Needle and ThREAD: Stitching for Literacy

Do you suppose we’ll ever have a national holiday celebrating Dr. Seuss? I mean, we have National Hotdog Month.

Dr. Seuss taught me to read. Nowadays early readers are abundant, but I don’t remember any books but Dr. Seuss’s from my preschool days. Were there any others?

My sister inherited the family collection, but her children are old now, so I’m thinking maybe I’m due for another turn with them.

I’d be hard-pressed to single out a favorite. I liked them all: the bright colors, even if there were only two; the made-up silly words; the rhymes; the funny stories. But I have strong memories of a few in particular. One is, I think, a lesser-known Seuss tale: I Wish That I Had Duck Feet.

I guess I always had a keen interest in animals, so it makes sense that I’d be drawn to a book about a kid wishing to have various animal parts. I wished for a few myself, though never for that long, long tail.

The thing that I remember most, though, was thinking that the boy in the book got it wrong in the end. It’s not better to just be ourselves; who was he kidding? It would be far better to have an animal part or two, provided you chose the parts wisely. It would be even better to have animal parts you could take off and put on. That’s the way it was in my book, you see.

You know what I wanted? Monkey feet and a telescoping giraffe neck. What, I ask you, is the down side to those?

Is there a lesser-known Dr. Seuss book that stands out for you? Which one?

A bookmark by Maureen, finished in the Bookmarks 101: Simple, Smart, and Swanky Finishes class at The Stitchers’ Village. This pattern was Maureen’s least favorite of the first batch she did, but I like it. Kids are into everything! I know there’s a bug-lover out there who will love to have this.

I’d way-yonder rather have this bookmark between the pages than all those smooshed skeeters.

The Monday “What have you done lately?” accountability post, where I announce my Needle and Thread: Stitching for Literacy program promotion goal for the week and fess up on last week’s goal.

Last week, my goal was to start gathering current info about events and contests taking place during this year’s Challenge. Thanks to the inclusion of the word “start,” I can call this goal accomplished. I’ve started!

I also wanted to finish the how-to-stitch video tutorial for the readergirlz event. Done! What an undertaking–it nearly killed me! Okay, that’s an exaggeration. Remember all my raving about the three-minute I-Heart-You Earrings video? Well, this video is ten minutes. Yeah-huh. I still need to polish and proof everything, but the hard parts are done.

In other news, I’m assembling posts and guest bloggers for this year’s Challenge. In the past, it’s been my goal to post something relevant to stitching and reading every day during the Challenge. This year, I aim to make it more interesting and fun by inviting others to participate. If you have something you’d like to share–a personal story about learning to read or stitch, teaching someone to read or stitch, an explanation of what happens in our bodies chemically while we stitch…–please email me.

In particular, I’m looking for Extreme Reader and Extreme Stitcher stories and images. These are stories that demonstrate just how far we’re willing to go to enjoy reading and stitching. If you’ve ever done anything kind of nutty just to read or stitch, I want to hear about it!

Send your stories to me at

mail [AT] funkandweber [DOT] com

That address is in the sidebar now, you know.

All right. This week, my goal is to–brace yourselves–create one more video. Uh…yep. It’s true. This one is to kick off the Bookmark Challenge. We’re setting up a new studio for it tonight. I’ll be working on it in the wee hours of morning while it’s dark outside. That’s all you’re getting for a hint. It won’t be all that long before you see it.

Do you realize the Challenge officially starts in seventeen days? Geez-o-pete, who’s running this thing?!

You have got to see this! A needleworker records her life in cross stitch.

Hats off, Jean!

I aspire to a giant project. No idea yet what the theme will be.

Thanks to Monique for pointing this out to me on Facebook.

A bookmark by Pine Glen Designs, enthusiastic promoters of the Bookmark Challenge. This pattern will be available as a complimentary chart.

Now, you know how I like connections. Well, in addition to this being a bookmark image illustrating a post about bookmark images, I’m giggling because I might also be posting this prematurely. I’m not sure the chart is available just yet, or if it will be available on the Pine Glen site or through shops. Instead of giving me pause, it makes me want to post it more because, you see, something else in this post might be premature. I suspect Lorrie will laugh, too, so no harm done.

After Monday’s Update post, Charlie asked if there was a place to upload images of bookmarks we stitch.

Well, I’d love to have a system so we can share images of the bookmarks we stitch, so I’ve started a Needle and ThREAD: Stitching for Literacy Flickr Group!

Right now, this is a free account, so we are limited to 100MB of uploaded images per month, and only the 200 most recent bookmarks will be shown. If we find we like this Group and use it, I’ll happily upgrade to an unlimited account and make one or two of you moderators. If we’re that busy–and I hope we are–I’m going to need help moderating images.

Mind you, I’ve never used Flickr before, so I’m just figuring things out there. I just uploaded my first image.

What? You think I’ve jumped the gun by going public without really knowing what I’m doing?

Well, yeah. So?

I’ve made it a public group, so anyone can see the images and anyone can upload images. If things get out of hand (you rowdy embroiderers, you!), I’ll make it a private group. I ask that you reduce the sizes of your images so that the longest dimension is 400 pixels, and I’ve limited uploads to five per week, so you never have to look at 200 of my own images at once. Please note that I’ve marked the group as “safe,” meaning content should be G-rated. Okay, maybe PG will be accepted. Not that I don’t appreciate a little R-rated embroidery now and then, but you should send those to me in an email…which is now listed in the sidebar, you know.

Also note that part of the agreement to post in the Stitching for Literacy Flickr Group includes permission for me to post the images here as well. This blog needs bookmark images!

I’ll be working on a group icon and my own buddy icon in the coming days. Or weeks. Or perhaps months. Who knows?

I’m excited to see how this goes!

One message from the Bookmark Collectors’ Convention that really hit home for me is that bookmarks, and all objects for that matter, have stories. This was the subject of Deanna Dahlsad’s presentation, but then it was further demonstrated by Laine Farley’s presentation and Don Baldwin’s presentation.

Maybe the story starts at the point where you pick it up:

• you decide to stitch a bookmark for the 2010 Bookmark Challenge
• you discover a pattern in a needlework shop in Metairie, Louisiana, when you visit for Mardi Gras, and you stitch it for the 2010 Bookmark Challenge
• you see a sculpture at an art show that makes you think of your Great Aunt Gertrude who reminds you of your sixth grade teacher who gave you a bookmark when you memorized The Walrus and The Carpenter, and so you stitch a bookmark with a walrus for the 2010 Bookmark Challenge and hope it goes to a sixth grader

Or, more likely, maybe the story started long before you entered the scene, and you just don’t know it, at least not yet. Laine’s presentation on researching bookmarks revealed the story of a man who ran a funeral home in the early 1900s.

Think about the stories the bookmarks we’re creating will have:

• why you’ve decided to participate in the Needle and Thread: Stitching for Literacy Bookmark Challenge (organizer of the Challenge threatened you?),
• how you selected the pattern and materials (fabric from a prize you won at a stitching retreat?),
• the stitching and finishing process (while witnessing history be made at the Olympics?),
• the donation to a shop or guild or participating group (attended a tea party to hand it in?),
• the delivery to a library (your needlework was placed on display for the whole town to see?),
• the prize/award/gift given to a young reader (who has never won anything in his life and worked really hard for the chance to win the bookmark you created?).

Where the story goes from here is anyone’s guess, but it will go on. Not only are we creating bookmarks, we’re creating stories.

Do you have an embroidered bookmark with a story? If so, I want to hear from you! Contact me at mail AT funkandweber DOT com.

A bookmark from Marion Scoular, teacher and embroideress extraordinaire. An example of pattern darning. That’s the front and back of the same bookmark.

The Monday “What have you done lately?” accountability post, where I announce my Needle and Thread: Stitching for Literacy program promotion goal for the week and fess up on last week’s goal.

Last week my goal was to update a couple of pages here on the site. I’m calling the goal accomplished, but don’t go thinking I’m finished. I need to get the events and contests page updated, but that requires getting information from others. The landing page, however, has 2010 info as does the About page, and after two good nudges I finally have my email address in the sidebar (so it’s on every page) and a second time on the About page.

The real accomplishment of the week, however, was the Bookmark Collectors’ Virtual Convention over the weekend. You may be sick of hearing me gush over this event and the people behind it (yay, Alan!), but too bad, so sad for you. A little gushing is justified; it was all I hoped it would be and more.

For starters, I met some fabulous people, all of whom can get on board the use of bookmarks as tools to promote literacy. No need to explain or twist arms; they get it. Best of all, they are eager to spread the word, too.

Lauren suggested an article on the readergirlz project for BiblioBuffet. Robin has already posted about the program at the Library and Information Science News blog and is initiating a contest to round up some new library jokes for me, which maybe I can turn into bookmark designs.

I’ll share other non-promotion convention tidbits in other posts throughout the week.

In other news, Monica at The Bibliophilic Book Blog is holding Bookmark Day on March 15 and has offered to profile the Stitching for Literacy program. Yippee!

This week my goal is to start collecting event and contest info for this year’s Challenge and to finish preparations for the readergirlz bookmark stitching event. The introductory / invitational video is finished as of an hour or two ago, and I’ll send it off to Melissa Walker tonight. Making the how-to-stitch tutorial video, which, I admit, looks a little overwhelming from where I sit just now, is what I need to finish this week. It’s going to be fun!

Oh…and by the way, the read, reflect, reach out hand mirror bookmark project is not what we’re doing this time around. That’s right! New project with a new hook…or clip, as the case may be. Wait and see; it shouldn’t be too long.

Your turn. What are your goals for this week?

Here’s a really fun post on the Bookscoops blog.

One of my career paths not taken was children’s party planner and host. This is precisely the kind of party I would host.

The Bookmark Collectors’ Virtual Convention starts tomorrow at 8 am, PST. It is so exciting to be part of something brand new! I love the people who are making this happen: they are fun, adventurous, hard-working, enthusiastic, willing to take risks, and creative and smart enough to handle whatever happens. It’s a first; no one knows what will happen, and it doesn’t matter; we’ll run with it.

That I ended up in this mix is serendipitous. Who’d have thunk? But I like it here, and I plan to pull up a chair and stay a while. I’m getting heaps of ideas for embroidered bookmarks and am eager to stitch some of my own–not pattern models or class models, but one-of-a-kind bookmarks of my own…fancy, complicated, interesting.

Learning the history of other kinds of bookmarks makes me curious about the history of embroidered bookmarks. I didn’t get responses from the embroidery historians I contacted, so maybe I need to do some research on my own.

The galleries, forums, and vendor pages for the show are up and running for pre-show viewing. I want to attend the presentations tomorrow, so I’m getting a head start on these. I just discovered this oh-so-clever vendor: In My Book. They create beautiful bookish greeting cards that recycle into bookmarks! Each of fifteen bookmarks finishes the sentence: “In my book, you’re _____.” Each one calls to mind a number of people to whom I’d send that particular one. Very fun!

According to the In My Book website, the cards are sold by the ZJ Loussac Friends of the Library shop, so I can get these cool cards and support Anchorage libraries simultaneously. Maybe your library or a local independent book shop has them, too.

I’m off to the convention!

Last night was the live readergirlz chat with Sharon M. Draper, author of Copper Sun, this month’s featured book.

I love the readergirlz chats, so much so that I’ve decided to attend even when I haven’t yet read the book–I am severely book-acquisition challenged, as you know. Hearing the author discuss his/her book, research (Sharon made three trips to Africa), the writing process (she gets up at 4 a.m., too), and what she craves for dinner (teriaki chicken) is always the highlight, but there’s more. Here are two morsels I especially loved last night:

JenFW:
How about plotting, Sharon? How do you build the different parts of your stories?

I’m always curious about plot-building. It’s kind of an impossible question to answer, but it’s a great topic to discuss when you can.

Sharon M. Draper:
Plotting is like braiding hair. It’s hard to do, and hard to explain, but the result is something complicated and beautiful if you do it right.

Oh, and Sharon can! We all loved the analogy. And then people began to build on that plot…

Melissa Walker:
I love the braiding analogy! I was trying to layer something today and that’s EXACTLY it!

Janet Lee Carey:
I think of it that way, too, and the thing about braiding is you’re always bringing the strand to the center each time. That’s the core of the scene.

Melissa Walker:
And the braiding makes the individual strands so much stronger and fully formed. Love it.

Poll:
Growing up I wore braids.
( 50% )
I did not wear braids.
( 0% )
I still do!
( 50% )

And there you have it: an example of idea/plot-building right there in a discussion of plot building, all starting with a lovely analogy from our featured author. It’s fun to hang out with people who think like this!

And then there was this segment, again spawned by one of Sharon’s comments.

Sharon M. Draper:
I don’t think there’s one I wished I’d written. I just look for books that make me hug them because theyare so good.

Janet Lee Carey:
HAB = Hug A Book

lizgallagher:
I think we should make “Hug a book!” the new readergirlz motto.

Little Willow:
I smell a picture-taking campaign of book-hugging!

JenFW:
So re-reading a book is REHAB?

Little Willow:
That’s a good thing there, JenFW! No 12 steps… just 12 chapters. HA.

No one gets mad when you make jokey comments in the background. A 12-chapter rehab program…I’m laughing all over again and imagining silly scenarios of such a thing–and building plots around them. How can you not want to hang out with a group of people who want to host a book-hugging photo fest?

Next month’s book is Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld. Grab a copy, read up, and join next month’s chat.

Of course, I don’t have Leviathan, so I’m reading Scott’s Peeps instead. Hey, at least I have one of his books. I’m a needleworker–I’m used to making substitutions.

After seeing Tam’s blue blackwork bookmark on Monday’s Update post, Shelly asked for a definition of blackwork. Tam answered with this (I changed some words in the first sentence to accommodate a new link):

Hi Shelly,
You can find out all about it on the Practical Blackwork site. It has a wealth of information by Liadain with the historical context. Blackwork is mainly backstitch but put together is such a way that it forms intricate designs with lots of repetition of motifs. You can do it with one strand if you like light & delicate, 2 if you like it bolder (like me), throw in some colours or keep it monochrome. The patterns can be done over & over with various schemes so you can personalise it to your taste.
Tam

What a wonderful site! Thanks, Tam.

In a nutshell, Shell (couldn’t pass that up, now could I?), historically, Blackwork was done with black thread on cotton and linen garments, hence the name. But there’s also a style to it as Tam describes, and we can keep the style while changing the fiber, giving us blue blackwork and so on.

“Portrait of an Unknown Lady” circa 1587, attributed to John Bettes. The lady wears a magnificent wired cut-work collar, edged with lace, and sleeves richly embroidered with large blackwork floral motifs beneath gauze oversleeves. –from Blackwork Embroidery, by Elisabeth Geddes and Moyra McNeill, published by Dover Publications, 1976.

Don’t look for embroidery names and techniques to make sense. They don’t.

Fringed bookmark with a blackwork motif I got from Marion Scoular, who also teaches the technique. I was experimenting with diagonal fringe but couldn’t resist adding a little something stitchy in the center.

Blackwork appeals to me for a number of reasons: it’s pretty; it’s simple to execute, but can produce complex designs; and it can be a puzzle. You see, some blackwork is reversible. The diagonal-fringe bookmark is, for instance. It takes some thought–some puzzling–to figure out how to make the design the same on the front and back, and I love figuring that out!