag pile, I cut out the embroidery. Some day, when I run across it, I will take a picture of it and show you, stained, rusted, used up, and loved.

Here's my slow progress on my latest temari. Even though I'm supposed to be smocking, I can't keep my hands off this. I think the thread is rayon, I got it from Japan. It looks wonderful on the temari, and stitches up very nicely. Can you see how it looks like different shades from the way the light hits it? I'm glad it comes on 50 m cards, because this temari is going to take a lot. I have 5 shades of red, and I'm excited to see how it will turn out. It's about the size of a pearl #5.



The flowers end up interlacing and overlapping; according to my calculations, there should be 122 of them. Then I have to decide if I am going to add french knots for the middles of the flowers. I don't have a good color for that in this type of thread, so we will have to see.