Mapping

Friday was National Quilting Day and no, I didn't.  I painted the hallway instead. And I'm trying to catch up on my reading since PH and I are staying up very late to watch episode after episode of Midsomer Murders  so my late night reading time is suffering.

 But I am tinkering with my map.  It's off the cuff making it up as I go along little snippets and bitsy bits of fabric around a street map of Lowell.

The original map was drawn by a local artist in 1952.  I traced it and put in the streets names but have since been told some street names have changed so I kept the old and put a  /  between the old and new. 

I embroidered the streets and wrote the names in permanent marker, the rivers and islands are represented and the showboat is, too.

 The trees are lollipops because I'm not crazy.  That's an apple in this tree representing the orchards around the area. The churches will get embroidered crosses on the doors.

 After I get the houses and trees in place I'll add touches of this and that, flowers, embroidery, maybe a window box here and there.  The trees in the four corners represent the four seasons.  This one is spring.

 Everything is done by hand.  Needle turn, eyeballing and funky colors.  Some of the bits are really bitsy but I'm not a fuser so everything is needle turned. Some of the houses look like they belong to garden gnomes but honestly, if you're going to look that closely then you're missing the point.  I'm just having fun.