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The following is
the excerpt concerning my entry in the StitchWorld Red Cross
Auction as taken from |
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Stitching is a bit of a family legacy for Audrey Fitzsimmons. "My grandma stitched, my mother stitched, my sister stitches, and I stitch, " she happily explains. She began at the tender age of 6, when her mother provided her with her first set of hooks and taught her to crochet. Years later, after Audrey learned to cross stitch in college, she was able to return the favor. "It was great getting to teach my mother something," she comments. Now Audrey is starting to introduce stitching to her two little boys. "They're only 5 and 6 so we haven't done too much yet, but I definitely will teach them to stitch," she says. After earning a degree in toxicology and working as a paralegal for 12 years, this diverse talent says, "being a mommy is my favorite job." Next is needlework design, though Audrey readily admits she is just getting started. "In addition to stitching, I'm kind of a computer nerd," she says. "About 3 1/2 years ago, I bought PatternMaker by HobbyWare. I was always changing the colors and small parts of designs anyway, and I thought having this computer program would make it easier to make the changes. I also like doing tropical things, and it's kind of hard to find them in the marketplace, so I started designing my own." |
Although Audrey dreamed of marketing her designs, other responsibilities monopolized her time. "Between taking care of my sons and working a part time job, I just wasn't getting very far with it." Her husband Kenneth came to the rescue. "He's the one who talked me into quitting my job to launch my business," she says. "He just said, 'Look, you've been talking about this for a while and it's something you really love. You might as well just try to do it." And "do it" she has. To date, Audrey has about 20 original designs and 10 licensed ones in progress. "I found my licensed artists on the web," she explains, " and I just contacted them and said I wanted to license their work for cross stitch. At last count, I had 15 that have said yes." Her licensed pieces
include juvenile designs, mountain landscapes, and tropical
scenery. "I've loved tropical things ever since I
vacationed in Hawaii years ago," she comments. "I'm an
emotional person when it comes to art -- I like anything that
reflects a happy place and makes me feel peaceful, and tropical
images do that for me." Since she says she's "only creative
geometrically," she licenses these designs; but the stained glass
pieces she creates are her own. |
"I really like stained
glass, but I don't have the time or the workspace -- especially
with young children around -- to do art with real stained glass,"
she explains, "so instead, I do cross stitch versions of it." When she told her husband about StitchWorld's Red Cross Auction, he suggested she design a stained glass piece for it. "Liberty's Torch" was the result. "I wanted it to be a simple design that would have a sort of timeless look," she says. She created the vivid, stained glass look with DMC variegated floss. "It's fun to work with these threads in the stained glass designs and see how they change colors," she comments. They can, of course, create a challenge, especially for a perfectionist like Audrey. "I had to do a lot of ripping on 'Liberty's Torch,'" she says. "It took me about 2 to 2 1/2 months to finish it, because I wanted the colors to lay just right to get the affect I was going for." Many who bid on this stunning piece during the auction would agree that her perseverance was worth it. Audrey sells her
original and licensed cross stitch designs -- including
"Liberty's Torch" -- via her website,
www.artful-impressions.com.
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This excerpt was
reprinted with permission from Stitcher's World.
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