Hi Everyone,

The punching of the Gaubles is very straight forward. We chose to use the fine point needle on this project to allow for more intricate patterns, especially with the Padula pattern. The Leaf and Star are very simple patterns that can easily be jazzed up however you may wish, whether it be by color placement, stitches (bead stitch would be super fun to throw into this project) or other design alterations. 

With fine point punch needles it is important to remember your stitch spacing. Every hole, every other row. This gives the loops enough room to bloom, as well as being packed in correctly so that you wont have exposed monk's cloth. 

Stitch Gauges always come in handy, especially with fine point needles. If you have one of our newer stitch gauges, you will notice that one side is geared towards regular point Oxford Punch Needles and the opposite side is for the fine point Oxford Punch Needles. If you ever are doubting your stitch placement or wondering if you are punching too tightly (you will notice this because it will be harder to punch as the stitches will be taking up too much room. Overpacking also causes your loops to look uneven and will give it a domed sculpted look, instead of the evenly packed loops which will lay at one height and bloom up nicely.) or too loosely (this will cause you to see patches of monk's cloth showing through your work making it look unfinished). Stitch gauges are great tools to help combat both of these problems. Pull it out and check your stitches from time to time, you will thank yourself as your project comes out looking perfect!

Now, as I have said you can get as imaginative as you want with this project. The Padula pattern has some great motifs you can play off of with the petals and different design elements that Cotey has already drawn in. The Leaf and Star are really great blank canvases. As you can see in the picture at the top, Heidi punched the different leaves, using each of the 5 colors as the main leaf color once. Then she used the others as the vein or in the whip stitching. While it may seem simple, it looks really elegant and fun. 

When I punched the stars I wanted to use the colors as many times as I could. I wanted to balance the lights and darks within each star but give them a fun whimsical look. Punching in stripes was a great way to do this. You can see in some I used one row of each color, or I punched multiple rows. Other stars only had 3 of the colors, while others had every color. I found it fun to do this, especially with the non-traditional star shapes. It gave me an amazing opportunity to play around with things! 

How do you plan to punch yours? Are you going to go crazy and experiment or keep it more simple and understated? I can't wait to see

Next week we will talk about whip stitching the crazy edges. This is our teachable moment!

Until then, happy punching!

~Hannah