Sewing With Nancy

Redwork embroidery hand- stitched on white cotton fabric gets its name from the colorfast thread developed in Turkey more than 200 years ago. I think we can just about picture dish towels and quilts adorned with this embroidery. Today's Nancy's Corner guest, whose quilts were on display at the Quilt Expo in Madison, Wisconsin, pays homage to her past with her amazing handiwork. One of the very traditional types of quilting includes embroidery, and Deanna Waltz is my guest who's going to talk to us about Redwork. And, Deanna, Redwork in quilting as an interesting history. Could you give our viewers a little synopsis of that? Redwork started in the 1870's. Before that, there was embroidery, but the red thread would often bleed. Mm-hmm. So at that time, in Turkey, they developed the floss called "Turkey red" and it no longer bled. It was a safe floss to use, and that was the start of Redwork embroidery. And it became very popular. Right. And it still has many people using this beautiful embroidery technique. Yes. Yes. It's had a resurgence, just lately even. You started a few years ago. Yes. Tell our viewers how you began doing this. When I was about nine years old, my mother taught me how to embroider. And many of us started on a dishtowel with a little piece of fruit embroidered on that. And I've been embroidering ever since and I love doing it. So most of my quilts have some embroidery on them some place. Now, the quilt behind us is spectacular, and it includes many designs, embroidery designs from the past. Yes. Yes. And this pattern is made from a reproduction. It's a reproduction of an old coverlet. Some people have bought these coverlets, taken the patterns off of them. And I happened to get it second hand. I'd been looking for it for years, but was lucky enough to find it in a quilt shop. And it's the only quilt that I've ever kept track of my time on, and it took me 487 hours to put the patterns on and do the embroidery, and then 57 skeins of floss were used in the quilt. Then you have a friend that helps you do the quilting. Right. My friend Barbara Hochstetler, an Amish friend from Northern Wisconsin, does most of my hand quilting. It's a spectacular design, and I think what's fascinating about it is the designs include portraits of presidents, presidents' wives. Yes. Interesting motifs. Right. History. History plus maybe there will be a crane or an animal depicted, birds. I think the peacock is especially showy. It's very flamboyant. Yes, it is. Now, I couldn't help but notice but Deanna goes every place with a little embroidery. Yes. Because I embroider in such a tiny hoop, it's real easy to take it with me. I take it to the doctor's office. I take it wherever I go, especially in the car. And I get hours of embroidery in. Now, you're using Bluework this time. Blue on blue floss. On off-white. On off-white. And your stitch that you use primarily is? Is a backstitch. So tiny, little backstitches that are traditionally done. It's hard to do in front of the camera, but, boy, beautiful work, even, even consistency. Thank you. But of course, you've had a little practice. Yes, a long time. Not always do you have just a whole cloth. Right. Right. Usually I-- that's the only whole cloth I did. Okay. So here we have some traditional piecing with the "Churn Dash" and then a little touch of embroidery. Very sweet. Oh, thank you, thank you. Yes. Now, the other quilt that we'd like to showcase is an "Amish Christmas." Right. Right. Now, tell our viewers about the designs along the perimeter are traditional Redwork. Right, right. And those patterns came together in a package, and I did the embroidered blocks. And then I asked a friend whose daughter is an artist if she would make the center piece for me. And she drew the Amish scene, a Christmas scene, from just looking at those other blocks. So I get patterns from many different places, and that happened to be a hand-drawn pattern there. Well, Deanna, your works are works of art, and what a treasure. Thank you. Good to see such intricate designs, such wonderful execution of an art. So, thank you for being an embroiderer and a quilter. Thank you so much for having me, too. You're welcome. Thank you for joining us today for the first episode of "Beginning Landscape Quilting." If you'd like to re-watch this program or any recent episode, go to

www.NancyZieman.com

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