eb-sb - finished...?

 suddenly the deadline was looming so i had to put some extra needle-time into completing my piece 

a meeting with a friend inspired some bird's footprint markings - i felt this simple stitch form hinted at more earth/sky links and a sense of transition

some additional dyeing of threads helped to increase my colour range - i don't know what mordant i need for using madder on silk, but as i had no alum i boiled some distilled water in an old alluminium pan and left it simmering, then standing over night, adding the silk thread during the simmer phase - i know madder prefers hard water so i added a little chalk to some of our (very hard) tap water, which had been left to stand for other purposes) to allow the added chlorine to "evaporate" or whatever - i was fairly pleased with the resulting red/orange colour, used near the top left of this picture

across the middle, the yellowish/green stitching is fine silk dyed with the carrot tops - but to achieve the more greenish shade in lower right corner i resorted to comercial silk dyes, heavily diluted

i started to "kantha" stitch areas, not sure whther i would fill all the blank areas - as i progressed i felt that i should limit it, using it to add a sense of movement with texture - this felt right and gave me a chance to consider what i wanted to add in other areas

the end result is a surprise to me, but as i had no real plan, i suppose that is only to be expected

it's now a piece i would be happy to hang, but am prepared to send in to the project if and when the time is right