Hey friends!
Happy Friday! This week I’ve got a new embroidered butterfly to share with you…
Last week I posted all about my recent experience of raising and caring for nine Peacock butterflies – a very pretty red fellow with large eye spots reminiscent of peacock feathers, I became so attached to the caterpillars and then later the butterflies in my care that I couldn’t help but want to create a needlework version as I really missed them once I released them into the wild.
Hey friends!
Last week I posted a One Frame of a Pearl-bordered fritillary – a beautiful black and orange creature who usually lives among the scrub on Bodmin moor, I felt so unbelievably blessed to not only have actually seen so many up close but to have gotten a couple of great photos as well! It goes without saying that a needlework version wasn’t going to be too long in the making!! (its #7 on my embroidered butterfly challenge.)
Hey friends!
A couple of weeks ago I posted a One Frame of a Speckled wood butterfly – a rather pretty brown and cream chap who usually lives in the woods, I felt so super excited to have seen one of these so early in the year that I couldn’t help but want to create a needlework version.
A Speckled wood has a real life wingspan of almost 5cm. There isn’t too much difference between and males and females so I just made the one – but might add another to this post later. All in all my needlework version has a wingspan of about 10cm to keep it inline with my ‘twice life size’ scale.
Hey friends!
Are you enjoying the last of the summer sunshine?
A while ago I posted a Complete Lifecycle of the Large white and then a couple of weeks ago I shared a One frame of two Small white butterflies mating…I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for cabbage butterflies – purely because of the fact that they’re treated as pests, in my mind it makes ‘em a bit of an underdog.
I thought that as they’re so similar I’d create both types in needlework at the same time, so this is both #4 and #5 on my Embroidered Butterfly challenge – only 53 more to go!!!
Similar to my Orange tip butterflies, you can easily distinguish between the two sexes of both types and can clearly see the size difference as well. They’re white with black wingtips (although the female have slightly creamy lower wings) and I thought it would be fun to create both a male and female, size wise the little pair of Small whites are about 7cm across (so they’re slightly smaller than the others I’ve already made!) While the Large whites have a wingspan of almost 14cm!! The body of each one has a crocodile clip sewn on so that I can attach the butterflies to plants, but I’ve also been wearing them in my hair.
Continue reading “Embroidered Butterfly #4 & #5 {Large & Small White}”
Hey friends!
**This post was edited on 17/5/24 as I’ve remade the butterfly and updated the pictures**
How ya doing?
I’ve got a new embroidered butterfly to share with you this week as we’re coming to the end of the Butterfly Count. Over the last six weeks I’ve been raising twelve Painted lady caterpillars (I did a post on them a couple of weeks ago) who all successfully pupated into beautiful butterflies that are now living out free in the big wide world and I couldn’t resist the chance to create a needlework one!!
So this is #3 on my Embroidered Butterfly challenge. Seeing as there are 61 types of butterflies in the UK I’ve got quite a few more to do.
Hello my friends!
**This post was edited on 17/5/24 as I’ve remade the butterflies and updated the pictures**
How ya doing?
I’ve got a new butterfly embroidery to share this week. I recently got the chance to be the adoptive parent of some Orange tip butterfly pupae – I did a post on them a couple of weeks ago (links at the bottom incase you fancy giving it a read!)
So this is #2 on my Embroidered Butterfly challenge. According to Butterfly Conservation there are 61 types of butterflies in the UK.
Hello friends!
**This post was edited on 17/5/24 as I’ve remade the butterfly and updated the pictures**
I’ve got a new butterfly embroidery to share this week. I’m really happy with the Small tortoiseshell photograph (that I posted last week!) I particularly love this type of butterfly, they always seem so happy – don’t get me wrong all butterflies seem happy, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who didn’t like/was scared of them (not that there’s anything wrong in that of course).
So now I’ve created a few practice versions of these I have decided to give myself a bit of a challenge…I’m gonna have a go at creating all 61 types of British butterflies…in scale with each other!
That’s right in scale!!
Yep I’ve gone and got cabin fever cos its been raining too long! I mean honestly it’s been persisting pretty much everyday since the middle of February.
Hello my friends!!
This week I thought I’d post a new embroidery that I’ve been working on.
Looking back at the Gatekeeper butterfly photographs (that I posted last week!) I decided to embroider one similar to my other needlework butterflies – I’m developing quite a collection of needlework bugs/insects.
As always I started by roughly drawing four wing and body shapes onto calico and then filled them in with the closest coloured threads I had. I like to block colour first using two stands of embroidery floss and then blend using a single strand (on the smallest needle imaginable – its like a hair!)
Continue reading “Embroidered Gatekeeper butterfly”
Hello friends!
This week I thought I’d post about some new needlework pieces that I’ve been creating on. Last year I fell so in love with bumble bees that I embroidered one (in fact I posted a new bumble bee embroidery only a few weeks ago!) and thought that as I’ve been captivated by the ladybird beetles why not sew one and add it to my ever expanding collection of insect needlework (in the end I created two!)
Usually I start all my needlework pieces the same way – by roughly drawing onto the calico and then its all sewn free hand using a single strand of coloured floss at a time onto a hoop and then sewn in teeny tiny little stitches. I’ve tried to sew them to look as round as possible.
I’m really pleased with these little ladybirds each piece is about an inch across so they’re very small, due to their size each one only took about 30 minutes to create from start to finish and its quite nice to have a quick and easy craft on hand for when the nights begin to get longer.
Up close the beetles are tiny – needlework is so soothing and I find its a really good stress/anxiety reliever.
Continue reading “Embroidered ladybird beetles”
Hello my friends!!
I hope the week treated you well!
This week I thought I’d post a new embroidery that I’ve been working on. Looking back at the bumble bee photographs (that I posted last week!) I decided to embroider one similar to my the needlework bee (that I posted last year).
A short but delicate art post this week…I’ve embroidered a new bumblebee! Very much like the one I created last year but the wings are in a different position.
As always I started by drawing the shapes onto calico and then filled them in with the closest coloured threads I had. For the bee I like to start in the centre of the body and work out in layers, using one stand of embroidery floss (on the smallest needle imaginable – its like a hair!).
Continue reading “Another Embroidered bumble bee”
ArtyMissK 
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