I guess I’m making up for an absence of work as this will be a trilogy of posts on  my new little mini-collection. Plus I just discoved the slideshow function on WordPress so you can see all the stages of work without so much space! But really I just wanted to try it out…

I had intended to do some more toadstools for ages but something always seemed to put me off when I actually sat down to do them. Maybe it’s the fiddlyness of Stumpwork. Yea probably that. Hadn’t done a bullion knot for a while and they make me cry sometimes. Now that I am working on the new collection using the new custom birch wood fittings, I had more motivation for doing several designs at once. Plus I ran a poll on my facebook page and out of toadstools and skulls, toadstools won. So there you have it. I consulted my old field guide and off we went.

This first one was the same classic shape and pattern as the first Fly Agaric I have in my shop but I wanted to do it in a different colour. We will call this one Tricholoma aurantium, as it is often seen in Fairy Rings. It looks rather tricksy in my opinion.

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Snazzy.

So I constructed it in basically the same way as the original in my shop – added french knots to the purple wool-viscose felt cap, then a simple satin stitch stalk, chain stitch frill and bullion knot fins. The cap isn’t padded, so technically it’s just aplique, but I just stitched it down so than the finished effect was 3-dimensional. Finally green french knots provide the forest floor. The bullion knots are still little bitches.

Next: I will show you the Devil’s Bolete.