Embroidered robin. In a hat.

This is a robin. Wearing a hat. Of course.

Last week I drew some silly pictures of birds wearing hats, and then spent ages deciding what I could do with them. Ages ago I bought a whole bunch of organic cotton tote bags, with the idea of embroidering designs on them. So, I embroidered the robin onto the tote bag. It looked like this.

I wasn’t very happy with the poor naked robin, so I decided to colour in his breast with a bright red fabric pen. Disaster! The pen came out pink, and no amount of layering would make it any brighter. Not good. Even adding his little embroidered top hat didn’t help.

So, in a fit of madness, I decided to cover up the fabric paint with embroidery. Lots and lots of satin stitch, done in a slightly irregular way, to look a bit like feathers. It took two evenings to finish, and I was completely cross-eyed by the end of it – but I really like it!