May Day Grazing

I hung my stitched sheep on the wall of my studio, pulled the stool from my desk to the middle of the floor, sat down and looked.

I knew I wanted to stitch the words MayDay Grazing on the wallhanging, but didn’t know where.  In my mind I pictured it on the top of the piece and on the bottom. To the left or right or the words small and repeated circling the whole piece.

Every time I  mentally placed the words on my stitched drawing, the fell to the bottom left.

“At some point you have to stop thinking about it and do it,” I said out loud.

I knew the words had to be in red, the letter “M” is always red especially in the month May.  Just to be sure, again in my mind, I tried them out in different colors, but they kept coming back to red.

The  capital “A” in the word “Day” is a snug fit  between the slant of the “D” and “y”.   And the lower case “grazing” is as easy going as animals eating spring grass.

The back of the old quilt that I stitched the sheep and donkeys on is worn.  I didn’t have to tea stain it to get that mottled look, it came with the the years. And I didn’t think about the small rips with the quilt batting poking through until I once again sat on the stool in the middle of my studio and looked.

I mended one at the bottom, I love those old repairs I find in the quits and linens people send me.  I know they were most used and valued.

The rip near the top of the piece when stitched open was the shape of a cattail flower.  The ones the red winged  blackbirds perch on this time of year.

I sewed the edges and pulled out the batting revealing the red fabric from the front of the quilt.  Then I stitched a blackbird on the long stem.

Next I put a border around the whole piece and backed it.  The last thing I did was tie a few yellow knots to hold the whole thing together.

May Day Grazing may be sold.  If not, I will put it up for sale tomorrow.