I need some embroidery thread for a project, so I go into my art room and grab the bag of floss. There is an exact shade of burgundy I am pretty sure is in there, and I need it quick, so I tip out the bag and reach out my hand -
- to be confronted with this.
A pretty selection of colours, to be sure, lovingly wrapped close about each other, twining and matting together. Some are still in their skeins, some are wound onto cardboard bobbins, some rolled into balls. Once I planned to wind them all onto bobbins and I cut multiple small pieces of cardboard. I got through about three skeins and realised: this is boring! And it will take forever. I shoved the leftover bobbins in the bag and resolved to do it while watching a really great dvd one day. Of course that day never came.
Back to the art room, and I am standing there, staring at my flossy mess and it suddenly occurs to me: I could put them in separate plastic bags! A little bird outside the window starts singing hallelujah, my heart lifts and I know my purpose in life. I grab a packet of small ziplock bags and start stuffing.
Skeins go in. Balls go in. Messy tangled bunches go in. If the skein wrapping has fallen off, it just goes in the bag too! If you have separated off four strands for embroidery and only used half, the rest just gets wound up and put in the bag too! No more little piles of half-used embroidery thread that you can't remember what skein it came off and they all gather up together and get tangled and eventually you just throw them out.
Then comes the fun part: colour theming! I put orange/yellow together, pink, red, brown, separate out all the different shades of green. All the colour groups go in their own larger ziplock bag. (but what would really be wonderful is an ornately carved wooden box, with lift out compartments, and each colour would have its own compartment...)
Done, with a sigh of satisfaction. (Seriously... it is winter here, long and cold, and I will take a little piece of happiness wherever I can find it!)
PS. I did eventually get on with my embroidery project - more on that in the next post.
- to be confronted with this.A pretty selection of colours, to be sure, lovingly wrapped close about each other, twining and matting together. Some are still in their skeins, some are wound onto cardboard bobbins, some rolled into balls. Once I planned to wind them all onto bobbins and I cut multiple small pieces of cardboard. I got through about three skeins and realised: this is boring! And it will take forever. I shoved the leftover bobbins in the bag and resolved to do it while watching a really great dvd one day. Of course that day never came.
Back to the art room, and I am standing there, staring at my flossy mess and it suddenly occurs to me: I could put them in separate plastic bags! A little bird outside the window starts singing hallelujah, my heart lifts and I know my purpose in life. I grab a packet of small ziplock bags and start stuffing.
Skeins go in. Balls go in. Messy tangled bunches go in. If the skein wrapping has fallen off, it just goes in the bag too! If you have separated off four strands for embroidery and only used half, the rest just gets wound up and put in the bag too! No more little piles of half-used embroidery thread that you can't remember what skein it came off and they all gather up together and get tangled and eventually you just throw them out.
Then comes the fun part: colour theming! I put orange/yellow together, pink, red, brown, separate out all the different shades of green. All the colour groups go in their own larger ziplock bag. (but what would really be wonderful is an ornately carved wooden box, with lift out compartments, and each colour would have its own compartment...)Done, with a sigh of satisfaction. (Seriously... it is winter here, long and cold, and I will take a little piece of happiness wherever I can find it!)
PS. I did eventually get on with my embroidery project - more on that in the next post.
Wow! I can feel your joy in accomplishing such a pretty task! Don't you love color? I find playing around with color sweet and sacred. That's what you did! Oh, I found your blog through Gillybean . . . I like it!
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