I've been working on an embroidery of a flying monkey from The Wizard of Oz. I knew I wanted to play with some fun stitches, and his fur and the embroidery on his outfit seemed like a great way to experiment with some new techniques.
I learned a new stitch for this project called the Hungarian braided chain stitch, and I thought I'd share it with you as a tutorial. It creates a really lovely textured, raised line that seemed perfect to decorate the monkey's little cap.
Start with a small straight stitch at the beginning of your design line.
Bring your needle up a little ways down the design line and pass it through the straight stitch from step one.
Bring your needle back down through the same hole you just came up, making a chain stitch.
Bring your needle up through the fabric a little bit further down your design line, and pass the needle through the small straight stitch from step one.
Bring your needle back down through the same hole, making another chain stitch, but this time, leave the chain loose so you can still see the first chain stitch you made.
Again, bring the needle up a little further down your design line. Pass the needle through the first chain stitch you made, keeping the needle on top of the loop from the second chain stitch.
With the needle still in place, tighten the thread from the second chain stitch (the one that you kept loose before).
Bring your needle back down through the same hole, again making a chain stitch and keeping it loose so that you can still see the previous chain stitch.
Pass the needle through the previous chain stitch, again keeping the needle above the loop of the loose chain stitch. Keep repeating the previous two steps along your design line. Once you get the chain going, it's very easy to continue.
When you're ready to finish your line, just bring the needle to the back of the fabric through the hole you just came through, and pull the thread tight. All done!
I'm enjoying this piece quite a bit and am looking forward to playing with more stitches as I move along. I've never stitched feathers before, so I'm sure it will be a fun challenge!