Found in our mailbox–this envelope from Australia. When I saw that it was from Maureen, my heart dropped. Oh no, I thought, she has sent me a fabric card and there’s no way I can reciprocate.
But when I opened the envelope, I saw, in a plastic baggie, first this:
And my heart leapt. She had sent a card for June, whom I visit every Wednesday and take to church in her wheelchair every Sunday.
Some months ago I got June started making stitches on a doodle cloth. Each week I photographed her work and showed it to Maureen, who saw the most wonderful images in June’s doodling, which I reported to June.
Although June has lost interest in doodling (and gained interest in other activities she’d declined previously), she remembers Maureen. She was delighted when she saw this card.
It is so delicately stitched, mostly with single strands of floss, and tiny beads. With the card I took a framed snapshot of Maureen, which June has in her room.
Now, when I first looked at the plastic baggie and saw the card for June, I turned it over and saw this card:
And when I opened the baggie, I discovered two cards. This one was for Ernie and me.
I tried to figure out how Maureen had crafted this card, and wrote what I thought, asking her to tell me how she’d made it. She wrote back:
“I got a download pattern for the deer for embroidery. When I did the felted version I sent a photo back to the designer, who liked it.
“I used a piece of wool batting , the size of the postcard, overlaid ordinary white felt at the bottom and needlepunched them together. I added pieces of white fluffy wool and needle punched again; I cut deer from ordinary fawn felt and again punched, then did fly stitches with 2/1? strands DMC. I had bought several hanks of variegated mohair knitting yarn – funny stuff that is spun tightly for about 8 inches and then barely a twist to it for at least 8 inches. I cut it up for mixed media things, so for the tree I laid a deep shade for the trunk and arranged greens over that and once again set my little punch to work.
“A couple of years ago I was asked to make a quilt from re-cycled pin striped clothing for a Country Bumpkin book (the Editor was in our Aussie group and asked several of us to do different crafts for the book). Boy that was a true miracle that I did it, found the measurements worked Perfectly and not only did I get paid but received the quilt back too. Finally got paid last year (company notoroius apparently as being slow but good payers). From the proceeds I bought a 5-needle punch and brush and have had great fun with it. My DD3 used it recently and was so pleased with it I bought her one as well.
“Thinking of the deer card, I wondered what the pale green swags were….LOL The stitch is Palestrina but I can’t remember what thread it is in.”
(I had been unable to identify the teeny, tiny stitches of the swags.)
Later she wrote:
“By the way, the deer postcard was a freebie for needlework, which I translated to felt. I got it here http://bustleandsew.blogspot.com/2010/11/woodland-friends-at-christmas-project.html”
If you would like to see more of Maureen’s beautiful work, go to her blog or to her Flickr site.
Well, Maureen’s cards have brought pleasure to many people, as I carried them around and showed them left and right to others where I visit June. So they brought me double pleasure–in seeing them and having one for myself, and in showing them to others.
