Brazilian embroidery

This is my attempt at Brazilian style Embroidery.
The first time I came across this style JDR Brazilian Elegance about six months back, I was stunned.



The double cast on stitch I used for the flower in 2 shades of purple and a bead in the center turned out quite well. And naturally, I am pleased.
The cast on stitch in red is a bit irregular and shabby.
The bullion flower looks better than I expected.

I love the flower worked in Bullion tipped lazy daisy stitch.
The drizzle stitch flower in variegated purple looks better in the picture than it actually looks. I think its unruly behaviour takes a bit of getting used to.

As for the red flower in detached buttonhole stitch, I need to practice the stitch some more.
The pistil stitch in pink is barely visible.
The leaves, I worked in stacked stem with a few French knots scattered along the edge.
The tiny bead flower I tried out after seeing a design in JDR Brazilian elegance.

In the JDR Brazilian Elegance's teaching kits, the focus is on how to use the different stitches unique to this style.
The cast on stitch, the double cast on stitch and the drizzle stitch are clearly explained in Sharon’s stitch dictionary.
The bullion tipped daizy stitch, I picked up from a tutorial by Sunshine in JDR Brazilian elegance. You can join Brazilian embroidery tutorial 101 to get free instruction in your mail.

The Embroiderer's Garden

Just returned from teaching Kutchwork to a batch of 7 students. It was a 4 day course. 5 out of the 7 mastered the technique. They want me to extend the duration to atleast one more day to clear all their doubts. So, I'll be busy tomorrow also.
After that who knows, they may sign up for my other courses.

I bought a couple of books on my trip to Chennai last week.

The Embroiderer's garden by Thomasina Beck is one.
I bought it because after reading so many craft blogs I noticed that most avid embroiderers are also avid gardeners. The title naturally made me curious and after browsing through it, I simply had to have the book. As the title implies, there are all sorts of wonderful gardens done in applique, counted thread, blackwork, brazilian stlye. There are no instructions. Plenty of ideas for compositions and some very striking examples but no instructions. Nevertheless it is a good book.

The second book is The Anchor Book of hardanger Embroidery. It contains dom 40 stitches and motifs.