~ Tricks & Treats ~

Yes, I know.

early for Hallowe'en ~

but, 

when you're in my line of 'work'

you must be one step ahead of the season...

So

here is the 'almost' finish of one of two new punch needle designs I'll be releasing very soon:

BUT 

before I show you the entire design,

I thought I'd share a few tricks that I've learned in my 20+ years of doing punch needle ~

 a couple of simple ways to make your little loops behave better.

Some of you have asked me how I get my lettering so clear…

or how I avoid 'blending' the loops of the lettering with the loops of the background.

My simple answer would be to first be very careful of where your needle tip is going,

 being conscious of the existing loop underneath {or on the 'front' of your work} so that you don't accidentally splice the previous loop.

as you can see in the photo below, when I flipped my project over to the front ~ 

that has happened, and it does happen to everyone ~ OH YES IT DOES!

no matter how careful we are!

see?

where my sewing-needle is pointing to the letter 'm'

 and how I spliced the darker thread with the lighter thread while outlining it?

I do this to fix it:

I use that sewing-needle to gently work the blended threads apart!

 by carefully running the tip of a sewing-needle {or pin} along the 'channel' or 'ditch' between the contrasting rows of thread {this is the finished or front side of my work}

 it will seemingly be more defined, as you can see in the photo below.

YAY!

So that was trick number Uno.

trick numeral Deux is this:

when working with different height loops, or 'dimensional' punching

ALWAYS punch the lowest details of your work FIRST…

like the smiling Jack-o below, for example;

see how his eyes, nose & mouth have been punched on a lower setting?

by punching all of the low-looped details first, then moving on to the higher loops to fill,

you're left with a nice clear difference between the varying loop heights.

THEN if need be, 

use the sewing-needle tip that I mentioned above to define the rows

between low & high loops…

silly-grin

and here is tip #3 ~

sometimes I don't want to try to punch teeny tiny details such as eyeballs or teeth,

SO

I will use my sewing-needle again but this time it is threaded! 

and I will use it to surface-embroider those details instead

like:

eyeballs = french knots

teeth = super-small straight stitches

hello!

so those are my 'tricks' for you today ~

I know some of you who have taken my classes are familiar with these already ~

but thought I could be of help to those who are just starting on their journey into punch needle :)

Rain & humidity but almost cooler breezes today…

I swear I caught the fleeting scent of woodsmoke this morning.

~ Blessings from the Farm ~

 Lori