Next Years Challenge

With only 4 more stitches to go its time to sort out what we will be doing next year. Last week I asked for preferences as to what people wanted as a challenge next year. Comments have been coming in all week and can it can be easily seen that the majority want a design challenge each month. So that is what it will be.

On the 1st of each month I will post key concept and the challenge will be to take the idea, develop it and push it towards a resolved design during the month. In other words you interpret the idea and apply it to fiber.

For those that don’t like themes I will post a colour scheme or a design element like a shape, to develop into a resolved design. This means every month there will be two options. If you don’t like the concept you can work the colour scheme or is you don’t like the colour scheme you can work with the concept. Or you can work with both.

For those who have been participating in TAST you will be able to take the time to develop skills at another level. For those who have not participated in TAST you can still jump in.

I am calling the challenge “Take it Further ” because it is one thing to learn stitches and another to apply them to a design. It’s the next step in taking a skill further along a creative path.

The actual thing you design can be any medium or format you choose. It can be a crazy quilt block, a postcard, a journal quilt, a piece of embroidery, a sampler, a fabric book page or whatever sparks your imagination. I will even include visual journal work in this. In other words pages spreads of designs worked in a visual journal will be seen as a valid entry and included as one of the formats acceptable for the challenge.

What ever you choose to do, you need blog your development of the idea through the month (preferably weekly) and to leave a comment here with your web address so that people can visit your site and see what you have done.

Now it is important to get the word out so please blog it, or if you are on a discussion list perhaps you can mention it with a link to this challenge page I have set up. Using this page means people can find information about it easily. The URL is http://sharonb.wordpress.com/take-it-further-challenge/

I would appreciate it as the more people who know about it the better.

If you have any ideas or questions leave a comment as the finer details are still flexible and can be shaped to what people will find interesting.

For those that wanted the stash reduction challenge I still plan to reduce, declutter and get hopefully a lot of work done next year. I will be posting regularly about it and if you are going through the same process there is no reason why you can’t let people know in the comments. If enough people do it it might shape itself into another challenge and we can formalise it.

TAST this week
Knotted Cable chain is a variety of Cable chain. Hopefully people will be familiar with cable chain stitch (week 36) and twisted chain.

Knotted Cable chain is used as a linear stitch on both plain and even-weave fabrics. The texture of the knot between chain stitches creates an interesting textured line. As with basic chain stitch this version follows curves well and can even be worked solidly as a filling stitch.

Bring the needle up through the fabric and work a twisted chain stitch on the line you want to work.

Slip the needle under the top thread above the twist. Do not pick up any fabric when you do this.

Take the needle through the loop and pull until the loop lies flat but not tight on the fabric

Insert the needle back into where it first came out.


Take the needle through the fabric bringing the point of the needle out a short space along the line to be stitched. With the thread wrapped under the needle point pull the needle through the fabric.

Pull the thread through the fabric and you have created your first knotted cable chain stitch.

Make a small twisted chain stitch just bellow the larger chain.

Take the needle under the twist and repeat the steps along the row

This is another quick and versatile stitch. You can also lace and thread this stitch in various ways taking advantage of structure of the stitch by threading either the knot or the chain.

That’s it for this week. Remember to swing by and leave a comment preferably on this page, so that people can follow the link and see what you have done. There is a Take a stitch Tuesday flickr group which you can browse and enjoy your stitching!