The end of the world

This weekend was my cousin’s 21st birthday party, so I decided to bust out some epic craft. Some months ago, after some conversation (and some none-too-subtle fishing), it was decided that embroidery would nicely fill the empty walls of her room, and that Frost’s Fire and Ice was an awesome poem, wasn’t it?

So, after an inordinately long time stitching, some fiddly framing and many failed attempts at photography, I present Fire and Ice:

Stitched mostly in white, on black 18 count Aida, this piece was definitely a challenge for my eyes! However, it’s not entirely monochrome. I managed to find some super-pale vairegated threads (orange and blue) for the words ‘fire’ and ‘ice’ – it’s not too clear in the photo, sadly, but it makes for a nice flicker of colour in person.

Happy 21st Birthday, Claire!

 

Cheerful misanthropy

I first read the poem Wishes of an elderly man about five years ago; it very much appealed to my sense of apathetic misanthropy. I also thought it was something that my Dad would appreciate. (I had to get my outlook on life somewhere, of course.)

So, when I was working out what to stitch for my Dad’s 50th birthday (other than lemmings, that is), this poem leapt swiftly to mind: