Simple Kantha Coasters for Two

Today is quite a busy day. Besides the usual home chores, I have several orders to send out in the afternoon, so I spent the first half of the day packing and printing labels. I am using DHL e-com and FedEx to shipping out my Etsy orders. 

Sometimes, we're scared to start something new because we're so comfortable in our current situation. This is what's been happening to me in the past year or so. As much as I enjoy making wallets and small bags, I truly miss the joy of "just create" something! Experimenting with my crafts and sharing joy with others. And if you're an Etsy seller, sometimes the pressure is more. You feel like everybody is doing much better than you, especially if you spend more time on social media (Instagram or Facebook). This year, it will be about me enjoying making my craft. I will not take too many custom orders so that I will have more time to learn new things, experiment, and sharing a few tutorials or sewing tips with you all. 

Ok, so this is what I've been working on after the Heartbeat Kantha Coasters! I have this beautiful block print fabric and want to make something with it. I guess, when you start your first step, the inspiration will just flow into your brain. I know I wanted to do more kantha but not sure what design. I wanted something simple and one day after dinner, I thought, why not using the design from the fabric, and this simple linen Kantha coaster is born. The design is about 3" in diameter and the inner circle is about 1" in diameter (I used my machine's bobbin to draw the circle). I used tricot interfacing for these coasters. I'll write more about it in my next post, Insha Allah. And if you want to try the design, be my guest! I'm trying to draft the template, hopefully, I'll have more time this week to complete it. 

Kantha and Block Print Coasters

I sent out 2 sets of Kantha coasters today and I'm so happy and grateful for the response I received on my small quilt shop! I really love making these small quilted coasters and practicing my hand quilting while I binge-watching my C-Drama on Viki after dinner. 

    

A customer wanted a round and rectangular coaster set. The round coaster was a bit of a challenge to do in a kawandi style of quilting, but it was a great experience. Maybe I will make a few more round coasters. Hmm, another idea to try! 

It's been quite cold in the past few days but today is better. After dealing with couriers almost the whole afternoon, I decided to make muffins but didn't turn out so good, because I found out afterward that the oven was set on upper heat only. This is why you should not multitask or arguing with your son while baking LOL. But the boys enjoyed it, anyway. I need to lookup more muffin recipes! 

That's all for today. Thank you for stopping by! 

Take care & stay safe!

Elvira

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Kantha - More Than Just a Running Stitch

 

my first Kantha Embroidery

I joined a Kantha Embroidery Online Workshop early this month. It was a 3-day workshop and I really had a great time learning. 

Brinda Ma'am and Nafisa are really patient with all of us and encourage us to take our time. I was pretty slow with my progress cos it was a busy week for me. 

We started making a sampler stitch on day one. It's amazing to learn that all the beautiful Kantha designs are done only with one simple stitch. The art of creating design with one stitch is really challenging. Creatively challenging! Kantha is an embroidery art which is originated in Bengal (West Bengal, Orissa, Tripura, and Bangladesh). 

The purpose of doing a sampler stitch is to familiarize us with the stitches and flow of work since it's different from regular embroidery. I have not done embroidery for years so the sampler really helped me. As I progress I noticed, my stitches are getting better. I used poplin cotton fabric and 3 strands of embroidery thread. 

Once we're done with the sampler, we moved on to work on a design. We were given 4 designs by Nafisa and I chose this one below.  Nafisa and Brinda Ma'am kept telling us to take our time deciding what stitch we want to use in our design. That way everyone will have a different result. It's really inspiring to see others embroidery even though we're using the same design but the end results are different. You can check others' works on the Moments of Quiet Facebook Page.

If you're interested to join the workshop, check out Moments of Quiet Facebook Page 

While Kantha is widely popular, it is also loosely interpreted as just a big running stitch in quilting, which is basically not. Kantha is more intricate than that. 

Nafisa showed us her 100 years old Kantha quilt belongs to her great-great-grandfather and also a few samples of Nakshi Kantha of Bangladesh. 

Nakshi Kantha (Source: ich.unesco.org)

Kantha tells the story of cultures and history. While the Indian Kantha has evolved in terms of design, including animal and intricate floral patterns, the Bangladesh Nakshi Kantta still sticks to the original Kantha with geometric patterns. 

I am glad I decided to join the class. Learning the history behind this ancient art is really refreshing. There are several books available on Amazon which I think I'll buy. Thank you Brinda Ma'am and Nafisa for the great workshop! 

Here's our virtual selfie moment! Learning and sewing with others are really fun! I'm looking forward to join in more online workshops! 

Thank you for stopping by! I hope you enjoy your visit to my blog.

Happy Crafting,

Elvira

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