ITAD 2010 Celebration Competition

Our 2010 ITAD celebration competition has now closed. Thanks to everyone that enetered by sharing your love of our craft and celebrating International Temari Appreciation Day. I am pleased to announce the winners of our two prizes.

The first winner was the Gifted Hands Group of Cary, NC, USA. They set up a wonderful library display and had some temari demonstrations too. Your prize is the one featured on the competition post.

The second winner was Rosa from Bundaberg, Qld, Australia. Rosa shared a wonderful story too. Your prize has been kindly donated by Barbara  Suess from Kiku Designs.

I will contact you both privately so you can recieve your prizes in the mail.

I hope you both enjoy your prizes.

Progressive Temari Project 2010 - Free Pattern

One of the activities I imagined up for ITAD was a progressive stitch along project.  The goal was to add one step at a time, with a different person adding each new step. I put the call out for participants on the Temari Challenge list and we had 7 participants sign up: Rod B, Kristy S, Laura B, Rebecca from Perth, Kat from IL, Barb S and Debi A. We decided to keep the project cheap and cheerful by describing the colours as well as giving the product codes, doing this allowed everyone to choose the best option from their own stash.

Here is the pattern for the temari we designed together.

Debi's completed temari

Step 1: Rod suggested:

Base size: 30cm  Mari colour: off-white/cream

Step 2: Kristy suggested:

C8 division, marked in pale gold. Nordic Gold ND1

Step 3: Laura suggested:
Using 2 colors of green 240 and 859 Anchor Perle #5 (the colors are a medium olive color and a lighter mint julep-y color), locate the 6 part triangles and stitch a sakasa uwagake triangle. To do this begin stitching 1/2 way point (between the side and the center) on the short lines. You will stitch 6 rows beginning with the darker green and alternating colours with each row, ending with the lighter green. This will give a corner border to each of the squares. If you are unfamiliar with this stitch you can read about how to stitch it on
temarikai.

Step 4: Rebecca suggested:
Using a puplish blue 791 DMC Perle #5 stitch two interlocking rows of Uwagake Chidori Kagari around the six 8-part squares to form a 4 petal shape. The outer points are stitched on the short lines just outside the square (at the 4part diamond) and inner points are stitched 1.25cm from the center on the long lines. Make the first row with slightly loose tension. On the second row drop the inner points down by stitching at 1.75cm from the pole. This will result in a 5mm straight stitch at the center. If you are unfamiliar with this stitch you can read about how to stitch it on temarikai. I recommend numbering each of the six centers so they are stitched in the same sequence on each row.

Step 5: Kat suggested:
Add another 3 rounds, this time in maroon, on the Uwagake Chidori Kagari, previously started in dark blue. In this case, I did one round around each center, noting the order as I went, then the second round in the same order as the first, the third round same way.

Step 6: Barb suggested:
Add one more row to the 4 petal Kiku herringbone design in medium blue, Anchor 129.

Step 7: Debi suggested:

 Add a starburst in the negative space of the four petaled flowers. Use the bluish/purple color that Rebecca suggested to make a starburst with long stitches that fill up the space and follow the contours created by the point overlaps. I kept mine rather sparse with only 8 stitches (or 16 points to the starburst). To tie the colors together add a small X stitch over the center using the blue from Barb's row.
 
 
I must say a huge thank you to everyone who joined in on this project. The temari we made together is gorgeous. It was really fun... maybe we can do this again sometime.

Rosa's 10 year service call

Ten years ago Rosa fromBundaberg, Australia, spent 9 weeks in Scotland when her mother had an accident while holidaying there.  Almost every day she made a temari and gave it away. The temari pictured above was given to the lady in the bed opposite her mother’s while she was in a ward and not in Intensive Care. The lady lived in Leichester (England) was also on holidays in Scotland when she hurt her back.  In September this year Rosa and her husband called to see the lady in Leichester and she bought out the ball.  The hanging cord had come loose and she had not hung it up for some years. Rosa mended it for her and back it went on her lounge door handle.   Rosa said "It was lovely to be able to make a house call to repair it after 10 years."

Temari can be an amazing gift of friendship (and also an excellent way to make new friends).

Thanks for sharing this story Rosa.

Update from Tiny's Exhibition in The Netherlands

This photo is from my exhibition which opened on 22 October. This is Mrs Tegelberg, who is a representative from the Japanese garden in Den Helder. After the opening She received a temari in the ITAD design.

This is a small overview of a nice corner and 3 you see to small boxes decorating with temari on a background. I used 30 black boxes decorated with different extra decoration, like a picture, some nuts and beans and also some with origami . See Tiny's website for more information and photographs.

Thanks Tiny for making this wonderful exhibition for temari to celebrate ITAD.

A spotlight on Temari in Queensland

Kristy from Queensland, Australia, works in a museum, and has kindly organised a small display for ITAD. Part of this museum showcases fading heritage trades like blacksmithing, leadlighting, silversmithing, felting etc...  At one time the art of Temari making almost faded away too but thanks to the support of a growing number of temari makers around the world, those old skills are being learned by new generations of people everywhere.

Kristy has also provided her local craft shop some temari leaflets, started writing her own blog, and will also help three ladies try out temari. Kristy told me "ITAD was a great idea and really gave me the ooomph to push the temari out there in ways I hadn't thought of before".


Go to the Flickr site to see Kristy's photos.
 
Congratulations Kristy and thank you for sharing temari making.

Temari Exhibition in The Netherlands

Tiny has made an exhibition of temari making at a gallery near Den Helder. It opens on October 22 and includes Tiny's own temari and those of students from Tiny's hometown.  The name of the gallery is called Galerie-Potterie 't Tiende Kind. Look a this beautiful poster Tiny has to promote the show.

Tiny will take some photos of the exhibition when it commences. They will be at Tiny's website, here is the link.  Thank you to Tiny and your students for making such a wonderful event for International Temari Appreciation Day.

Gifted Hands Shares the Art of Temari

This photo shows the Temari display that our local EGA chapter, Gifted Hands of Cary, set up for one of our local libraries in North Carolina, USA. We will be giving a Temari demonstration, actually showing how to create a Temari, at the same library on Oct. 30th. Our group is Gifted Hands of Cary which is a chapter of Embroidery Guild of America.

Thank you to Jeannie's group for sharing the love of temari making for International Temari Appreciation Day.

66 days to go.

Tiny from The Netherlands is organising an exhibition on the 22 of October which will show case temari made by Tiny and students in Den Helder. The name of the gallery is “het tiende kind” and is situated near Tiny's home town. See Tiny's website in the links right or here.

If you are planning a special event which you would like to let everyone know about please contact me and I will post a note about it.