Dollhouse Miniature NAVAJO BURNTWATER: 44,625 stitches were accomplished

WHAT A RELIEF! I've finished stitching my Navajo Burntwater rug today! 44,625 stitches!

I need to call it Burntbrain rug - this rug gave me a little bit of headache when it came to choosing the colors. I spent so far $100 on the silk thread (Gloriana silk is very expensive), trying to match the colors, but I think it was worth it. What do you think?

The rug was stitched on 40 count silk gauze, with Gloriana silk thread, 10 colors. It measures 4.5" x 6.5" (11 x 16 cm) and has 44,625 stitches. It took my one month to complete it.

More close-up pictures:

This is how the back side of the rug looks like:

I haven't blocked (stretched) the rug yet - that's why it still looks a little bit crooked, because there is still some silk gauze left that I can use probably for Navajo throw pillows. I will try to finish them this week and will let you know.

have a great day!

Best regards,

Natalia

CONVERSATION WITH GOD: Perfect Imperfection

I finished building a table for my project "Conversation with God" during last weekend. I painted it blue to match the color of the windows, and actually my grandma's table was painted blue too. Then I aged it. You can see that the table is missing 2 parts at the bottom, and, of course it happened not because I was out of scraps of wood. The real table was missing those parts too.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Navajo Burntwater Rug, 1:12th scale

One more week has passed by. November is almost over - WOW!!! time is flying!

I worked on my Navajo Burntwater hard only last 2 days.
Yesterday it looked like this

and today it has absolutely different look. What do you think? Is it too many colors?

I hope I will finish it this coming week.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Navajo Burntwater Rug, 1:12th scale

Winter has come to our city. My week was not very busy and it allowed me to spend more time working on my Navajo Burntwater rug. You probably can notice a huge difference in the progress. I am a half way done with this rug. Just want to remind you that I am working on 40 count silk gauze with Gloriana over dyed silk, the size of the rug will be 5" x 7". So far 8 colors were used, I am planning to add 4-5 different shadows more.

At the same time I am working on other small projects and on the roombox to honor my Grandma.

I wish you to have a great weekend!

CONVERSATION WITH GOD: Floor

I worked with the floor today. The floor in my grandma's real bedroom was treated with brown paint. Those who live in Russia know what I am talking about. It took me for a while to decide what I wanted to do with the floor in the room box.

My grandma loved to keep the whole house in order and clean. You probably won't believe, but she moped the floor each day, and I thought: in order to give the atmosphere of how clean it is in the bedroom, I will "wash" the floor.

Of course, I didn't wash it with water, I used Lemon oil.

The floor is completed and Nataly is picking to the family generation's history through the window:

CONVERSATION WITH GOD: Windows' Installation

Next step: I painted the walls and the ceiling white.

I've had 2 big windows

and I painted them blue, because this is how I remember them. I also remember that blue was my grandma's favorite color.

Then, I installed the windows:

CONVERSATION WITH GOD: Walls and Ceiling were Added

It is not my intention to build the whole house, I want to reproduce my grandma's bedroom in the way I remember her. It shouldn't be difficult, because my grandma had very simple, modest setting. It was 1980 when last time I was at that house and I am trying to remember all details. I remember 2 big windows, so I cut out the pieces of the wood where I am planning to install the windows,

and I added the roof

The size of the room is 14" long (without frame) x 12" high x 11" width

NEW PROJECT: Conversation with God

I've been carrying the idea to build a roombox to honor my grandma for a long time. Didn't know what to start with till one day I saw this old looking frame on sale at Michael's. Nothing could be better for the frame for my new roombox. I didn't do anything to it, didn't sand, didn't stain, didn't paint. I like the way it looks: old, little bit rusty, at the same time comfortable and cozy, like old toys that you haven't been playing with for a long, long time.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Navajo Burntwater Rug

I am a little bit late again with my update on stitching Navajo Burntwater rug, 1:12th scale.

Haven't stitched too much, I was in the mood to work on a couple of small projects:

Thank you for looking!

WORK IN PROGRESS: Navajo Burntwater Rug, 1:12th scale

Oh, I should tell you it is soooo frustrating to deal with the the fact that one day your computer can be crashed. What is more frustrating for me is that it happens to me each year. Last Friday my computer crashed and only today after examining it my computer guy told me that there is no way to restore the saved information!!! INCLUDING ALL MY PATTERNS!!!! Another lesson for me: keep saving them om the disks! and sorry to everyone on whose e-mails and comments I haven't answered in time.

It was a reason why I didn't post an update on working on my new project yesterday. I haven't installed any programs that I used to work with the images on my new computer that is why this image is huge and not looking nice. Sorry about that. Here is where I ended up last evening:

Now I am going to take a cold shower to cool my steam down.

Have a great week!

New Project: Navajo Burntwater Rug

I wish you would feel my thrill because I am about to start stitching a new rug. It will be a reproduction of Navajo Burntwater rug, my charting. It measures 5" x 7" and will be stitched on 40 count. I again chose Gloriana over dyed silk thread for this project - just love simple down to the Earth colors and a range of beautiful overdyed shadows. I think, I will give myself 2 months to complete the project and each Sunday I will post an update on my work. Christmas is coming and I have some projects to finish for gifts and exchange.

Navajo Burntwater type of Navajo rugs belongs to so-called Modern period (post WWII) of Navajo rugs. Burntwater rugs use designs that are much like the Two Grey Hills style rugs but are woven using vegetal dyed colors or colors that imitate natural dyes. This style of rug was developed in the late 1960's encouraged by trading post operator Don Jacobs. The weavers used actual natural dyes to achieve the unique colorings of Burntwater rugs. Later, Bruce Burnham encouraged the weavers to use more colors in each rug and to use commercially dyed wool yarn.

Have a look at this WOOOW beautiful collection of contemporary Navajo rugs:

http://www.navajorug.com/html/museum-exhibitions/2001-caballeros-western-museum.htm

Have a great week!