Monday 19 November 2018

Behind the Scenes: Working on New Bird Patterns

I'm slooooowly working on turning my old felt bird designs into printable sewing patterns for my shop...


... transforming them from things I've made (with my own weird methods of doing things) into things other people can easily make (with sensible processes, clear instructions, updated pattern pieces, etc).

I added the first bird pattern to my shop this autumn: the robin!

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/633107342/robin-pdf-pattern-felt-bird-sewing

Each of the felt bird patterns will come with a matching embroidery pattern, so I'm busy designing and stitching those, too. Here's the robin embroidery:

https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/633107342/robin-pdf-pattern-felt-bird-sewing

Progress is being slowed by all the DIY projects I've got in progress (which are both time-consuming and distracting!) and by the truly terrible quantity and quality of the daylight we've had lately (which makes photographing project steps very tricky!).

Hopefully I'll have some more birds in my shop soon (I will, of course, announce all the new patterns here on my blog and in my newsletter), but in the meantime here are some sneak peeks of the work going on behind the scenes.

I've been sketching embroidery patterns (choosing flora to accompany each bird and making all the patterns work well together as a set = a fun challenge!)...


... cutting out lots of felt pieces and sewing lots of birds as I work out the best way to describe each step...


... and getting stuck into lots of embroidery!

This is the greeenfinch, half-finished. I'm so pleased with how those fir tree branches have turned out.


Here's a slightly blurry snap of my bullfinch embroidery, from a day I was stitching while surrounded by workmen making a lot of mess and noise!


I think I might need to re-stitch this one as I'm not 100% happy with the flowers but We Shall See. Sometimes these magically things turn out how you picture them in your head, and other times they need a bit of tweaking and prototyping to get things just right.


I definitely need to buy some more embroidery hoops so I can get all of the embroideries framed up as I finish them! I've got lots more to stitch but I'm really pleased with these so far, both individually and how they look as a set.


Can't wait to get them finished so you guys can stitch them too! Watch this space...

UPDATE: My greenfinch design has now been added to my shop! Visit my shop to see all my printable PDF patterns:


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