Essence of the Sea

My Traveling Page for June was a little late . . . and I'm even later posting about it here.  I think it's worth the wait, though.  I had all kinds of fun working on this one!

This page was for Mandy and her theme is the Sea.

I’ve always had a deep affection for the sea. I suspect I would have chosen it for my theme if I had not already declared Doors! I was born and raised in Kansas – and have returned to it after years away – so I can’t really explain how I feel about ocean waves and sea creatures. The sea seems to cleanse my soul when I stand on the beach and I treasure memories of many vacations at the shore.

I have always wanted to do a piece featuring the seahorse. I started with the image from a seahorse stamp – sent to me by a friend when I admired her work – and stitched it on a separate piece of linen.

 

 

 

 

For the blue coral, I free motion stitched on dissolvable film and then tacked the finished product down before adding the seahorse.

 

 

For texture I twisted netting and couched it down and used an eyelash yarn in feather stitch. Once these main elements were in place, I went slightly crazy with embroidery stitches and beads! That’s my favorite part of working any piece.

 

Sometimes the back of the page is almost a disappointment after all the foofooraw on the front.  But this ocean print was made just for this project!

 

 

 

 

As often happens, this piece did not turn out exactly the way I had pictured it in my head. However, some areas are even better than I thought possible! At least I think so.   I hope Mandy does too.

July page is almost finished!  Just in time to start August.  LOL!