Now that I’ve completed the stitching for the thread-cutter cover from Carolyn Pearce’s book ‘Home Sweet Home: an embroidered workbox’, I need to assemble it – not my favourite occupation! I always think I’m going to ruin things at this point!
I apologise in advance for the quality of the images in this blog post – I was doing all this late at night, and the photos needed to be taken as I went along, to try to show the stages, but it’s not been very successful 😦
Anyway, here are all the pieces, cut out and ready to assemble. Stitched pieces (front and back) striped cotton for the lining, fine wadding (Pellon) to back the embroidery with, and two pieces of acetate to stiffen the front and back pieces (which you can hardly see in the photo).
Each embroidered piece is first attached along what will be the bottom edge of the cutter cover to the relevant lining piece.
A gathering stitch, using quilting cotton (the white thread in the photo) is made in the seam allowance of each joined piece. The piece of acetate is put behind the embroidered side, and the thread is gathered up, pulling the seam allowance over the acetate. The rest of the gathering thread, around the edge of the lining side, is supposed to help pull it into a curved shape so that it backs the acetate/embroidered side piece. This didn’t work too well!
But with a bit of fiddling, I managed to get the lining to fit the shape of the front piece, and slip-stitch the lining to the front around the edge, angling the stitches so that the lining piece was just a tiny bit smaller than the front. This way, the lining won’t show around the edges when I do the next bit.
The two embroidered/lining pieces are then put lining sides together, and slip-stitched all around the curved edge, leaving a half inch gap at the very top, for the hanging cord to go through later.
Next morning, I carried on with the assembly, the sun came out, and my photos were a lot better!
This is the thread-cutter cover once I had worked Knotted pearl stitch all around the curved edge, over the slip-stitches. Around the gap at the top, I worked the Knotted pearl stitch on both edges.
So, this is the front of the thread-cutter cover itself, once completed except for the decorative edging along the bottom edge, which I’m hoping to do next, before going on to making the hanging cord.
It’s coming out really nicely, isn’t it?!
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Janet Granger's Blog 
It looks great!
It’s looking very cute. I love the hive in particular.
I love this! So cute and charming. You’ve done a fantastic job finishing it!
On Thursday, 28 January 2016, Janet Grangers Blog wrote:
> Janet Granger posted: “Now that I’ve completed the stitching for the > thread-cutter cover from Carolyn Pearce’s book ‘Home Sweet Home: an > embroidered workbox’, I need to assemble it – not my favourite occupation! > I always think I’m going to ruin things at this point! I apolog” >
I love that you are assembling each item once sewn. It’s my least favourite part too and often things get left because they need assembling :(. But as with all the items for this workbox, the thread cutter cover is so pretty and charming. You’re doing such a good job of all these pieces.
If I left all the assembly until the end, I don’t think I could face doing it!